Wordpetition, a card word game inspired by Balatro!

[holo]

ACTIVE PLAYTEST:

Wordpetition PLAYTEST by happyholo

The word game where the meaning of your words matter!

Wordpetition is a brand-new multiplayer word game with a completely unique mechanic where you alter a changing word box to score words. 

The box stays the same after every word spelled, which makes the previous word you spelled affect the next. It’s like word ladder on steroids!

YOUR WORDS MATTER:

The specific words you spell matter and carry meaning beyond their points! Every special word has a unique Word Card (joker) you get when you spell that word, the cards completely change the game! For example, if you spell three, it’ll give you the THREE card which gives +45 points for every three letter word scored.

Every word card has a unique effect that depends on the word you spelled.

Here are all of the ones shown in the image! 

RAMEN (spell ramen): 2x fire, loses x0.01 fire per card drawn. 

COOKBOOK (spell cookbook): Spawns a random food Word Card for every 5 valid words spelled consecutively.

ARSONIST (spell arsonist): Burns all tiles behind a space/blank when the space/blank is “scored.” Gains +1 fire for every card destroyed.

 HINT (spell hint): +75 points when a special word is spelled. Shows the closest special word in the text below the hint.

THE WORD BOX:

 To make words, change the word box by dragging letters around! The main mechanic is that the box stays the same after every word spelled, which adds so much depth to the game.

MULTIPLAYER:

It also has full multiplayer that allows any number of players to play the game, making it the first game in the sub-genre to do so. It's been in development for about 6 months.

Demo coming soon! (will be available on the web)

Watch me play the game here:

WORDPETITION (balatro-like word game) - Gameplay Teaser V2

Theres also a itch.io page for the upcoming demo here:

Wordpetition DEMO by happyholo

[Frozen_Fried]

I love the art style! it’s cool!

[holo]

Thanks! I almost abandoned the art style at the start, but then I just decided to keep the goofy letters and build the entire rest of the game’s art style based on them. It clearly turned out well

[holo]

also tobylane is just absolutely insane: https://pixabay.com/music/beats-save-as-115826/

[ComicallyUnfunny]

@holo

the first game in the sub-genre to do so.

Sadly…
https://balatromp.com/

About - Major League Balatro - Season 3

Also, consider removing the dollar sign in the score. Makes it confusing with the gold. Maybe rename gold? Either way works.

[holo]

I knew about multiplayer balatro when I typed the first bit, but if we only count standalone games, it’s the first, probably.

Yeah, I kinda realize now that some people coming from balatro (my entire target audience) might get confused by the money being replaced by gold. I changed it to gold to make it more different than balatro, since I didn’t want to also copy the currency.

[holo]

Devlog #2:

New logo for the game!

Here how it looks like in-game:

Added a limit on how many word cards one player can have:

If you have too many word cards, the word cards you get from spelling words will be transferred to the letter pile. You can then use them with their effect as regular cards in the word box.

Added a currently hovered/dragged letter highlight in the word box:

“o” is hovered in the image.

The highlight allows for absurdly long words to be editable, since you’re able to see the letter you’re picking up.

Devlogs are also at itch.io:

Devlog #2: NEW LOGO & misc changes - Wordpetition DEMO by happyholo

[paintsimmon]

now the real question is how many curse words you can create /s

[holo]

Here’s an actual answer though:
All of them except for slurs.

There will be an option to automatically censor normal ones though (it’ll just not show the letters).

I just don’t want there to be a gameplay advantage to spelling slurs. Imagine a speedrun where the speedrunner has to spell $&*#% to save time.

[ComicallyUnfunny]

Just took another look at your gameplay video. I assume like Balatro you’ll want to have modifiers on specific tiles eventually, but for now, consider a typing feature where you can clear the list and type to bring up a letter if you have it in the hand. The hand looked pretty cumbersome to move cards one by one. I saw you had a highlight effect for this, but if possible (all the tiles of that letter are the same), it should just bring up the tile. Maybe that happens when holding Shift and the highlight happens normally?

[holo]

@ComicallyUnfunny

now, consider a typing feature where you can clear the list and type to bring up a letter if you have it in the hand

Thank you so much for the advice! Definitely adding this to the game. I want to have modifiers on specific tiles eventually, but if the player has to hold shift then it fixes any gameplay issue with it (has to be intentional).

The “typing” effect would happen with the first card found with that letter. By “bring up a letter” I assume you mean having the card move to the player’s mouse location and start automatically dragging it, like a magnet or something (please correct me if that’s not what you meant). I don’t know what “clear the list” means though.

For mobile/mouse support, I’m also going to add the ability to quick tap the card itself to quickly add it to the word box.

[ComicallyUnfunny]

By bringing up a letter, I meant putting it at the end of the word box. Then players could just read the letters and type out the word they want while holding shift (wouldnt work if there are different tiles of the same letter to choose from)

[holo]

That’s what I thought you said initially (but then I reread it and thought something else), thanks for the clarification

[holo]

More word cards from the game!

GIBBERISH - Every word is valid up to 9 letters. -15 max turns.
EXCELLENT - Every “E” held in hand gives 1.5x fire.
RULER - Gains +1/8 fire per card in word box.
DROPLET - Adds +50 points, but extinguishes -3 fire.

Alt text:

The image shows 4 word cards in a dotted orange horizontal box. There is also text under the box that says 4/8, how many word cards are there and the limit on how many word cards you can have.

The first word card, GIBBERISH, appears as three scribbles going from left to right spaced out vertically. It also has a yellow background with many scattered purple letters in the background. These letters do not form any words or sentences, making them gibberish too.

The second word card, EXCELLENT, appears as a gold medal with a red ribbon that has E+ written on it. The background is yellow with many “E+” letters.

The third word card, RULER, is a ruler. It has a background that is a checkerboard-like grid with yellow and dark-beige squares. It has school supplies in the background that includes, a painting palette, a ruler, and a pencil.

The fourth word card, DROPLET, is a water droplet. It has a blue, water background.

[holo]

Thanks for the suggestion earlier!
It’s in the game now!

holo (@hologodot.bsky.social)

(linked to bluesky due to upload size limit)

[verious_bolcious]

Oh this looks fun! Art is funky in a good way. Animations feel super solid too, how much work was it to get the states working right?

Also, my favourite visual element by far is the animated fire!

[holo]

Tysm! I’m so glad you like the visuals.

I spent so much time on the fire lol, it’s a combination of my goofy pixel art and a fire shader with an outline shader. Both the pixel art and the fire shader are layered in a really weird and specific way to make the outlines look like they merge together. So glad you liked that one.
The fire word card got the fire shader, while the campfire got the pixel art.

There actually isn’t much state with the animations lol, it’s just that most of them in the AnimationPlayer (e.g held, score, destroy, appear) very conveniently almost always happen when the others don’t. Any other animations are tweened (e.g hover), so they just kind of layer on top of eachother.

Edit:
I actually did have to add state so that the destroy animation wouldn’t get interrupted lol, it’s just one if statement though.

[holo]

Multiplayer!
(i’ve basically been posting updates everywhere but here, rip)

Wordpetition (balatro-like word game) - MULTIPLAYER Gameplay

[holo]

More word cards!

[holo]

Even more word cards!
(videos)

TIMER Word Card - Wordpetition (balatro-like) #balatro #games #indiegame