Balatro is beginning to seem like less of a game and more like an all-encompassing cosmic force that stretches along inscrutable dimensions until everything is folded within it and reshaped into clowns, cards, and hypnotic chillwave. Today, we have yet more evidence thanks to new crossover content for Rusty’s Retirement, the delightful robotic farming idler that is now firmly within Jimbo’s uncanny grasp.
Announced today via a surprise release trailer, the update adds a new map that replaces the base game’s main character and structures with Jimbo, other jokers, and an ominous circus tent that—I assume—radiates an unsettling yet arresting aura. The other robots are still there doing their robot farming stuff, though. It’s fine.
Typically in Rusty’s Retirement, collecting crops will provide spare parts to spend on farm progression. In the Balatro map, harvesting crops will instead add an associated card and its spare parts value to a Balatro-style poker hand. As in Balatro, active jokers will add multipliers and other effects, letting you dramatically increase the value of your crops.
In other words, you can get a straight flush with cabbages. Frankly, I’m surprised that videogames took this long to give me a reason to construct that particular sentence. Better late than never.
Mostly, I’m just worried about where Rusty is. Hopefully he’s not playing Balatro in that circus tent. We won’t see him for months.
Today’s update marks Rusty’s Retirement’s second collab with another breakout indie hit. In honor of April Fools’ day earlier this year, the game released a Vampire Survivors crossover update, forcing beloved oldster Poe Ratcho to plant garlic as a ward against crop-thieving bats. I’m not sure what the bats wanted with farm crops. It’s not my place to know.
To celebrate the new crossover, Rusty’s Retirement is currently 33% off on Steam. If you want to do your own idle farming/robot automation/unfathomable pseudo-poker, you can pick it up for $5 until August 21.