Poker News, Tips, Tricks & Ideas

I realized a long time ago I was probably never going to be good at poker. It’s not that I’m bad at assessing risk; worse, I just don’t care. When I used to play casual games in-between classes in school, I’d go all-in on bad hands. I’d swap cards for a flush that probably wouldn’t show up. So imagine my surprise when Balatro, a deckbuilding poker roguelite, asked me to lean into those bad habits.

Love crossword puzzles but don’t have all day to sit and solve a full-sized puzzle in your daily newspaper? That’s what The Mini is for!

Connections is the latest puzzle game from the New York Times. The game tasks you with categorizing a pool of 16 words into four secret (for now) groups by figuring out how the words relate to each other. The puzzle resets every night at midnight and each new puzzle has a varying degree of difficulty. Just like Wordle, you can keep track of your winning streak and compare your scores with friends.

Breakout 2024 poker roguelite hit Balatro is coming to Apple and Android mobile devices, according to solo developer LocalThunk. That’s great news for all of us currently invested in creating the highest-scoring poker hands, and bad news for our productivity related to anything else.

The solo dev behind the indie poker roguelike Balatro is disappointed over how games with "actual gambling mechanics" are given age ratings, after seeing their own game's rating skyrocket due to gambling-related concerns. This came despite the fact that Balatro doesn't actually feature gambling, and the developer is strictly against it. 

There are some games that keep you entertained for a weekend. Some keep you busy for an hour on a weeknight after failing to settle on what new Netflix documentary to watch next. But then, every so often, a game like Balatro turns up and takes hold of your entire life – to the point where you open up your wardrobe and the only four suits your eyes can make out are clubs, spades, diamonds, and hearts. This poker-influenced roguelike may appear straightforward at first, but take the risk of picking it up, and its ludicrously fun gameplay loop won’t let you put it down.

You may have heard about Balatro recently — it's the latest indie sensation currently doing the rounds, and it's truly excellent. The roguelike deckbuilder has you playing poker hands to score points, and using joker cards and other upgrades to amplify those points to potentially stratospheric levels — it's tremendous. However, that basic poker element at its very core appears to be causing some unforeseen problems.

Playstack, the publisher of popular roguelike deckbuilder Balatro confirmed on Twitter that the game has been temporarily removed from some digital storefronts due to a sudden rating change. Apparently, the UK rating board PEGI changed the rating from 3+ to 18+ overnight due to “prominent gambling imagery” which prompted the sudden delistings. The problem here is that there is literally no gambling in Balatro.

Balatro publisher Playstack Games has taken to social media to defend its poker roguelike after fans noticed it had been removed from certain stores.

Balatro, the hot new roguelike card game of the moment, has been pulled from several digital storefronts after its age rating was changed due to perceived gambling concerns. In response, publisher Playstack Games says the ratings decision is "unfounded" and vows to fight back against Balatro's removal. 

Balatro, a poker roguelike that has become a surprise hit after being released last month, will get delisted in some regions after a sudden rating change that claimed the game encouraged gambling.

During a recent Polygon meeting, I realized something: I have no idea how to pronounce Balatro, the name of developer LocalThunk’s incredible roguelite poker game that’s occupied every one of my evenings since it was released. None of my colleagues knew the answer, either, so I did what any reporter would do. I sent an email to ask.

We’re only two months into 2024, but it’s already a surprisingly front-loaded year for new games. We kicked the year off with great Like a Dragon, Tekken, and Prince of Persia games in January, but February turned the heat up even more. Persona 3 Reload andFinal Fantasy VII Rebirth gave us two excellent RPGs, whileHelldivers 2 has been a surprise hit for Sony. Even just trying to keep up with the major releases has been a daunting task.

Every so often, a Balatro run will click. The random number generator is on my side when I pull a series of buffs that perfectly align: It’s the Half Joker (+20 to the multiplier for hands with three or fewer cards) pulled as I was upgrading pair, three of a kind, and high card hands, topped off with a Supernova (the number of times a poker hand’s been played is added to the multiplier), Burnt Joker (upgrades your first discarded hand) and Space Joker (a one-in-four chance of upgrading a played poker hand). Add in extra face cards, a few Stone cards (that add chips) and buffs to those, too, and it feels hard not to win.

I’m not a poker guy, but I am definitely a Balatro guy now.

The solo developer of roguelike deckbuilder game Balatro has admitted that he’s “not very good” at his own game, and that he’s always “shocked” when players manage to reach extremely high scores since he “can’t.”

Until the sterling evaluations of Final Fantasy 7 Rebirth dropped earlier today, the best-reviewed game of 2024 was Balatro - a deck-building poker roguelike that seemed to take over Steam Next Fest.

Have you ever stopped to think about your average deck of playing cards and what a design feat it is? Those 52 cards have kept people entertained for centuries thanks to limitless creativity. You can use them to play anything from Go Fish to King’s Cup. No matter how many times you shuffle them, there’s seemingly no bottom to the amount of games that can be dealt out.

Garena Free Fire MAX Redeem Codes for January 18: Luck Royale events have been extremely popular in Garena Free Fire MAX recently, so much so that the game's developers have been rolling out one after another. Now, one more event has arrived in Garena Free Fire MAX, and it offers Poker MP40 skins as top rewards! This event comes following the success of Free Fire Emote Royale that offered emotes such as Heartbroken, Bony Fumes, Mind it!, and The Collapse. So, if you wish to obtain amazing weapon skins in the game, then check out the details of the Free Fire MP40 Ring event in Garena Free Fire MAX below.

Solquence is a puzzle game by indie developer Contentato available on Android and iOS. Priced at $4.99, it’s an instinctive puzzler that blends strategy with classic poker. The game recently got an update and now boasts new effects and a bunch of other improvements. Keep reading to know more!

For years I’ve enjoyed one-off murder mysteries that friends recommended, but the genre hadn’t really gotten its hooks in me. I’ve simply never been the kind of reader who actively tries to solve the case. My friends who champion these books tend to care deeply about tracking red herrings and attempting to out-sleuth the author. I’m just as content to know whodunit from the very start, as long as the novel itself has enjoyable pacing and character writing.

It's a great feeling when you find a new nightly game—something you want to sit down and play for an hour or two every evening after a long day. A couple weeks ago I found my newest obsession: Balatro, a roguelike deckbuilder that uses poker rules (and then utterly shatters those rules). Since I found it, not a night has gone by that I haven't played at least a few hands of Balatro, and when I'm not playing it I'm often watching videos of other people playing it. 

SEGA’s excellent Yakuza series is well-known for its minigames, but Like a Dragon: Infinite Wealth looks to seriously expand upon the expectations of fans with an unprecedented number of side-activities and distractions. Chief among them is the inclusion of some fairly famous Model 3 arcade games, including SEGA Bass Fishing, SpikeOut, and Virtua Fighter 3tb. These are brand new ports, and it’s the first time SpikeOut has been playable on console since an iffy Xbox spin-off almost 20 years ago.

Board games that I find average, but with great potential, that get an expansion always grab my attention. 3000 Scoundrels is no exception. Our very own Andrew Smith reviewed the base game in August of 2023, and I couldn’t agree more with his overall conclusion: “Generally, I’d say 3000 Scoundrels is a well-produced game with some great ideas. But it doesn’t have enough depth to the gameplay to really make it worth keeping around in my collection…” So, does the new Double or Nothing expansion help it find its footing? Let’s find out. 

This is not investment advice. The author has no position in any of the stocks mentioned. Wccftech.com has a disclosure and ethics policy.

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Ubisoft are "decommissioning" another slate of games next January, including Assassin's Creed Revelations, R.U.S.E., and Trials Evolution. These games will remain playable, but their online services will be switched off meaning leaderboards, online multiplayer, co-op and other features will stop working.

Hallow's End is upon us, and many spooky things are brought up with it. With this year's Hallow's End, a special old place has risen from the dead: Access to the Scarlet Monastery of Old! Prior to Mists of Pandaria, Scarlet Monastery was a single instance divided in four wings — Graveyard, Library, Armory and Cathedral. The expansion revamped the instance into two separate dungeons — Scarlet Halls (which merged the Library and Armory) and Scarlet Monastery (which merged the Graveyard and Cathedral). However, with the instance revamps, many sought-after loot drops were lost to time… until now. In this post, we teach you how to find the new mysterious Scarlet Key that unlocks access to the dungeons, as well as returning loot!

Sei stanco delle solite opzioni e limitazioni dei casinò italiani? Ti sei mai chiesto se esistono alternative che ti offrano più libertà e una gamma più ampia di giochi e bonus?

Games industry charity GamesAid raised over £23,269 in three days at EGX via its tombola.

Everyone loves a little mystery. Heck, players have been trying to solve a puzzle in Cyberpunk 2077 for almost three years. And now some Starfield sleuths are trying to solve a puzzle in Bethesda's space RPG.

There was a time back in my school days when cardgames were all the rage. Everybody had a deck of playing cards in their pocket for cheeky 15 minute rounds of Texas Hold 'Em between lessons, with Milky Way segments and Niknaks wagered in place of chips. Yes, I'm aware I'm starting to sound like Grandpa Simpson, and no, this wasn't from some murky era before the invention of videogames. It was the heyday of the Gameboy Advance! I'm not sure what we were thinking. But two things: 1) decks of playing cards are cheaper than game consoles, and 2) part of the fun, possibly, was that nobody really knew how to play the ostensibly well-known cardgames we were playing.

Kazuma Kiryu may have faked his death and quietly walked away from a life of street brawls, tense hostage situations, and mini-games galore at the end of Yakuza 6. But an iconic character like that will never be shelved for too long. With the Yakuza series retitled to more closely match the Japanese translation, Like a Dragon Gaiden: The Man Who Erased His Name has roped in Kiryu for one last simple job. And we all know how well “one last simple jobs” tend to go. Even though it was a bit disappointing that my playthrough strayed away from details of the main story arc, what I did see strongly justified bringing our boy out of retirement for another go-around.

A 12-second clip of Michael Cera doing an impression of Tony Soprano is making the rounds online – and it's... fine?

Zoeti is a roguelite deckbuilding game that sees you fighting fantasy monstrosities with magical powers, all fueled by poker rules and hands. Playing for your life can be a bit more exciting than playing for money, after all.

Murder has been comfort TV fodder for almost as long as there has been television. Standards like Murder She Wrote and Columbo and modern homages like Poker Face offer predictable rhythms and familiar characters — and the promise that the perp will always get caught in the end. All of those shows star detectives, oddballs, and misfits who I love to watch for hours on end, but none of those characters feel like my friends. The stars of Hulu’s Only Murders in the Building, though? I want them to get along with each other (and me, if they were so inclined) maybe even more than I want to see them solve a murder.

Every summer, hackers and researchers from around the world brave the broiling Las Vegas heat, coming together for the hacking extravaganza known as Black Hat. This is the opportunity for academics and professional testers to wow their colleagues by showcasing the vulnerabilities they’ve discovered or new protection techniques they’ve invented. 

Twitch has updated its community guidelines to ban promotion and sponsorships of skin gambling sites.

CSGO gambling promotions and sponsorships are now prohibited on Twitch, as the streaming platform publishes revised rules relating to the Valve FPS game. According to the new regulations, CSGO streamers who may be sponsored by skin gambling sites will no longer be allowed to promote those sites during their Twitch broadcasts. The rules come as Valve alters the Steam regulations regarding CSGO gambling, ahead of the Counter-Strike 2 release date.

Amazon-owned Twitch said Wednesday it's expanding the ban on livestreams of gambling content on the platform.

Missed the GamesBeat Summit excitement? Don't worry! Tune in now to catch all of the live and virtual sessions here.

It wasn’t terribly shocking when Netflix announced it would be adding games to its platform. Instead, the news was treated with a mild disinterest. “Games” on the platform at that point were the “choose your own adventure” style interactive TV shows like Black Mirror: Bandersnatch and Carmen Sandiego: To Steal or Not to Steal. Though Bandersnatch had a hot moment, buzz for the “game” didn’t last terribly long. Then, when actual games first started rolling out on the platform, they were little more than inconsequential time fillers with names like Shooty Hoops.