Most games I've played do use it, actually, sometimes when I wish they hadn't. (I really like the crank in many games, but some games go out of their way to use it when they should have stuck to buttons.)
> Their decision to have a greyscale screen also saves them money, instead of a common full color one like those 30$ devkits have.
...but the PlayDate's screen doesn't look like a typical LCD. It looks much closer to e-ink. (E-ink is even better, but the Playdate is maybe ~60% of the way there.)
I did some very quick Googling and it looks like this type of screen, at the PlayDate's size and resolution, costs about $30[1]. If the SOC is indeed $5 we're now at $35 from just those two parts, before assembly or anything.
> You comparing to Nintendo's first-party joycon pricing, I'm not sure you understand how deep walled gardens can be.
But Nintendo also has economies of scale to work with that Panic does not. I've used third party Switch controllers, and they don't feel as nice—I'm paying for quality. (Admittedly I don't love how the PlayDate buttons feel either, they're fine, not Nintendo quality!)
I do agree that the Playdate is a game console, and when you buy a game console you're paying for the cohesive ecosystem. PC gaming is better in basically every way but requires more work. Not much work, to be clear, but some.
I'm not entirely satisfied with my Playdate btw, because I don't love the game library. But it's cute and I really like the software (not the games specifically), I'm a sucker for UIs that are polished to an extreme level.
1: https://www.digikey.com/en/products/detail/sharp-microelectr...