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*edit adding the review link: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZGdP59hhiDg *

This thing, I'll never forget John Gruber saying "The story is about Playdate, the most amazing and exciting product announcement, for me, since the original iPhone." I don't know if I could roll my eyes harder without getting a headache. Is this thing some sort of techie inside joke?

Then reviewers get their hands on them. Metal Jesus on YouTube recently got to test one and it confirmed everything I needed to know. It's expensive. The screen isn't backlit so you've got OG gameboy issues. And it's a complete chore to hold. He was complaining about hand cramps after a little bit of play time. And the screen resolution is so low that some of the gameplay is hindered.

But it has a hand crank: https://i.imgur.com/wBmESKj.jpg

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This is the John Gruber article you're talking about (from May 2019):

https://daringfireball.net/2019/05/playdate

I just read the article expecting (based on your tone) to see Gruber making grand predictions about the Playdate being a massive success or having a massive impact. But no, it's very clear in the article that he's just personally excited about it. He doesn't make any grandiose predictions or even really attempt to persuade other people that they should be similarly excited about it. Clearly he just thinks it's neat for a small software company to develop their own affordable consumer electronics hardware. He's even explicit about thinking the product will likely be playing in a relatively small market: "Panic is almost cheating in a way because they’re tiny. The Playdate platform isn’t competing with the state of the art." I don't see any reason to roll your eyes about this one.

Here is a great image (from the Ars Technica review) showing how utterly bullshit the comparisons with the original Gameboy screen are: https://cdn.arstechnica.net/wp-content/uploads/2021/07/IMG_1...

Since you mentioned reviewers getting their hands on Playdates: doubtless they're out there, but ("Metal Jesus", whatever that is, notwithstanding) I don't think I've seen a single net negative review from any source I previously considered anywhere close to reputable. Everyone is, of course, entitled to their opinion—but as someone who presumably hasn't actually used a Playdate yourself, I don't think you're making much effort to keep yours objective.

>"Metal Jesus", whatever that is, notwithstanding

I don't quite have a dog in the race of Playdate, but I do want to note that MetalJesusRocks is in fact a legitmate and longstanding video game reviewer, over a decade old by now. He's not qiute a pre-Google YT era reviewer, but he's close.

I don't have any particular attachment to him nor his opinion, but I have watched a few of his reviews over the years. Particularly a few Vita game reviews (he's given more focus to portable/handheld games that other reviewers). His name definitely betrays his presentation (asusmedly because the channel, in actual pre-Google days, had some music coverage).

I think the flood of hot-take Steam Deck reviews has given me handheld console clickbait fatigue. I saw the title and thumbnail for this video on my YT feed, and immediately blacklisted the channel. Maybe it's a fine review; I definitely understand why YT creators do this (money) but it still leaves a bad taste in my mouth, and I tend to find that it correlates with lower quality content.

Yeah, that is unfortunate. But as full time creators they basically have to follow the trends, because it's not just about others getting ahead; Google actively punishes and hides your content for not doing so, even to people already subscribed to you (because YT had to make subscriptions 2 tier by default).

But I'm sure I'm speaking to the choir in terms of Google's scary control over the internet and lack of alternatives in several fields.

Agreed. He is a real, known, video game YouTuber. I think he focuses more on retro than present day.

The video review linked by the GP does state that the screen has better quality than the DMG (Game Boy) one, showing even a comparison image similar to the one you posted from Ars Technica. The Playdate screen has nevertheless visibility issues under low light conditions due to the lack of backlight, just like the early Game Boy consoles.

Of course, and backlit screens have issues with visibility under high light conditions due to the backlight. I live most of my life in well lit environments, and sleep most of the time when it is dark.

It's trivially obvious that an unlit screen will be unusable in the dark. However, the original Game Boy's screen was practically unusable in the light, too.

Maybe the comparison just rubs me the wrong way because I actually had one and played games on it, and I remember how fucking terrible it was. Even the Pocket was a quantum leap in usability. It just isn't useful to compare the original's screen with anything resembling a modern reflective LCD, except to illustrate just how far the technology has come.

eInk displays aren't supposed to need backlights; LCDs need them because they just wash out if you light them from above, but eInk doesn't have that problem.

Playdate is some kind of "memory LCD" that's more like eInk, but I don't know how much like it.

Memory LCD is nothing like eInk except being lower power. It's an LCD screen but each pixel has a bit of memory with its state so it doesn't need to refresh if it hasn't changed. It still has all the optical properties of LCD. This is still a reflective LCD. It's better than the 30 year old one in the Game Boy but it's still a reflective LCD.

The thing that I think some folks miss about the Playdate is that it’s not just a device meant to play a catalog of high budget polished games. It’s not necessarily for the masses.

It’s also a platform and developer ecosystem explicitly made to get new/interested devs involved in game development with documented support for side loading.

I preordered early on, and haven’t gotten mine yet, but I bought in to the idea because I love to tinker and have always wanted to dabble with game dev. I like the possibility that there will be many others like me, trying similar things on the same exact hardware, opening up opportunities for community and collaboration.

I have yet to see if my excitement is warranted, but I thought it was worth mentioning that some people are not as focused on the end product as they are on the community, ecosystem and tinkering opportunities it enables.

I've been playing around with the Playdate SDK, and it's pretty darn simple for the most part (the documentation could be better, but it mostly gets the job done). I have a working version of my Pico-8 game that I ported in a couple of days (the core gameplay loop at least), including crank functionality.

The code is basically just Lua with some extra Playdate specific bits. This tutorial helped me get up and running:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=J0ufxinp7No

The hardest bit for me so far has been how to make graphics look halfway decent in 1-bit, especially when I'm not much of an artist. Still haven't figured that bit out. I'm just drawing polygons and text on the screen right now programatically. Works okay for the core gameplay, but I'm struggling more with menus.

> The code is basically just Lua with some extra Playdate specific bits.

Now I'm interested in this device. I absolutely love working with Lua and I'd do anything to help that language spread.

trying similar things on the same exact hardware, opening up opportunities for community and collaboration.

The Gameboy homebrew community would provide that for you, with the added benefit of a much larger potential userbase.

Playdate games can be played online through the browser, I think.

The Playdate has WAY more CPU power, WAY more RAM, WiFi, storage, and drastically better sound. Plus a crank!

No need mor mapper chips or other complications.

I like that they kept limitations like having a black and white screen (not greyscale ala GB), and a smaller resolution. so there are still creative constraints. But a lot of the software constraints no longer exist so it’s more approachable.

As someone who's been really wanting to make a Gameboy port of one of my games and also played with PlayDate dev, PlayDate has been much easier to get up and running with it. Gameboy has been difficult enough (although it has gotten a lot easier with the gb dev kit, it's still not easy) I haven't gotten very far with it yet.

I think that's great, but how accessible is that community? How high is the barrier to entry? Genuinely interested because I'll probably spend some time dabbling there.

I don't think this needs to be an either/or conversation though.

I like the comparison to the iPhone, because for all it's done, the iPhone has effectively likely annihilated a generation worth of fun gadgetry. Nearly literally every available cell phone is an iPhone clone.

> the iPhone has effectively likely annihilated a generation worth of fun gadgetry

This just doesn’t ring true. It’s a golden age of fun gadgetry. It’s easier than ever before to combine off the shelf components (e.g. ESP8266) with a myriad of sensors and other devices. Can you expand on what you mean and what you’re referring yo?

You seem to be implying that the Playdate will annihilate a generation of gaming gadgetry? I also don’t understand this when there’s a rich ecosystem of gadgetry all focused on various forms of gaming. Granted, most of those are focused on emulation, but the hardware is capable of more.

It's easier than ever to experiment with off the shelf components if you're interested in that stuff for its own sake or you have very specific niche goals, but smartphones have annihilated the need for a generation worth of fun gadgetry. You don't need an MP3 player, a pager, a camcorder, a handheld video game console, a PDA, a voice recorder, a walkie talkie, a GPS device, a remote control, a calculator, etc. because your smartphone can do all of those things (and you're already carrying your smartphone anyway!). I think that's what people mean when people say "the iPhone annihilated a generation worth of fun gadgetry."

I didn't mean "the Playdate will do the same thing" but I stand by the thing you quoted; I was more interested in OPs excitement, as in: There's nothing exciting in gadgets anymore because of the iPhone, now there is.

Yes, it's easier than ever, but you'll also have fewer reasons than ever to actually do it, as most usecases for gadgets are already perfectly served by an off-the-shelf smartphone.

"Perfectly?"

Oh, HELL no.

On a smaller level, quality suffers when you only have a brick and a touchscreen, too many activities are improved by better tactile controls.

Also, quite a bit of those experiences are clunky due to intrusive software, notifications, etc. E.g. Personally I absolutely hate trying to listen to music on a cellphone, I don't want interruptions and I want to easily adjust song/volume without looking.

Perhaps the biggest point: You can do NOTHING on a cellphone without being surveilled while doing it.

Regarding adjusting song/volume without looking, you can obviously adjust the volume with the volume buttons, but if you have an Android you can also change tracks with a long-press of the volume buttons, even when the screen is locked. I use a sideloaded app that uses an ADB-only permission that makes this possible (see link). I'm not sure why this isn't a native feature.

https://github.com/Incineroar/skipTrackLongPressVolume

In all fairness, it's not like the handheld gadgetry from non-Nintendo in the 2000's/90's were some hidden gems. Sony had some quality systems (the Xperia Play not withstanding), but then there was "okay" stuff like the Neo Geo or the Sega Nomad that were neat but not very competitive. And then you get to the depressing tech like the Atari Lynx or the N-gage and understand exactly why a decent Smartphone can pretty much eclipse the market.

The Steam Deck does give me hope of the next form of this market, however. The portable "gaming" PC. I've been invested in this market since the GPD Win and I hope Valve's iteration ushers a new age of handheld competition. Still won't compete with the Switch, but I'm fine being in a "niche" and catered to

In terms of gaming, you've decided to highlight all the competitors to the champion: Nintendo. You want fun portable gaming, there's no other player.

But I think OP was thinking more in terms of other things the iPhone destroyed, like camcorders, cameras, PDAs, GPS navigation systems, etc.

You need light to see it yes, but that screen is nowhere near OG gameboy issues

The screen isn’t a normal LCD but a Sharp Memory device - https://www.adafruit.com/product/4694

Is that the same technology as RLCD, or is it a different type of display?

Pretty much. Memory LCD adds a bit of memory to each pixel so it doesn't need to refresh if it hasn't changed. Otherwise the same.

Thanks! I found a whitepaper describing the tech: https://www.sharpmemorylcd.com/resources/Polarizer-free_Refl...

In terms of display properties it's in a pretty sweet spot between eink (electrophoretic displays) and conventional RLCD. Slightly lower contrast than conventional RLCD but much better reflectance (roughly on par with eink).

Yeah. Not sure if the parent commenter had an original Gameboy as a kid, because if they did they wouldn't throw that comparison around so inflationarily...

I had an original gameboy. So it's not exactly the same type of torture, but in 2022 not having backlighting is kind of a joke.

It's a weird niche device with weird niche games, I'm not planning to buy one but I'm happy to see people doing something interesting instead of all chasing the same mass market. There's a certain retro appeal to the "shades of gray like a gameboy" screen without the part where it's impossible to see in 90% of lighting conditions.

It's not even shades of grey, it's black and white only (on or off). This means it's very high contrast and the white pixels are very reflective.

They tout the system as having "a very special black and white screen – not backlit, but super reflective – that looks way more amazing than you're probably imagining".

If it is the kind of display I am imagining (which I think is different from the one they claim I probably am), then that display will probably look much better than an equivalent backlit displays.

It's just not usable in low lighting conditions, which is a tradeoff I can imagine them accepting, and customers as well. Though unlike an original Gameboy, and more like a common book, a crappy bedside lamp will likely suffice.

At first I thought that you could charge the batteries through the hand crank. Does anyone know if it would be throetically possible to fit something like that into such a small enclosure? I actually have an electronic game toy from when I was a teen that has a hand crank. If anyone wants to see a pic of it let me know.

Yes, it's possible. The components needed are very small. However I think it would risk people damaging their device (or their fingers) by trying to crank-charge the batteries too zealously.

I think that was one of their original ideas.

On top of your reason I think the problem was when they looked into it it was incredibly impractical to actually charge the device that way. You just couldn’t generate enough electricity with such a small crank.

I mean if you had the crank for 10 minutes and it would only charge the little battery in that thing 1%, would it be worth it? That’s the impression I got.

This is what I thought it would be for, I have a small radio with a similar crank and it should be possible to power it that way. The designers probably considered it and I wonder why they didn’t do it.

Pretty sure the gearing and/or flywheel spinning required to actually reasonably charge a device like this would make using it as a gaming input mostly useless. If you've tried any of those hand crank devices, they take quite a bit of force to get going.

A radio compared to an ARM chip with a display for gaming are not in the same hemisphere of power needs. You simply cannot power a system like that through a crank.

It clocks in at 2.74 Wh (740 mAh @ 3.7V).

https://www.ifixit.com/Teardown/Playdate+Teardown/143811

Assume 75% usable charge that’s about 2Wh. Ads say 8 hour active time so you’d need to make 0.25 W to power it.

Say the crank is about 0.1m and you turn it at once per second, 6 radians per second, your force needs to be roughly half a newton when accounting for losses. Half a Newton is about the weight of two AA batteries. So it’s perfectly achievable to keep it running, but we’d have to really think about how much you can output with a hand crank. You wouldn’t want to crank it and try to play at the same time, so you’d be cranking to charge and then play.

I found here many crank chargers useful for charging phones and some with as high as 20W output. The ones that are small and cheap can do 1A, 4W, but that would be plenty. 15 minutes of cranking would give 4 hours of play time.

https://housegrail.com/best-hand-crank-generators/

> 15 minutes of cranking would give 4 hours of play time.

Ok that doesn't sound fun at all.

But here are the bigger problems:

> https://housegrail.com/best-hand-crank-generators/

Those things are fucking huge -- you are comparing some junk ass Ali Express device to proposing actually integrating in the product. Could you find a cheaply and readily available mass produced motor/dynamo that would fit in this 9mm thick form factor and still produce enough power? And at the end of the day the only reason that a device like this is possible for them is they can basically build around easily sourceable, highly integrated parts - The only thing really custom on this is the shell/mechanicals - and that probably blew the majority of their design budget. Spending 10s of thousands for a custom micro dynamo for a dumb feature doesn't seem like well placed priorities. Also, you would have to integrate this without interfering or degrading the primary function of the crank.

And the thing is, it’s made by Panic. A company, that aside from like one piece of software, is absolute garbage at supporting anything they sell.

I wouldn’t own another Panic product if they paid me.

Ok apart from Prompt, what did they ever do for us?

Firewatch.

Ok, Prompt and Firewatch.

And Untitled Goose Game.

Ok, apart from Prompt, Firewatch, and Untitled Goose Game.

…

> Firewatch, and Untitled Goose Game

Both were only published by Panic, not developed. They had barely anything to do with how the games were made.

oh lol. They “published” those games for other companies. Panic did the best job ever by staying the heck out of the way.

Panic sucks.

Which software have they supported poorly? I’ve had nothing but good experiences with them. And even when they’ve had to retire an app, they’re usually super transparent about the reasoning.

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