So, it turns out that I’ve been pronouncing Balatro wrong all this time, and now feel like a total spade. I really don’t know how to deal with this revelation, it’s left me rather flush-ed.
I have been saying B-LAH-tro, but that’s not exactly how the deckbuilder’s anonymous developer pronounces it. According to Naman Budhwar – that is to say, the head of video marketing at Balatro publisher Playstack – LocalThunk puts the emphasis on the ‘Bah’ in Balatro.
Speaking with GameFile’s Stephen Totilo, Budhwar said LocalThunk pronounces the name of his roguelike deckbuilder thus: “BAH-luh-trow.”
So, my almost throw away effort on the B is not what its maker calls the game. Whoops!
Not that it sounds like LocalThunk will really mind my poor pronunciation, though. Budhwar said it was kind of like “a ‘gif/jif’ situation”, and people can just say Balatro the way that feels right for them (for the record, I say gif with a hard G).
“He doesn’t really mind how people say it,” Budhwar said of LocalThunk, to which Totilo jokingly asked if pronouncing it “BAY-la-tro” would still fly.
“Sure, you can say BAY-la-tro, yeah,” Budhwar replied, but I am not sure that will ever stick. To paraphrase Regina George, stop trying to make BAY-la-tro happen.
I am curious, what do you call it?
Earlier this month, Balatro’s LocalThunk shared his thoughts on the AI art debate, stating “I think it does real harm to artists of all kinds”. Many believed both LocalThunk and Playstack supported AI art.
Also this year, the Balatro developer successfully appealed PEGI’s decision to classify the game as PEGI 18 due to its poker theme.