Playdate - new handheld gaming system, with a crank

Video Games
221

Another new game!

Fore! Track is golf in a tank, and is a version of an X68000 indie game Ball und Panzer Golf by a friend of mine.

2 Likes
222

Pilotwings rocketbelt prototype

Free Download at https://gingerbeardman.itch.io/prototypes-for-playdate

Runs at 50fps on device.

Can also be played in the Playdate Simulator.

thrusters

4 Likes
223

Ooh, very cool. Liking the look of that.

224

UPDATE

  1. A new game of mine is out now on Playdate Catalog: Super ICARUS

Score points by flying close to the edge, but not too close! Colliding will drop mines & make things more difficult. Fly through the centre area to regain energy and generate power-ups.

  1. thereā€™s a week long Playdate Catalog sale on March 7th. Three of my games will be on sale.

  2. Community Awards also in March.

  3. Lukas Popeā€™s game Mars After Midnight is out on March 12th

  4. If you donā€™t have a Playdate, theyā€™ve caught up with pre-ordersā€¦ which means you can order one today and itā€™ll ship with a day or two. Easily Iā€™m time to catch the whole March Playdate Bonanza.

1 Like
225

Playdate Community Awards for 2023 have just happened!

Iā€™m happy to receive two awards!

Both currently ON SALE! :money_with_wings:

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226

Congratulations on your awards! :+1:

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227

Congratulations!!:tada::confetti_ball:

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228

New Lucas Pope game released yesterday, itā€™s a typical high quality production!

Last day of sale tomorrow.

What a week! :chart:

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229

Congrats Matt! Sorry Iā€™m late to this. I moved (again) and need to find where I packed my Playdate. Itā€™s somewhere in a pile of boxes.

Looking forward to all the great software. Keep up the great work!

2 Likes
230

Cheers! Iā€™ve just started a Peggle type of game. More soon!

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231

Yo, I LOVE Peggle.

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232

WipEout on Playdate? Yes.

https://twitter.com/gingerbeardman/status/1784654873440473295

2 Likes
233

Very cool.
Just how powerful is the Playdate? Is it as powerful as the PlayStation?

234

Yes, and no.

Playdate is

  • more powerful (CPU, RAM)
  • about the same (sound)
  • less powerful (no GPU, screen updates are a bottleneck)

On average

  • I say itā€™s somewhere between SNES and PS1

Examples

  • itā€™s unlikely Playdate would be able to run Wipeout with textured polygons
  • but it could do filled polygons

But itā€™s still very early days in terms of developers getting the most out of Playdate. I imagine if development studios were working on it the capabilities would be pushed much harder.

Technically they could allow the use of an extra CPU on the WiFi board for use as a DSP or co-processor. Maybe theyā€™ll open that up in future. Would be cool and then it would definitely be PS1 level or higher.

1 Like
235

A flatshaded polygon version of Wipe Out would look rather cool on the playmate!

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The problem is we only have black and white! So it would need to be filled with different patterns or random densities of dots

237

I see. No shades of grey available?

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No. You have to fake them with patterns of dots (dithering).

So itā€™s like Classic Macintosh rather than Game Boy, WonderSwan, Palm Pilot.

1 Like
240

I finally pulled the trigger and ordered one of these despite the hefty cost.
I want to try my hand making some stuff for it after messing with pico-8 on and off for a while. Bit intimidated by the relatively high resolution (compared to pico-8) but will give it a go anyway.

241

I released a version of SameGame thatā€™s a couple of years old the I planned to revisit and dress up but never did or will in future.

1 Like