UNO + Balatro + battle pass

On Pranab’s site

DRAFT (needs work or removal)

UNO with a “battle pass” and Balatro’s game feel could reach the same peaks as Candy Crush and Wordle.

Battle passes are a staple in free shooter games, where they offer character outfits, weapon modifications, kill and winning animations, and more, with a premium paid tier for higher quality unlocks. UNO can offer card styles, banners, stickers, player avatars, badges, special action and winning animations, and so on.

I also mentioned Balatro because it won Indie Game of the Year, every clip I’ve seen of it has great animations, and it’s built upon a well-known card game, poker, which is likely second in popularity only to UNO. There’s also a slew of other (indie) card games with incredible animations and game feel.

Mo’ features🔗

• Lobbies for team ups or competitions with friends, family, acquaintances, and so on

• Daily and weekly missions, limited by battle pass tier

• Achievements to unlock special decorations

• Stickers to place on top of cards to customise further

• Player gallery with all unlocks and achievements

• Clubs for friends, families, and online communities

• Friendly and competitive tournaments

• Spectators that can view player cards if allowed

• Unlock card sets one card at a time, with the ability to mix and match cards from different decks

• Collaborations with artists and designers to design custom cards and other cosmetics

• Collaborations with other organisations and media works, like games and TV shows, for custom cards and other cosmetics

• Controls for all input devices, for cross-play across all platforms, starting with browsers and expanding to app stores, consoles, and desktops

• Official global and national tournaments streamed live to an online audience, or even at a venue, with various prizes and goodies

A potential issue🔗

One key difference between UNO and games with battle passes is that those games offer upgrades that affect core gameplay. They interact with the rules of the game.

So far we’ve discussed changes outside the main game, such as cosmetics and clubs, which might lose players like water in a sieve.

We could unlock new game modes, but those extra modes often have long waiting times because most people go to the main game mode, especially if the waiting time for extra modes is longer than what they’re used to. You would also need to unlock all modes pretty soon, otherwise you’ll frustrate the players who got the game for those modes.

We would want something that’s only for the player who unlocked the feature, but doesn’t give a direct advantage, instead adding interesting twists. Perhaps something that also has costs for the player.

One viable solution is something like “air drop” cards. At the beginning of the match players will get to pick a special card, and during the match they can pick up an “air drop” card that would turn into their special card. Players would start with only a single special card to use, and then they’d unlock more options as they play. This is quite similar to Helldivers, Hades, and other rogue-lite games.

Audience🔗

I briefly mentioned Candy Crush and Wordle in the beginning. Like them, UNO is a game for all kinds of people from all walks of life.

It’s for families, friends, acquaintances, colleagues, and more.

You might spot people on the train playing UNO. Maybe someone has earphones plugged in and is talking to their friends or family as they play.

That’s one of the main reasons I think this idea is so viable.

However, unlike Candy Crush and Wordle, UNO is already well-known across the world, and this would give it a new breath of life.

Another possible problem🔗

Given the audience the game is meant for, especially people playing it in their down time, there should be a way to make matches shorter.

This can be done using special cards or rules, such as a timer for the match.

If nobody wins before the timer is over ¹, whoever has the lowest total card value wins ². This is inspired by the tournament rules given with the physical cards.

Experimentation and play-tests might reveal other options.

It doesn’t need to be UNO🔗

Balatro’s example could be followed more directly, but building a multiplayer poker game instead, though poker has a steeper learning curve and negative associations — since we don’t want people to actually gamble, players would bet the coins and cards they get in-game, so that there’s still a sense of investment in every round.

But it doesn’t need to be poker, either. It doesn’t need to be any pre-existing card game.

People could launch their own player-versus-player card game if they can keep up with the content demands.

It won’t have the same power as UNO, but they could still win big, and I’d love that for indie devs.

If you’ve been noodling on a cool card game design, go make it!

Conclusion🔗

We have a future award-winning, money-making, viral hit in our hands.

Someone please reach out to Mattel, or your management, if you already work there, to get this off the ground.

I beg thee.

Hand this lowly one word from above. That troops are being mustered. That the tall blonde himbo rides out for battle.

:)