To celebrate 2 years of Balatro, creator LocalThunk reflected on dropping out of an engineering program to make games: 'Even if I could warn myself I’m not sure what I could have said to prepare for the insanity'

To celebrate 2 years of Balatro, creator LocalThunk reflected on dropping out of an engineering program to make games: ‘Even if I could warn myself I’m not sure what I could have said to prepare for the insanity’ | PC Gamer Skip to main content Open menu Close main menu PC Gamer THE GLOBAL AUTHORITY ON PC GAMES US Edition UK US Canada Australia Subscribe Sign in View Profile Sign out Search Search PC Gamer Games Hardware News Reviews Guides Video Forum More PC Gaming Show PC Gamer Clips Software Codes Coupons Movies & TV Magazine Newsletter Affiliate links Meet the team Community guidelines About PC Gamer PC Gamer Magazine SubscriptionWhy subscribe?Subscribe to the world’s #1 PC gaming magTry a single issue or save on a subscriptionIssues delivered straight to your door or device From$1Subscribe now Don’t miss these RPG ‘We lost things such as physics in games:’ The dev behind my most anticipated RPG thinks players are craving more interactive games, not just ‘moving around in a static 3D environment’ Gaming Industry Doom co-creator John Romero adores Ghost Recon and has over 3,000 hours in World of Warcraft: ‘God, I lived in that game every day for five years’ RPG The dev behind my top upcoming RPG is a Hungarian chef who thought ‘if not now, then when?’ and learned coding from scratch to make his dream ‘eurojank’ masterpiece Roguelike Mewgenics provides the best proof yet that the turn-based tactics genre is the true home of drama and excitement in gaming Fallout Fallout was a ‘B-tier product’ that lost both the licenses it was banking on and had its lead dev joking, ‘In a week, we’re going to be asking whether people want fries with their meal,’ but now he thinks those trials ‘turned out to be positives’ Adventure ‘We never had plans to update Peak at all’: Aggro Crab reveals that it doesn’t want ‘to be a studio that works on one game forever’ Horror ‘Art and science and procreation, that’s about all life is good for:’ Two former freeware developers are still trying to keep it weird in an era when companies ‘sell games to people in 5-second clips’ MOBA I’m sad Deadlock is ‘just’ a MOBA—not because I don’t like them, but because I’m in love with Valve’s lore and characters enough to want any other game instead Roguelike Mewgenics review: The creator of The Binding of Isaac has transcended his own past work with this sprawling, ridiculous, and endlessly surprising roguelike Roguelike Cult of the Lamb may be a murder-happy fever dream, but the devs have principles: ‘We wouldn’t want to fleece players’ Roguelike ‘We’re definitely excited to do something else’: After Cult of the Lamb Woolhaven, the Massive Monster devs are excited at the prospect of something new—’We always like to follow the fun’ Strategy ‘We’re going to make some horrendous mistakes,’ Peter Molyneux says about his upcoming swan song Masters of Albion: ‘Horrendous, horrendous mistakes’ Roguelike ‘It’s weird in the industry right now’: Cult of the Lamb’s devs still have faith that the indie scene will continue dishing out ‘smash hits’ Survival & Crafting Hytale’s unfinished sandbox has finally given me hope for a voxel RPG, after Cube World broke my heart twice Games The best laptop games PopularNEW: PC Gamer Clips!Arc RaidersBest PC gearFalloutGame Quizzes Games Roguelike Balatro To celebrate 2 years of Balatro, creator LocalThunk reflected on dropping out of an engineering program to make games: ‘Even if I could warn myself I’m not sure what I could have said to prepare for the insanity’ News By Justin Wagner published 21 February 2026 “Thank you to everyone for allowing this terrible student to keep staying up too late.” When you purchase through links on our site, we may earn an affiliate commission. 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From first-look trailers, interviews, reviews and explainers, we’ve got you covered. Signup + Once a month SFX Get sneak previews, exclusive competitions and details of special events each month! Signup + An account already exists for this email address, please log in. Subscribe to our newsletter Even two years after release, Balatro is one of the biggest and best roguelikes going—there may be no one more keenly aware of that than developer LocalThunk, who’s managed to keep a low profile despite his game selling millions of copies and scoring crossover after crossover.In a recent anniversary blog post titled “Bad Grades,” LocalThunk looked back on his earliest forays into game development. “I think about that version of myself a lot now,” he wrote. “I didn’t know what was coming and even if I could warn myself I’m not sure what I could have said to prepare for the insanity. I’m not even sure if there’s a lesson to learn.”His first game was a four-word ladder game in command line, something he cooked up during an Intro to Computer Science class. He “wasn’t a good student” by his own admission, but it inspired him to drop out of the engineering program he was in to pursue a degree in programming. It set his education back a year, but he was passionate about it—engineering, on the other hand, was a bore. Related articl