I will not lie to you (at least in this sentence), but things are quite dire in the realm of money, and especially video games. Many people are up in arms over the recently announced tariffs, as it’s expected that many games will only become more expensive. Some people hone in on the affordable choices, while others take up the Jolly Roger to claim what little remains. But others, as we may see in our resourceful community, make do with what we have and create something of our own. I speak of the peculiar emergence of a very strange yet very intense game: Competitive Balatro-Solitaire.

The game of Competitive Balatro-Solitaire emerged from a group of students from the video game and board game clubs. Given the rising costs of games they had to buy, an idea emerged after a serious brainstorming session to combine two games into one. While technically a card game, Competitive Balatro-Solitaire combines elements of both physical and digital mediums into a succinct package of a game.

In Competitive Balatro-Solitaire, the goal of the game is to attain points faster than the competition, with the winner having the most points after three rounds of play. At the start of each round, or after a suit has been completed by a player, they randomly draw a Joker card to alter not only their score but also how the game is played. The complexities of this game allow for a confusing but quite entertaining metagame to form. Already, we are witnessing the rise of an apparent could-be champion of this game, a student who goes only by the name of “Jimbo.” Nobody knows who this person really is, but all who know of Jimbo are rooting for them in this home-grown game of wits and luck.

Competitive Balatro-Solitaire has become rather popular at Whitman College, and I say so because of all the right reasons. In times as stressful as this, where even the bread and circuses are too expensive, we still find the power to bake our own bread and perform our own circus.