Pirate poker battler Piroker has a playtest you can sign up for now

Pirates and poker are two of my favourite things beginning with the letter 'P', so I'm delighted we just revealed a new animated trailer for Piroker during the PC Gaming Show Tokyo Direct. It's an asynchronous multiplayer poker game with a wonderful pirate theme, and fans of Balatro are sure to enjoy it.

I played a bit too much Piroker when PC Gaming Show editorial director Jake Tucker first slid an early build of the game across my desk. You pick a pirate captain and go head-to-head against seven other players trying to score the best hands possible.

It's not just Texas Hold 'Em, though. Seven cards get dealt, and the game will automatically score every possible hand combination you get. Just like poker roguelite Balatro, Piroker lets you make some truly wild builds and cheated hands. Increase the value or change the suit, read one suit as two, score some cards multiple times, and more.

You increase your score through the use of relics—items that make your cards and hands score higher or have larger multipliers. Collect three of the same relic and it turns into a super-powered variant. We discovered some pretty broken builds during our time with the game, but so did the other players.

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If you score too low, the winning players shoot you and lower your health—it's brutal. There's an element of luck to it, too, because if there are three winners and four losers, one of the losers won't get shot, giving them more time to get their build online.

The animated trailer we just revealed didn't show off any new gameplay, but it does set the tone of the game well. It encourages you to sign up to the playtest, and as someone who's already had a blast with the game, I'd recommend you sign up, too. You can sign up and wishlist Piroker on Steam.