Why are so many in the Balatro community against changing the game for the better?

[Jakkson K]

A lot of threads here are people arguing that Gold Stake lacks agency and then people telling them that its poker it should lack agency.
(which is a bad argument, but ok)

Look, this game will be played years into the future by the roguelike community that enjoy hard difficulty, if the difficulty is fun. So the roguelike community has been voicing their opinion on how to make the game better. (It just released, and no just-released game is anywhere near perfect) And we are getting backlash saying "The game is fine as it is"

And while yes it is fine, we hope it is better. It is more frustrating if an otherwise good game has a bad part than if a game is all around bad.

And what are you defending here? Lame and boring stat tweaks that make the game "more punishing" and harder to start?
It is the equivalent of FPS games that just multiply enemy health and damage with the difficulty rather than having unique mechanics, smarter AI, or less resources.
It is bad difficulty, where it narrows the playing field rather than forcing the players to expand their strategies.

To take from other roguelikes, first difficulty increase of Monster Train mostly just gives you 3 random cards added to your deck at the beginning. This is genius as it pushes you to build builds you have never done before.
Most deckbuilding roguelikes like StS, Monster Train, Luck be a Landlord, etc. start you deck with unplayable Dud or Wound at some point along the difficulty slider. These are interesting as making a larger deck means you get less dead cards in hand and smaller more consistent decks can run into the problem of drawing these useless cards. It flips some deckbuilding principles on their head.

This is interesting. Right now only Red Stake and Black Stake give interesting challenges.

People are constantly asking on these other deckbuilding roguelikes "What can I play next that is similar?" and I would love to suggest Balatro... if it had a better difficulty system.

[ZeppMan217]

You see the same people argue against any positive changes in every thread because they wasted countless hours hitting the R button until they got the perfect RNG, and so they want everyone to suffer like they did. After all, that's all they got going in their meaningless lives.

[Jakkson K]

Origineel geplaatst door Ronald Brain:

To all the people claiming this is a big issue, I have a suggestion. Go change all of your review to Negative and cry "THIS GAME IS TOO HARD". Maybe LocalThunk will add a "Easy Mode" DLC if overall review falls off the cliff.

If you actually read any of my points in any of the 3 threads, you would know that I want a hard mode. A good, well designed hard mode and makes me think critically about the situation and use game mechanics to overcome RNG rather than having the RNG crush me to smithereens.

Even you said the game is stacked against you, and there is a feeling of accomplishment when you win something that feels like the odds are stacked against you through skill. Not just hoping that the game lets up and gives you a good run.

[Jakkson K]

Origineel geplaatst door malogoss:

What is it, 97% of players who bothered giving the game a review like it? We don't even get 2 "what a fantastic game" for 1 "game is bad" in the posts here. Complainers are generally loud, others generally just enjoy the game and you never hear them. Generally.

Can you guys stop bringing statistics that don't prove anything and aren't actually negating our arguments.
While 97% of people (including me) would give this game a positive review, 98% of players have never won a run on Gold Stake difficulty. Therefore, Gold Stake being bad wouldn't even be on most player's minds when reviewing.

I am a pretty patient guy when it comes to roguelikes. I have played tens of hours in roguelikes while making literally zero progress. But at least I felt like I was still learning or at least I could point to things I did wrong or could've done better.

[Winter Wolf]

The way I see it is... A good game is one many players love despite its flaws.

A great game is one that improves itself on the regular over a long period of time. That said, some changes are greater than others.

Three cases in point:

- Terraria (a side scrolling rpg-elemented platforming exploration and building survival game with a strong lovecraftian subtheme) Been going strong for 13+ years and many crossovers with other games because the devs are constantly thinking of new ways to build the game better and the players are heavily into modding the game so the two sort of ping off of each other and the game has gone on this way for a long time. It might NEVER stop updating! (I highly recommend it for those who like the genres mentioned above.)

- Tales of Maj' Eyal (formerly known as Tales of Middle Earth, a spin off of a spin off of several spin offs of Angband, one of the older roguelikes out there.) Tales has been its own original game complete with several full game campaigns (heavily RPG with strong Tactical Roguelike play -- Losing a lot is expected). This game is essentially a one man thing that he's been developing more or less nonstop for 15+ years. More if you count the time before it was a fully original experience. Lately his updates have slowed way down (thanks in part due to covid, etc I imagine) but it's still a living growing game.

- Stellaris (a 4x by Paradox, not exactly known for being 4x makers being formerly fully entrenched in the Grand Strategy genre.) It has since become synonymous with the modern 4x in Space experience. I don't love the changes to the game since 2,0 but I respect the growth of the game over time. The DLC model is kind of a turn off and it is exactly this that tends to make the game less interesting for me but I think many many fans of the game love it. Another mod heavy one btw. Some have reported using hundreds of mods on it.

I think all these count as great games and yet at some point they were merely good games. All these games suffered through problems both QoL and Bug related and all also have rabid, active fans contributing ideas and mods and in some cases help with the game development itself.

I think Balatro is a good game that could become a great game. Changes to it will displease some of its fanbase and some QOL changes may never happen despite widespread popularity of the ideas. We should not be against hearing ideas as long as we are also not against criticizing those ideas. Mods would probably help this conversation along since the official game will not please everyone even if the dev listens to his fans.

Let's steer clear of the acrimony and usual internet farce stuff and concentrate on talking about what we like about the game, would like to see improved (the stakes? sure I can see arguments for it) and what we don't want to change because we like those things just the way they are.

[BeautifulFlowerField]

why don't you just not play the game on gold stake then

[Ronald Brain]

Origineel geplaatst door Jakkson K:

If you actually read any of my points in any of the 3 threads, you would know that I want a hard mode. A good, well designed hard mode and makes me think critically about the situation and use game mechanics to overcome RNG rather than having the RNG crush me to smithereens.

Even you said the game is stacked against you, and there is a feeling of accomplishment when you win something that feels like the odds are stacked against you through skill. Not just hoping that the game lets up and gives you a good run.

And I'll repeat again, this game has a hard mode, visioned by the dev and apparently playtested in the past year to fine tune. Of course it isn't flawless, but it is the way it's set up. You guys are asking for a different game altogether, at which point all I can say is "install some mods and enjoy your hard mode, leave the dev alone".

I want to win Gold stake despite its odds stacked against me, but at the same time I do NOT want to win it just because I unlocked some NG+ buff that allows me to bulldoze through 7 out of 10 run and only lost because of a tough boss that countered my build, that isn't fun. This game has always been about "you get your starting deck and what the shop offer you, see how far you can go", and people are trying to change it because they don't like it. That's what I, and most other people playing Balatro for what it is, have issue with.

[AN]

Origineel geplaatst door Amplify:

Your side is in the minority, there are far more people calling for change than not.

You got it wrong. There's your side, the tiny loud minority, and then there's the vast, silent majority that doesn't give a ♥♥♥♥ about anything you're saying.

[Amplify]

Origineel geplaatst door Ronald Brain:

Origineel geplaatst door goobie snoobert:

this might be shocking but the world doesn't revolve around you

Same goes to you.

To all the people claiming this is a big issue, I have a suggestion. Go change all of your review to Negative and cry "THIS GAME IS TOO HARD". Maybe LocalThunk will add a "Easy Mode" DLC if overall review falls off the cliff.

I'm not going to repeat all of my arguments here (much like Goblin). My take is simply "This is what Balatro is, deal with it or leave." Well before the demo was out, I watched countless videos and decide this is something I'd enjoy, and I enjoy it for what it is - a deckbuilding "rougelike" video poker game, where the odds are against me and I make do with what RNG gives me. This isn't RE4 or any AAA games with NG+ that allows you to unlock super OPed ability to bulldoze a new run - You're given the starting deck with some benefits and that's about it.

The isn't "too hard" and if you think that's why there's so many complaints then you continue to be illiterate. The game is unfair and does not give the player the bare minimum needed amount of agency, that's the problem. "Hard" is when there is a solution to the problem but it requires sufficient amounts of personal skill to overcome, "unfair" is when skill is not the main thing required and luck is instead.

[Amplify]

Origineel geplaatst door BeautifulFlowerField:

why don't you just not play the game on gold stake then

Why don't you just not play the game then?

Origineel geplaatst door AN:

Origineel geplaatst door Amplify:

Your side is in the minority, there are far more people calling for change than not.

You got it wrong. There's your side, the tiny loud minority, and then there's the vast, silent majority that doesn't give a ♥♥♥♥ about anything you're saying.

Source: "It came to me in a dream".

[Goblin]

Origineel geplaatst door Amplify:

Origineel geplaatst door BeautifulFlowerField:

why don't you just not play the game on gold stake then

Why don't you just not play the game then?

Because he's not the one who has an issue with the game? Jesus, you're really scraping the bottom of the barrel on your remaining number of braincells by now, aren't you?

[Amplify]

To people who want to play the game with luck instead of skill:
There's absolutely nothing stopping you from doing that forever, even if changes / additions were made to the game that allowed people to make skilful plays and informed + intelligent choices. You wouldn't be forced to use any of it, you could just play the game the exact same way you do now, so why be against it?

[Jakkson K]

Origineel geplaatst door Goblin:

Origineel geplaatst door Amplify:

Why don't you just not play the game then?

Because he's not the one who has an issue with the game? Jesus, you're really scraping the bottom of the barrel on your remaining number of braincells by now, aren't you?

Ok, that was clearly a rhetorical question. Saying "Don't play Gold" is like saying don't play the game.

[Goblin]

Origineel geplaatst door Jakkson K:

Origineel geplaatst door Goblin:

Because he's not the one who has an issue with the game? Jesus, you're really scraping the bottom of the barrel on your remaining number of braincells by now, aren't you?

Ok, that was clearly a rhetorical question. Saying "Don't play Gold" is like saying don't play the game.

That's not how logic works. No, it's saying "play the game on a difficulty setting you enjoy" and nothing more.
I've played Cave Story on hard mode (essentially 1 hit death for 99% of enemies and projectiles, and it gets bullet hell tier) and most people hate even the idea of that. Should it be changed to let you gain HP like normal and just do double damage because "if some people can't play hard mode without hating it, you may as well not play the game"? How does that even make sense?

[Jakkson K]

Origineel geplaatst door Goblin:

I've played Cave Story on hard mode (essentially 1 hit death for 99% of enemies and projectiles, and it gets bullet hell tier) and most people hate even the idea of that. Should it be changed to let you gain HP like normal and just do double damage because "if some people can't play hard mode without hating it, you may as well not play the game"? How does that even make sense?

I am not asking for easy mode. In fact you don't even have to go very far to find things I am asking for https://steamcommunity.com/app/2379780/discussions/0/4308327178399280225/

I have come up with my own creative ways to do difficulty that will still be difficult.

[Amplify]

Origineel geplaatst door Jakkson K:

Origineel geplaatst door Goblin:

I've played Cave Story on hard mode (essentially 1 hit death for 99% of enemies and projectiles, and it gets bullet hell tier) and most people hate even the idea of that. Should it be changed to let you gain HP like normal and just do double damage because "if some people can't play hard mode without hating it, you may as well not play the game"? How does that even make sense?

I am not asking for easy mode. In fact you don't even have to go very far to find things I am asking for https://steamcommunity.com/app/2379780/discussions/0/4308327178399280225/

I have come up with my own creative ways to do difficulty that will still be difficult.

https://steamcommunity.com/app/2379780/discussions/0/4346607305583823636/

Here's my own ideas for things that could be done, as a bonus they wouldn't even change how the game functions at all and anybody who doesn't like them could completely ignore them and just keep playing the same way they're doing right now.