'You must have played this before!': Balatro's creator impressed bystanders with his Balatro skills at GDC, and nobody knew who he was

Balatro developer LocalThunk is notoriously private. It's not some kind of put-on: Wout van Halderen, communications director of Balatro publisher Playstack, told us at GDC that LocalThunk isn't "trying to pull a Banksy," he's just "a person who doesn't really like the spotlight," and choosing to stay anonymous helps him manage the pressures of his newfound success.

But like a king wandering incognito amongst his subjects, that anonymity also enables LocalThunk to get away with things that other...