Before Balatro took over the world, the roguelike's creator considered naming it Fool's Gambit - "obviously not a great name," but it had a killer main menu

Oct. 25, 2024

You could rearrange the letters for fun

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Prior to Balatro marking its place among some of thebest roguelikesaround, solo developer LocalThunk considered calling the game something else - and giving it an interactive menu in which players could rearrange the title’s letters to spell “random crap.”

Balatro is a clever name for a poker-inspired deck builder with unique Joker cards - after all, it translates directly to “clown” or “jester” in Latin. In ancient Rome, a balatro was essentially a professional buffoon paid to jest. Balatro wasn’t, however, always the title that LocalThunk had in mind for the smash-hit roguelike game - in fact, it actually turns out that one of the original “candidate titles” for Balatro was Fool’s Gambit.

Speaking in a recentpostwith a clip featuring Balatro’s old main menu, LocalThunk reveals as much. “One of the candidate titles/main menu designs before I chose ‘Balatro,'” the dev writes. “Fool’s Gambit was obviously not a great name but dragging the letters around to spell random crap was incredibly satisfying.” It looks incredibly satisfying indeed - a throwback to the fun, interactive menus many games used to include.

I’m honestly obsessed with the old menu, especially after considering how LocalThunk never knew how big Balatro would become while cooking up the final product. As the dev admits in a follow-uppostto the clip of what was once Fool’s Gambit, “I was expecting like 4 of my friends and my parents to buy the game and that would have been awesome.” According to LocalThunk, “the entire past year has been a series of crazy events.”

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After spending years with her head in various fantastical realms’ clouds, Anna studied English Literature and then Medieval History at the University of Edinburgh, going on to specialize in narrative design and video game journalism as a writer. She has written for various publications since her postgraduate studies, including Dexerto, Fanbyte, GameSpot, IGN, PCGamesN, and more. When she’s not frantically trying to form words into coherent sentences, she’s probably daydreaming about becoming a fairy druid and befriending every animal or she’s spending a thousand (more) hours traversing the Underdark in Baldur’s Gate 3. If you spot her away from her PC, you’ll always find Anna with a fantasy book, a handheld video game console of some sort, and a Tamagotchi or two on hand.

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