After selling 1 million copies, Balatro creator admits it’s “held together with hopes and dreams” as game devs rally around the roguelike’s beautifully nightmarish code

With 1 million copies sold, Balatro has cemented itself as the roguelike hit of 2024 – despite the fact that its underlying code is apparently “held together with hopes and dreams.” After some examples of the game’s beautifully nightmarish code hit the internet, game devs are rallying to say, basically, if it ain’t broke don’t fix it.

The original tweet that spawned all this discourse has since been deleted – probably smart – but the gist is that Balatro has bespoke code for many objects where modern programming standards would typically suggest that you build some universal ways of handling those objects. That is a gross oversimplification, and this breakdown from game developer Sean Barrett will give you a much smarter overview of what’s happening here, but that’s the gist.