Balloonist review

In 2007, a game called Peggle was released. In 2008, the world was hit by a global economic crisis. To this day I still can’t believe that these two facts weren’t related. Peggle was as time-consuming as it was elementary – it was basically just a pachinko machine where you shot a ball at a screen full of “pegs” and tried to hit ten orange ones along the way. The thing is, the only interference you had was the direction you shot the ball. After that, all you could do was sit back and watch, which was almost entirely based on luck.

When you finally accept it, the spell will be broken and you can finally uninstall the damn thing. But now developer newobject has come up with Ballionaire, a pachinko variation that adds roguelike elements to your deckbuilding. Basically, Peggle went to college, smartened up, and got a master’s degree in the fascinating game of strategy. Oh no. Oh God NO.

The aim is to earn enough money to pay the tribute, which must be settled every seven balls, otherwise the game is over. The starting bid is $500, which is disturbing because management is a complete coward to begin with. Hitting these pegs nets a paltry $1 each, the kind of financial reward that would embarrass even a gaming journalist. Fortunately, after each ball you have a choice of three obstacles (also, somewhat confusingly, called balls) to add to the table. The trampoline will pay out $200 if you hit it and bounce the ball up. The Smiling Tree will also pay out $200, but only if you hit it from the bottom up. Ah, but as an apology for that annoying caveat, the tree also gains a diminutive multiplier bonus after each ball played, meaning it can become a significant payout in the behind schedule game.

Ooh, hold on! If I put the ball on the trampoline under tree, I’m much more likely to get that nice multiplier. And of course, this kind of synchronicity is what you strive for with every ball you put on the table. Some balls are “droppers”, meaning that when hit, they will drop another ball. They pair well with “holds” that will hold any ball you hit and give you a great bonus in return (but naturally now the ball is “held”, it’s out of play and can’t hit anything else). Best of all, some balls activate automatically at the start of each move, like the fantastic butterfly ball that flies up the screen – of course, you can only get it if you keep the caterpillar ball from hitting for five rounds.

This means that a game that at first glance seems as random as flipping a coin can be turned into a game that actually rewards strategy. Sure, sometimes God decides they hate you and nothing falls on the screen in the direction you want. The trick, however, is to assemble a Rube Goldberg machine so sophisticated that such randomness has no chance. There’s a Piggy Bonk that pays out $800 for every marble it holds, and I’m obsessed with shaping my entire strategy of stuffing marbles into it regardless of what tools the game gives me (that’s, in roguelike lingo related to deck building, is referred to as “being an idiot”). Whatever, runs to where my beloved pig is trick has I worked challenging and it gave me a wonderfully satisfying salary.

When you win a round in the initial stage of the pyramid, you will unlock four more, each nicely differentiated. We see the ball being lowered onto the line, which is then reeled back up as it hits the bottom. It’s great for trying out things that are more bottom-hitting. The pinball table with two limited-use pinball machines is a personal highlight of mine, and I can assure you that the name of the Wheel of Death stage was no exaggeration.

But let’s get back to the point for a moment, because what quickly worries me becomes my most innuendo-filled review ever. The balls are divided into subcategories such as Agers, Movers and the previously mentioned Droppers and Holders. I had fun slowly figuring out what all these different terms did. This is good news because the game did a pretty penniless job of explaining them to me. Hidden on the pause screen is a “Ballipedia” that gives detailed information about each ball, but it’s one of those annoying tutorial screens that often only gives you half the information you need. “Adjacent triggers of this ball have a factor of +0.1 for each coin ball held.” OK, great, and the “trigger” is…? It’s incredibly annoying to mess up a run because you just have to guess how something works.

That’s not the only place where Ballionaire feels a little incomplete. Win a run and you’ll be rewarded with currency that you can exploit in the slot to get more ball options for future runs. It won’t take you long to unlock everything (in fact, it only takes a few seconds if you select “unlock all” in the pause menu, which is a nice touch). It’s fine, but it was the restricted difficulty options that left me struggling to find a reason to go back.

There are five difficulties that throw predictable challenges at you, such as demanding higher tributes (yawn). Much more fun are the mischievous twists that force you to place nasty annoyances on your lovely table. You have to be hit 500 times before the game ends or you lose. Another will suck out your entire paycheck from the surrounding balls and may need at least $250,000 before he finally gets pissed. I love these. Worrying about them while also trying to meet the required tributes is a great but tough balance.

I just wish it would go further. Once you get past the five difficulties, it’s your fate and it seems like the game could easily escalate further – look at all the nasty debuffs available in the build your own table mode! The lack of an infinite mode is also disappointing – it would have been a perfect addition.

But maybe it’s greedy to complain about longevity when I had 20 hours of fun playing Ballionaire. I’d rather pick on its annoying, repetitive music or its terrible dancing mascot. These are absurdly petty groans from someone who had to constantly pat themselves to stop Alt-Tabing on Steam and play more instead of writing this review. It’s a great end to a year that started with the almighty Balatro, and with a few updates, Ballionaire could easily become my novel favorite podcast game. For now, it’s the Peggle deck builder’s elevator throw, executed with pinpoint precision.