this post was submitted on 07 Aug 2024
267 points (97.2% liked)

Games

40037 readers
1032 users here now

Welcome to the largest gaming community on Lemmy! Discussion for all kinds of games. Video games, tabletop games, card games etc.

Rules

1. Submissions have to be related to games

Video games, tabletop, or otherwise. Posts not related to games will be deleted.

This community is focused on games, of all kinds. Any news item or discussion should be related to gaming in some way.

2. No bigotry or harassment, be civil

No bigotry, hardline stance. Try not to get too heated when entering into a discussion or debate.

We are here to talk and discuss about one of our passions, not fight or be exposed to hate. Posts or responses that are hateful will be deleted to keep the atmosphere good. If repeatedly violated, not only will the comment be deleted but a ban will be handed out as well. We judge each case individually.

3. No excessive self-promotion

Try to keep it to 10% self-promotion / 90% other stuff in your post history.

This is to prevent people from posting for the sole purpose of promoting their own website or social media account.

4. Stay on-topic; no memes, funny videos, giveaways, reposts, or low-effort posts

This community is mostly for discussion and news. Remember to search for the thing you're submitting before posting to see if it's already been posted.

We want to keep the quality of posts high. Therefore, memes, funny videos, low-effort posts and reposts are not allowed. We prohibit giveaways because we cannot be sure that the person holding the giveaway will actually do what they promise.

5. Mark Spoilers and NSFW

Make sure to mark your stuff or it may be removed.

No one wants to be spoiled. Therefore, always mark spoilers. Similarly mark NSFW, in case anyone is browsing in a public space or at work.

6. No linking to piracy

Don't share it here, there are other places to find it. Discussion of piracy is fine.

We don't want us moderators or the admins of lemmy.world to get in trouble for linking to piracy. Therefore, any link to piracy will be removed. Discussion of it is of course allowed.

Authorized Regular Threads

Related communities

PM a mod to add your own

Video games

Generic

Help and suggestions

By platform

By type

By games

Language specific

founded 2 years ago
MODERATORS
Dremor@lemmy.world
JonsJava@lemmy.world
fxomt@lemmy.dbzer0.com
Dremor@jlai.lu
modfxomt@lemmy.world
267
Balatro celebrates 2 million sales, will feature major gameplay update in 2025! (files.catbox.moe)
submitted 10 months ago by simple@lemm.ee to c/games@lemmy.world
54 comments fedilink hide all child comments
 

The dev says this is one of three big announcements. One could possibly be a release date for the mobile version, but I'm not sure what the third could be.

top 50 comments
sorted by: hot top controversial new old
[–] astrsk@kbin.run 74 points 10 months ago (4 children)

For anyone interested in game development: Balatro is made with Love2D. Which means the exe you download from steam can be unzipped using just about any zip program (might need to change the file extension from exe to zip) and the whole source code and 2D asset files are available for perusing. Not even obfuscated, full variable names and comments available to inspect as a real world example of a working game that has sold like hotcakes because the end result is good. Let it inspire you, let it teach you :)

[–] lanolinoil@lemmy.world 11 points 10 months ago

VERY COOL! I have used Love for some simple stuff before but I didn't realize balatro was built in it.

[–] mikwee@thebrainbin.org 4 points 10 months ago

Yoooooo awesome! Even source-available games are better than proprietary games.

[–] Daxtron2@startrek.website 2 points 10 months ago

Thus also applies to many games made with Unity as well. It just requires a program like ILSpy to view it all.

[–] drislands@lemmy.world 2 points 10 months ago

Oh shit, that's amazing! That could be a real learning opportunity for folks interested in starting game dev like me!

[–] wasted_in_time@lemmy.world 30 points 10 months ago (7 children)

Good for them.... Still have yet to win a run.

[–] makeshiftreaper@lemmy.world 19 points 10 months ago* (last edited 10 months ago) (2 children)

Generally some good advice is that Balatro is a math game first and foremost so you want to focus on things that raise your score the quickest. So adding chips is ok, adding multiplier is better, and multiplying your total is the best.

For example let's say you are playing straights and you have a 10-6 with level 3 straights. So you'd have:

10+9+8+7+6=40

(40+90)x10=1300

So let's compare how jokers impact that score:

Devious joker: +100 chips if you have a straight

(40+90+100)x10=2300

Crazy joker: +12 mult if you have a straight

(40+90)x(10+12)=2860

The order: x3 mult if you have a straight

(40+90)x(10x3)=3900

You can see those are very big differences! It's also helpful to pay attention to the order of your cards. Generally Balatro cards are scored left to right. The most important thing is to take any card that multiplies any part of your score on the right so you can add as much to the score as possible, then you multiply that number

So in short: multiplier jokers are best, additive multiplier jokers are good, additive chip jokers are ok, and pay attention to the order of your jokers/played cards

[–] sushibowl@feddit.nl 8 points 10 months ago

This is basically correct but i would add sometimes it's better to add chips than to add mult. For example, if your score is something like:

10 x 50 = 500

Adding +50 mult here would give you 10x100=1000 points. Adding +50 chips will give you 60x50=3000 points.

Adding to the lowest of the two numbers improves your score the most. Especially early game, mult is much lower than chips, so you want to improve mult. However once you have some good mult jokers improving chips becomes important. Especially in high card based decks, where you get very few chips from your hand.

If the multiplier jokers come in, the picture can change again. It makes adding mult more valuable because the addition will be multiplied.

[–] BluesF@lemmy.world 5 points 10 months ago

One thing to watch out for though, is that if you focus exclusively on mult, eventually the scale tips and chips become more valuable.

You're always ultimately doing c * m, chips times mult, right? Increasing c by 1 increases your total by...

(c+1)*m - (c*m) = (c + 1 - c) * m = m

And vice versa for increasing m by 1. So, whichever is higher - your total mult or total chips - you should increase the other one. Usually this means increase mult, but building a bit multiplier can quickly make it outpace your chips for some hands.

[–] Skullgrid@lemmy.world 6 points 10 months ago (1 children)
[–] Cris16228@lemmy.today 1 points 10 months ago (2 children)

Thanks for this! Saving and checking them but.. I'm more a "Look at me playing a game and tell me what I did wrong at the end" kind of player

[–] Prunebutt@slrpnk.net 1 points 10 months ago (7 children)

Maybe experiment a bit more. That way, you can deduce yousrelf what works and what doesn't.

load more comments (7 replies)
[–] calabast@lemm.ee 1 points 10 months ago (1 children)

I was going to say "ahh, too bad the Internet isn't really helpful for that method of learning", but with AI who knows, maybe that'll be something your computer can do before too long

[–] Cris16228@lemmy.today 2 points 10 months ago (2 children)

I don't really understand your comment - sorry! - but I've played some games with the plasma deck and I still have to understand how to play exactly with it, I do good-ish at first but after a few rounds/first boss I do so little numbers and I can't win, having someone watching what I do wrong and telling me would be great

[–] makeshiftreaper@lemmy.world 2 points 10 months ago (1 children)

For plasma specifically I'd focus on high additive chip jokers. While that's normally bad advice, consider how crazy good a card with +50 mult on it would be. Now consider that a +100 chip joker is effectively a +50 chip/+50 mult (I know that's not technically true but I'm illustrating a point). Also eventually you do hit a point of diminishing returns because plasma prevents you from having a super high multiplier or chips, so like every build, total score multipliers are the best

[–] Cris16228@lemmy.today 2 points 10 months ago* (last edited 10 months ago) (1 children)

The one who played it before me said it was best to get the X multi jokers so I always ignored the + multi ones and even the X multi final score.. I tried but I don't exactly know which ones do that. I should try with what you said and see if it works, thanks! Which poker hand is better with it?

[–] makeshiftreaper@lemmy.world 5 points 10 months ago (1 children)

It's hard to offer strong heuristics for Balatro because you could theoretically build up to a point where you've got a crazy high multiplier but if your chips are low it doesn't matter.

For example let's say you've got a face card 4 of a kind build going with: Pareidolia, Zany, Smiley, Trio, and Family jokers. These give you (respectively) all cards are face cards, +12 mult for 3 of a kind, +20 mult for each hand (all cards are face cards), x3 mult, x4 mult for a total of 384 multiplier! On base 4 of a kind this is

60x([7+12+20]x3x4)=28,080

However if you were to drop smiley face (+5 mult per face) for scary face (+30 chips per face card) which by almost every heuristic is a bad decision your score becomes:

(60+120)x([7+12]x3x4)=41,040

Which is a way bigger score!

So while people can offer general advice like stack high chips on plasma, always go for total score multipliers, etc. sometimes you just have to evaluate your specific build and figure out the best play

Finally outside of decks like abandoned and checkered which are specifically made to get certain hands, there isn't a "best" hand to go for. The highest possible scores I've seen all come from high card builds but most normal players won't get those. I've won two of a kind runs, flush 5 runs, straight runs, flush runs. You just have to evaluate your deck and tarot cards to see your options

[–] Cris16228@lemmy.today 2 points 10 months ago

This is interesting to know since I would love to win at least one game with plasma since people said it the funniest deck but for some reasons I can't get past ante 2/3. I'm going to try to play a game or 2 trying to buy chip jokers and tarots hoping for the best, I do really need to understand better jokers and synergies between them

[–] ABCDE@lemmy.world 1 points 10 months ago

I could have a go at that.

[–] Cris16228@lemmy.today 3 points 10 months ago (1 children)

How many hours in? Just curious, I'm bad at it but I got my first win ~16 hours in, are you doing something wrong?

[–] wasted_in_time@lemmy.world 1 points 9 months ago

22.9 hours in...I've gotten close, but no cigar.

[–] RincewindThreepwood@lemmy.world 2 points 10 months ago (1 children)

lol. I feel you! My max Ante was 7. Everything after that seems impossible :D

[–] ivanafterall@lemmy.world 5 points 10 months ago (1 children)

The most-satisfying part is when you stumble onto the right Joker combination and realize, "Oh snap, I think this is the one."

[–] makeshiftreaper@lemmy.world 2 points 10 months ago (1 children)

Conversely the worst is when that happens and a bad boss blind screws your run

[–] RincewindThreepwood@lemmy.world 2 points 10 months ago

The worst one I think is the one where you can only play one hand. I hate that one, because in most cases it’s game over for me 😆

[–] GissaMittJobb@lemmy.ml 1 points 10 months ago

Balatro University has some good guides if you're looking to improve.

[–] Bluewall@lemmy.world 1 points 10 months ago

How long have you been trying.

load more comments (1 replies)
[–] SleepyWheel@sh.itjust.works 20 points 10 months ago

I've been playing it on mobile for months

https://github.com/blake502/balatro-mobile-maker

[–] wurstgulasch3000@lemmy.world 12 points 10 months ago (1 children)

Most people who liked balatro will probably also find dungeons & degenerate gamblers interesting which is coming out tomorrow. It's a similar take on blackjack but with a few other ideas mixed in. I've played the demo and I'm looking forward to the full version

[–] echodot@feddit.uk 8 points 10 months ago

So is this a new emerging genre? Poker Like?

[–] pastabatman@lemmy.world 7 points 10 months ago (1 children)

I'm super excited for the mobile version but also worried about my future productivity

[–] lobut@lemmy.ca 5 points 10 months ago (1 children)

There's a converter on GitHub for it.

It works surprisingly well. I wanted to wait for the official but I have a flight coming up and this is gonna make it awesome.

I can't wait to buy the mobile version and recommend it to all of my friends!

[–] ABCDE@lemmy.world 2 points 10 months ago

Would be nice to convert my Steam progress.

[–] RizzRustbolt@lemmy.world 5 points 10 months ago (1 children)

#3: Everybody gets laid!

[–] altasshet@lemmy.ca 3 points 10 months ago (1 children)

Laid off probably...

[–] ivanafterall@lemmy.world 5 points 10 months ago

Because they discovered Balatro.

[–] Zoldyck@lemmy.world 4 points 10 months ago (3 children)

Played it for some hours, but I don't get the hype tbh. Maybe I'm missing something

[–] Tagger@lemmy.world 9 points 10 months ago

Hey, maybe it's just not for you. that's okay.

[–] Ageroth@reddthat.com 5 points 10 months ago

It's really just poker solitaire with a bunch of math added to flavorful bonus cards, if you're not really into poker, solitaire, or math it isn't going to be the right game for you.

I have a buddy that hates RNG, mostly plays shooter games, he hates poker in all its forms because of the randomness but I feel like learning to deal with probably and chance are really good lessons that apply to broader life.

[–] Speculater@lemmy.world 2 points 10 months ago

I think the fun is that every run is unique and trying out new combos and finding one that works is very rewarding.

[–] Gerudo@lemm.ee 4 points 10 months ago

I recently got this game, and wow, what a time sucker. FINALLY won my first run yesterday. I've played a fair share of rogue likes, but this one really does feel fresh every game.

[–] Tagger@lemmy.world 1 points 10 months ago (1 children)

Coming to Xbox with day one game pass? 🤞🤞🤞

[–] ABCDE@lemmy.world 5 points 10 months ago (1 children)

It's cheap.

[–] Tagger@lemmy.world 3 points 10 months ago* (last edited 10 months ago) (1 children)

Is it on Xbox?

ETA: oh cool, it is! Still, probably going to wait for it to hit game pass - there's more games on there that I want to play then time to play them, but if balatro gets on there I think it will move to the top of the list.

[–] ABCDE@lemmy.world 2 points 10 months ago* (last edited 10 months ago) (1 children)

It's on almost everything; I got it on Steam, works on my Deck and Mac perfectly. It's really not demanding at all, and will be on mobile platforms soon.

I would be surprised if it went on Game Pass.

[–] Tagger@lemmy.world 1 points 10 months ago

Fair enough. Thanks for responding

load more comments
view more: next ›