Best game of the year, but I’m warning you. Don’t download the game Balatro on your iPhone

Do you remember that there is such a subscription – Apple Arcade? More than 200 games, all without advertising and internal purchases. Sounds great. For some reason, it will actually be useful to her.

But in September, for the first time in my memory, Apple did the impossible with this service. A game has appeared in the arcades that is unique it’s worth subscribing. Someone else still has a trial one, by the way.

It’s time to subscribe. Activate the trial for a month. And first thing download Balatro+. I can’t install other games. You won’t have time for them. You won’t have time for anything.

There will be a game in Balatro until 5 am every dayin every pause and every free moment, like me and millions of others.

What is Balatro

Balatro is a mixture of poker and solitaire. “Buffs”, card upgrades and other special abilities were added to it. All this drops out randomly between rounds in the store, where the money received after each win is spent.

The goal of the game is to earn more points with card combinations than the bet requires. The bet increases with each round. Bosses with our worries about distribution or scoring appear randomly.

It sounds simple, because in general it is so. You hope for luck and try to take advantage of the abilities and cards you’ve been dealt.

so whatwhat do you say? It looks like a completely ordinary game.

Balatro, what are you anyway, let me go

According to 9 out of 10 game critics and publications, Balatro’s “regular card game” is most likely best indie game of 2024. Just look at these ratings:

▪ OpenCritic: 91/100
▪ Metacritic: 94/100.
▪ IGN: 9/10
▪ GameInformer: 9.5/10
▪ PCGamer: 91/100
▪ GameSpot: 9/10
▪ App Store rating: 5.0.

To glean the gist from the hundreds of reviews, the reason for Balatro’s success is that, as far as we know, it’s a highly addictive combination of (sorry) ease of learning, multi-layered mechanics, and the randomness of each game.

The game is actually not easy. You will lose much more often than you will win. But we will start again with redoubled determination. That this time you will be 100% and definitely lucky, and your strategy will survive the game with the “last” boss.

There is a meme like this, it’s about those who installed Balatro:

I never regret putting the game on my iPhone and all my Macs. My only regret is my free time, which suddenly disappeared. Fifteen to twenty minutes is the same as one whole pass. Or five, if you’re really unlucky. There are so many blocks to go through, so many jokers to unlock, so many strategies to try. And I haven’t even started the quest mode yet.

Balatro is an absolute phenomenon on the level of Vampire Survivors, the indie hit from last year. Only in the last game it is more difficult for an unprepared person. But you can give Balatro even to your grandfather, who has only ever seen cards in games. He will thank you later! But his garden is not.

The game was released at the beginning of the year for PC and consoles. Now it is available on iPhone and Android for 900 rubles.

But Apple Arcade subscribers can play these cards for free, because a separate version of Balatro+ has been made for them. No different from the others.

My iPhone now runs two applications: Telegram, Balatro.

In short. Do you have a long flight? Nothing to do? Need a distraction? Tired of having free time?

There is a simple answer to all this: put Balatro. But I warned you – you’ll get completely hooked.