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Joker Madness is a poker-based card duel where each card you pick automatically goes to your opponent, forcing you to draft strategically around shared joker modifiers. The asymmetrical drafting creates an interesting high-concept hook that works best in head-to-head multiplayer against friends, though single-player depth fades quickly without additional tactical layers.

About this game

What players are saying

▲ Recommended 0 hrs

The main idea is fresh (at least in video gaming I think), but it becomes repetitive quite soon. It's a fun game for in between, however. And the greatest strength lies in PvP, when it becomes a fun little face-to-face game.
My feeling is that it may need more tactical depth (like more limited money oder a limit of possible joker per round or per match) and I hope this is reworked during Early Access.

So yeah, for the small price and the possibility of playing online, I'll give it a recommendation - as long as you are not scared by the font which can be hard to decipher sometimes. 🙃

0 found helpful Steam ↗

▲ Recommended 1 hrs

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Joker Madness has an interesting premise where the the AI receives the card you didn't pick all the while you both draft jokers that boost or nullify both yours and AI's cards. Unfortunately, once the novelty wears off the rough edges and lack of meaningful progression make way for the repetition to settle in quite quickly.

Understandably the early access means lack of polish but the cards are too hard to see even in fullscreen, and windowed mode is even worse (also the rules were illegible). The main screen animation is also too long.

The jokers you buy change in price dynamically, which is an interesting idea, but it happens that buying one joker causes another to cost 0, so you buy those, and then another joker costs less, so you buy that one, chaining joker reactions which feels a bit unfair.

Considering the game is EA and low price, I'm giving it a Mixed recommendation. Probably better to play against a friend though.

Favorite mechanics

• Take a card and opponent gets what you didn't take

The positive

+ Some new ideas

+ Good tooltips on how scores are calculated

The neutral

* Lack of polish

The negative

- Gets repetitive quickly

- Nothing to play forward to in single player

Conclusion:

Some interesting ideas, but requires polish and a stronger gameplay loop to counter the repetition. Probably better with friends. Mixed recommendation, 6.5/10

0 found helpful Steam ↗

Reviews are by Steam users, hosted on Steam.

Latest updates

Joker Madness is on the Steam Summer Sale!

33 days ago

Hey!Not long ago I cut the price of Joker Madness to let as many people as possible try it out. And now, on top of that lower price, there's an extra 30% discount - the game costs less than $1 (and the equivalent in other currencies). Perfect moment to give it a shot!- BadGafi

Mac build is back with update 1.3.0!

45 days ago

Hey!Apple finally confirmed that my game doesn't bring anything bad anywhere! So Mac owners can now install the latest version!P.S. Thanks to everyone who finds bugs and reports them personally or in the Community — I see all of it and I'll be back with fixes!— BadGafi

Update 1.3.0 for Windows is live!

57 days ago

Hey!Before taking a break from Joker Madness development, I decided to push out one more update. If you run into any crashes or bugs — please post in the Community, I'll try to fix everything ASAP!⚠️ Important for Mac users: I'm currently having issues with my developer.apple account and waiting for a response from their support. So this update is WINDOWS ONLY FOR NOW, but the Mac version will follow as fast as humanly possible. Sorry for the inconvenience!🃏 6 New Jokers6 more beauties are now available in the Joker Shop. Let me walk you through each:Joker — JokatroYes, this Joker is a nod to a certain game everyone loves! Here's how it works: after activation, the lowest card in your hand becomes Jokatro. It's worth 0 points itself and can't be part of combos. But from that moment on, what matters isn't the card itself — it's its neighbors. The card to its left becomes the "Donor," and the card to its right becomes the "Beneficiary." The Donor passes its value to the card on the right of Jokatro as a Mult, multiplying the Beneficiary's score by its own value.Let's say you have 7 (left) — Jokatro (center) — K (right). That means K (assuming it's not killed or anything else weird) is worth not 10 but 70 points! And K can still be combined with other effects (like Dancer) and used in Combos. Overall, a really cool strategic card that you'll want to move around the board depending on the situation.Joker — BalatnessYep, this one's also a nod to our favorite game! Here's how it works: after activation, every 4 turns each player gets a random (heh, well, almost) charge that can be applied to one of their playing cards on the field (if it's alive!). There are 4 effects:・Foil: adds +10 points to the card ・Polychrome: gives the card a x3 multiplier ・Holo: gives x3 to the combo bonus multiplier if the card is part of a combo ・Negative: lets the card participate in two combos at once (you could form, say, 2 Flushes in a row)The card works similarly to Switcher from update 1.2:...

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