Ever since its release and subsequent success in 2024, indie hit Balatro has garnered attention for a somewhat surprising and amusing reason. That being how you're actually supposed to pronounce the title correctly. Is it 'Bah-LAH-trow'? 'BAH-luh-trow'? 'Bay-LAH-troo'? Yeah okay, no one's saying that last one...
Well, we now have an official answer courtesy of Stephen Totilo over at Game File (thanks, Push Square). While at GDC, Totilo met with Naman Budhwar, head of video marketing at Balatro publisher PlayStack. According to Budwar, Balatro developer LocalThunk pronounced the game 'BAH-luh-trow'. We don't know about you, but we've been pronouncing it 'Bah-LAH-trow' this whole time.
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So, chances are you've been getting it wrong, but don't fret, because Budwar says that LocalThunk "doesn't really mind" how folks pronounce it. We can't imagine he ever considered that the game's pronunciation would be such a hot topic while knee-deep in development, but there you go! You can click through to the above Game File link to listen to a short audio clip of the pronunciation too, if you wish.
In a separate reveal from PlayStack's communications director Wout van Halderen, it turns out that LocalThunk's anonymity is for the simple reason that the developer simply wants to be left alone to create his games. Yeah, no Banksy-inspired conspiracy theories here, folks.