, the Playdate crank is absolutely a novelty, and it is incredibly effective. Most of the games rely on it in some way or another. Some of them do so in ways that feel creative and intuitive:-style surfing game, lets you move up and down a wave by turning the crank, and spin yourself to do tricks in the air. Other games force the issue: A circularforces you to spin the crank to move your paddle around a circular track.
Panic claims Playdate should last through 8 hours of active use, or up to 14 days in standby mode. That’s incredible, given the small size of the device and how I found myself playing it in 10-15 minute bursts. It charges via a USB-C port on the bottom of the device.Casual Birder’s virtual camera is one of the more interesting uses of the Playdate crankThe Playdate game library features 24 games, which you’ll get in sets of two over the course of your first 12 weeks of owning the console.
In fact, whimsical would probably be the best single word to describe the entire playdate lineup. Many of the games have either well-crafted writing and/or an especially pointed layer of ambient storytelling., a satirical match-three game about packing and shipping boxes in a warehouse, has a punch and a message about overly demanding workplaces that you wouldn’t normally expect., a resource management game about running a potion shop, also finds ways to inject small jokes into every moment.
With no store or platform to distribute Playdate games, it seems safe to assume that whatever support Playdate receives will come mostly from the far indie fringes—first-time game-makers and people with simple, story-driven ideas. It could be an incredible place for aspiring game developers to flourish, or it could be worthless to players.
Great writeup, bombur. Might be worth mentioning that there are already a few great playdate games available on itchio - I recommend puzzlers Shift and Skwish. The sideloading process via is super seamless and can even be done from your mobile phone!
How to sideload Playdate games from your iPhone.
I put together a little video on how to sideload playdate games from an iPhone. Same should be true for Android phones.