RoguedexPart 5 (Jul 2026) · #9 of 10 in that tierWatch the moment (1:29:15)
Gambonanza
- Developed by
- Blukulélé
- Published by
- Sidekick Publishing, Stray Fawn Publishing
$14.99
Gambonanza is a tactical roguelike that sets chess pieces on a tiny board. Forget traditional chess and embrace the chaos of breaking the balance! Spend your money on rule-bending upgrades, board tiles and pieces. Experiment with illegal combinations and face off against iconic bosses!
Consensus
D64.8/100
Steam players75.7% positiveMostly Positive1,725 reviews
Metacritic ↗64/100Users: 7.3/10
VG Insights estimate ↗≈174K copies · ≈$1.5M gross
What creators say
Ranked Jul 2026 · #6 of 14 in that tierListen to the episode
What players say
A Balatro-style chess roguelike where you fight on a tiny board, buy rule-bending Gambits (joker equivalents), board tiles and pieces, and must capture every enemy piece rather than just the king.
Gambonanza launched May 1, 2026 (Steam, iOS, Android) from Blukulele, co-published by Sidekick and Stray Fawn, and sits at Mostly Positive on Steam (about 74-76% of roughly 1,700 reviews; recent reviews ~73%). Critics are split: Metacritic shows a 64 Metascore from 5 reviews, ranging from 90 (DualShockers) to 40 (Destructoid), with a user score of 7.3 from a small sample. Fans enjoy the addictive synergy-building loop, the presentation and the chess-meets-Balatro hook. Detractors find it shallow and unbalanced, with a weak AI, permanent piece loss that discourages trading, and a few dominant builds. It is a full release that still has an active Steam forum with bug reports and difficulty-balance questions, not abandoned, but I found no concrete patch notes in the pages I could read.
Players love
- Strong high-concept hook: Balatro-style run building applied to chess, with Gambits that change piece and board rules (150+ advertised)
- Slick, polished presentation: CRT pixel-art look, smooth animations, catchy music and a clean interface
- Addictive 'one more run' synergy building when a combo lands, e.g. mass-producing pieces or chaining skipped enemy turns
- Easy to pick up for people who only know basic chess moves, and some players say it quietly teaches chess tactics
- Unlockable Gambits and higher difficulties extend replay beyond the first win
- Tiles, enemy modifiers and boss fights add tactical puzzle variety; some reviewers call bosses and tile upgrades the highlight
- Short-session friendly, especially on mobile and Steam Deck
- Mobile and PC versions exist, and several players like the low mobile price
Common complaints
- Enemy AI is weak or effectively random unless it can capture, so the optimal play is often to burn turns and wait for it to blunder a piece
- Permanent loss of captured pieces across the run means trades and sacrifices, the heart of chess, are punished and the economy drains on replacing pieces
- Balance: queens outclass other pieces, duplication and skip-turn Gambits are overpowered, phantom-to-gold tile combos dominate, while many Gambits are weak or rely on 1/3 to 1/5 random triggers
- Crumble mechanic (tiles falling away to end stalling) and some enemy modifiers feel random and can decide or ruin a run
- Unskippable animations and boss cutscenes with no speed-up option make the game feel slow on PC
- Repetition: identical starting board layouts per stage, builds locking in early, low variety in pieces and tiles
- Heavily derivative of Balatro in art, UI, sound and loop, which some reviewers saw as near copy-paste
- Bugs and rough edges reported: achievement and Gambit interaction bugs, lost progress in one review, resolution shared across devices, no cross-save
- Price: several top-voted reviews (85 and 161 helpful votes) say $14.99 on Steam is too high for the content, especially since the mobile version is about $6 and includes a PC copy
Can feel tedious
- Waiting moves and passing turns until the AI hangs a piece, which some players describe as effectively AFK play
- Long unskippable animations, especially the roughly 15-second boss intros, plus a gacha opening delay
- Rerolling the shop and chasing specific pieces or Gambits via gacha RNG to complete a build
- Repetitive runs because stage layouts repeat and the same strong Gambits get picked every time
- Higher difficulties (queen strain and above) that feel more like RNG or forced resets than tactical depth, with Gambits expiring
- Text is small and hard to read on Gambit tooltips
What's unique
- Win condition is capturing every enemy piece, not checkmate, which removes check and pin logic
- Gambits rewrite chess rules and piece behavior, and a reserve system lets you deploy pieces from off the board
- Pieces are a permanent run resource: losing one removes it for the whole run, tying chess tactics to a shop economy
- Tiles on the board (trap, gold, ghost, blessed) plus a crumbling-board timer that forces action
- Gacha, pachinko and slot-style mini-games for acquiring pieces and items
- Mobile-first origin (simultaneous iOS/Android release with a port by Ateo) with a Steam version that has controller and Steam Deck support
Players want
- Add an animation and game speed option or skippable boss cutscenes
- Make the enemy AI play to win and rework the stalling meta (for example make piece loss partial or chance-based, or restore pieces between stages)
- Rebalance the economy, especially strain 2 price and income changes and queen-strain perishable Gambits
- Buff or redesign weak Gambits, reduce low-probability triggers, and nerf the dominant queen/duplication/tile combos
- Add more pieces (e.g. fairy pieces), upgrades, tiles, board layouts and music for replay variety
- Add an undo or confirm-move option, larger or clearer text for tooltips, and cross-save between platforms
Summarised from Steam reviews and community discussion.
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Tier list Part 5 (2026)
Gambonanza is a chess-based roguelike often described as a Balatro-like chess game, with blind-style boards, a shop for jokers-equivalents (gambits), new pieces and board upgrades. He feels the roguelike layer dominates and the chess itself gets lost quickly, leaving him with a muddled in-between design. Randomness, permanent piece loss, hard-to-assemble builds and a dumb random AI annoy him. He enjoys the tutorial, bosses and music, but calls it an inferior chess roguelike to Below the Crown and places it low B.
Liked
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