PS5’s most addictive game this year has yet to conquer the PS Store

It's hard to believe that Balatro's PS5 and PS4 player count suggests the game is only "mildly popular" and not "the biggest game on PlayStation right now."

Lee Brady

Published 29 Mar 2024

As any mad person who has attempted to collect all of those Balatro trophies will tell you, it's easily one of the most addictive PS5 indie games ever designed. That's why I was baffled when I found out that Balatro's PS5 and PS4 player count is actually pretty average. From experience, I know that once you play Balatro, it's hard to think about playing anything else. So, the fact that it's not one of the biggest games on PS5 right now tells me that people still simply have yet to hear about it!

Balatro on PS5 deserves better than what it's getting

For those who have never heard of the game, Balatro is a deck-building game that, on the surface level, appears to function a lot like a video Poker game. That is, at least, until the game starts throwing magical Joker cards at you that grant you bonus chips, shortly before it lets you upgrade your cards by drawing Tarot cards.

It's one of those games that feel perfectly simple in design and absolutely sucker you in with their stellar execution. It's effectively the card-dealing equivalent of Vampire Survivors, except you can actually play it on PS5 and PS4 (still waiting on that Vampire Survivors platinum trophy, guys, thanks).

It's also criminally underplayed at the moment on PlayStation consoles, which shocks me to no end. According to our exclusive active PS5 and PS4 player data (courtesy of GameInsights), Balatro is currently ranked as the 164th most-popular PlayStation game as of Sunday, March 24, 2024.

Maybe it's my social media feeds, but I feel like the world hasn't shut up about the game since it launched in late February 2024. I mean, it only started to appear in our top 200 PlayStation Chart in the week ending Sunday, March 11, 2024, and its steadily grown more popular since then, so clearly the buzz is having some sort of an effect.

Still, to think that it's seeing less players than years-old games like Detroit Become Human or Farming Simulator 22, that's just upsetting. Plus, the idea that Uno currently has 80.4% more players than Balatro on PS5 and PS4 drives me hog wild. This is a bonafide gem of a game, and yet it's losing out to Hasbro's charlatan snap simulator? There truly is no justice in the world.

The game's only hope here, as far as I can tell, is to allow word of mouth to keep generating far and wide. I mean, it's exactly the kind of game I know my mother would love to play — working out which poker hands to play is a truly absorbing and relaxing routine after a long day of work. She'll find out about it from me, but what about all the other hard-working moms around the world? Who will recommend Balatro to them?

For this role, I must entrust you, dear reader. Go out and spread the good word — that Balatro is one of the best PS5 games around and that people should definitely check it out. Now, if you'll excuse me, I've got to go. It's nearly time to clock out and I've currently got a ridiculous set of legendary Jokers to play with in my save file. Insert call to action here — Lee do not leave this unedited in the copy again, please.

Chart compiled using gameplay data from over 3.1 million active PlayStation accounts (not just TrueTrophies accounts). Chart information is copyright GameInsights. Regarding this data:

When an account opens a game, this is registered as a game being played. Accounts can only register a game once per week.
Our data is good for suggesting general trends — we represent this using percentages, not numbers.

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Written by Lee Brady

Staff Writer Lee keeps one eye on the future (Astro Bot), one eye on the past (PS1, PS2, and PS3 games), and his secret third eye on junk he really likes (Final Fantasy, Kingdom Hearts, Sonic). A PlayStation fan for over 25 years, he loves replaying classic games via PS Plus.