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Balatro developer LocalThunk is notoriously private. It’s not some kind of put-on: Wout van Halderen, communications director of Balatro publisher Playstack, told us at GDC that LocalThunk isn’t “trying to pull a Banksy,” he’s just “a person who doesn’t really like the spotlight,” and choosing to stay anonymous helps him manage the pressures of his newfound success.
But like a king wandering incognito amongst his subjects, that anonymity also enables LocalThunk to get away with things that other, more recognizable developers never could. As an example, LocalThunk was actually at GDC, and took the opportunity to school the crowd with some slick Balatro moves, before fading away into the crowd like a half-heard whisper.
“One of my fav moments from GDC—they had a booth set up to play Balatro since it was an award nominee,” LocalThunk revealed on Bluesky. “I watched for a bit then I gave it a go myself. Crushed a white stake run. Someone approached me as I was about to leave. ‘Wow you must have played this before!’ ‘I guess you could say that’
“Also this was actually the first and only time I have seen strangers play my game in real life. Have yet to see Balatro in the wild. So as far as I’m concerned y’all are just Truman Show-ing me.”
LocalThunk’s tale of ghosting through GDC inspired some fun responses:
A few people said LocalThunk’s extremely public yet virtually invisible spin with Balatro at GDC reminded them not so much of Banksy, but another famous celebrity who goes places and does stuff almost entirely unnoticed by the world at large:
One person recounted some advice they were given ahead of GDC: “[Don’t] read the badges until AFTER you have talked to someone for at least a couple of minutes, so you don’t get star struck.” LocalThunk’s tale, they added, gave them another reason to stick to that policy.
In this case, though, I don’t think reading the badge would’ve helped. Most people don’t know LocalThunk’s real name or what he looks like, and even if he’d been walking around with one of those “Hi! I’m LocalThunk” stickers on his shirt we probably wouldn’t believe it anyway, unless he wore it while accepting top honors at the GDC Awards. In that case, well, maybe. But I hope he doesn’t: Anonymity seems good for him, and it turns out it’s kind of entertaining for all of us, too.
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Kurt Indovina
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