Publisher Balatro advised other publishers to invest more in indie teams and not to expect huge profits from them
What could publishers do to better support indie developers? This was the question journalists from Inverse asked the winners of the 2025 Game Developers Choice Awards. According to one of the Playstack executives, publishers need to simplify the process of allocating funds for games.
Balatro
“Make financing more accessible, without requiring [developers] to pay back huge sums. Let it be a reasonable budget, but open access to it for more people who need that reasonable budget,” said Patrick Johnson, head of new game acquisition at Playstack.
The current hit from Playstack is the card “roguelike” Balatro, developed by solo developer LocalThunk. At the GDC Awards 2025, the title won four awards: Game of the Year, Best Game Design, Best Debut, and Best Innovation. It was also a laureate of many other awards, including the 2025 BAFTA Games Awards and The Game Awards 2024.
Previously, LocalThunk admitted that he did not believe in Balatro's success and thought the game would only be of interest to his friends and parents. Playstack also did not expect it to become so popular, even though they saw great potential in it.
As a reminder, by the end of January 2025, Balatro sold over 5 million copies. The revenue from its mobile version alone to date amounts to $14.97 million (according to AppMagic).