Local Thunk Avoided Roguelikes in Balatro Development, Except Slay the Spire

Local Thunk, the developer behind the popular game Balatro, recently shared a detailed account of the game's development journey on his personal blog. In an intriguing revelation, Local Thunk disclosed that he deliberately avoided playing roguelike games during Balatro's development, with one notable exception.

Starting in December 2021, Local Thunk made a conscious decision to steer clear of roguelike games. He emphasized that this choice was not about creating a superior game but rather about preserving the joy of exploring game design as a hobby. He wanted the freedom to make mistakes and innovate without the influence of established designs, even though this approach might have led to a less refined game. However, a year and a half later, he broke this rule once by playing Slay the Spire, which he found exceptionally compelling, especially in terms of its controller implementation for card games.

Throughout the development process, Local Thunk shared several interesting tidbits. Initially, the project was simply called "CardGame" in the working folder, and the game was known internally as "Joker Poker" for a significant portion of its development. He also discussed various scrapped features, such as a system where players could only upgrade cards in a pseudo-shop, a separate currency for rerolls, and a 'golden seal' mechanic for playing cards.

One amusing anecdote from the blog details how Balatro ended up with 150 Jokers. This was the result of a miscommunication with the publisher, Playstack, where an initial mention of 120 Jokers was mistakenly heard as 150. Local Thunk decided to go with the higher number, adding 30 more Jokers to the game.

Lastly, Local Thunk explained the origin of his developer name. It stemmed from a humorous exchange with his partner, who was learning to code in R and playfully suggested naming variables "thunk." Combined with the Lua programming language's use of the "local" keyword, "local thunk" was born, eventually becoming his online developer handle.

For more insights into the making of Balatro, readers can visit Local Thunk's blog. IGN has praised Balatro, giving it a 9/10 and describing it as a deck-builder that captivates players to the point of losing entire weekends to its addictive gameplay.