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400 × 240 1-bit display...and its pushing $200??! even Retroids cheapest pocket at $70 crushes this hipster garbage. what is the appeal of playdate? https://

400 × 240 1-bit display...and its pushing $200??! even Retroids cheapest pocket at $70 crushes this hipster garbage. what is the appeal of playdate? https://www.goretroid.com/ https://www.goretroid.com/

dbeley 5y ago
There are exclusive games made by some famous people in the industry, and it features a new gaming device: a crank.
- nimbius 5y ago
  you could buy two retroids for less than the cost of this novelty garbage and you now have a multiplayer gaming experience and a linux environment with proven SDK's and interoperability but heres the dealbreaker: no crank. Nowhere does Playdate indicate it is anything but single player or that it currently has any games, but im sure 'some famous people' doing stuff is cool too.
  - justwalt 5y ago
    The things have wifi and Bluetooth. Why couldn’t someone write a multiplayer game for the playdate?
  - paulcole 5y ago
    > you could buy two retroids for less than the cost of this Yes! I could buy many assortments of things for the cost of a Playdate but I want a Playdate. It sounds interesting to me in a way that 2 retroids or 200 packs of gum doesn't. > some famous people' doing stuff is cool too. Yes! I find it interesting and a project I'm interested in supporting even if it ends up being disappointing.
  - gpt5 5y ago
    Tell that to Nintendo
  - cpmsmith 5y ago
    Their homepage[1] is pretty up-front about it: > The Season. > Here's the truly unique bit. Playdate isn't just an empty system. Once you set up your Playdate, you'll start to receive two brand new games... every week. For 12 weeks. Having novelty doesn't make it garbage, and yes, paying for 24 new games to get made is generally more expensive than pirating Dreamcast ROMs. [1]: https://play.date/#the_season https://play.date/#the_season
    - nimbius 5y ago
      "The Season" is frankly just a season pass with more steps. until any of these games get made and reviewed, its an empty system that doesnt even ship with a game. FYI: NONE of the games listed on their season page have a release date.
      - kemayo 5y ago
        Granted, this is taking them at their word, but they're certainly claiming that they'll be shipping two of those games every week for the first 12 weeks after the system ships. That's a release date, even if a slightly amorphous one keyed off of a specific event that we don't know the exact timing for yet.
      - philistine 5y ago
        They have failed to adequately explain this detail: the season starts when you power up the machine, delivering two games a week for 12 weeks. So the games release when they first start shipping the first units.
        kemayo 5y ago
        Oh, that's interesting. I had been assuming it'd be a more universal release schedule. I wonder how the people getting their devices after the early orders have already received all the games are going to feel about it.
    - ChrisRR 5y ago
      I'd rather just pay for the games I'm actually interested in
  - teawrecks 5y ago
    A retroid is an off-the-shelf quad core CPU running android and an emulator. The playdate is an actual custom console platform inspired by retro designs. Modern consoles are so powerful that an indie dev is rarely limited in what they can do, which might sound like a good thing, but there's a reason Orson Welles once said, "the enemy of art is the absence of limits". Think of it like a film maker spending more money to use old film/lenses. Yeah, using the phone in their pocket and windows movie maker would be cheaper and higher quality, but that's not the point. I am also very curious what MP experiences will be possible with the WiFi/BT on a retro handheld.
  - emptyparadise 5y ago
    https://hard-drive.net/spend-80-snes-classic-can-install-emulators-raspberry-pi-never-shut-fuck/ https://hard-drive.net/spend-80-snes-classic-can-install-emu...
warglebargle 5y ago
it’s also designed by teenage engineering, which has made a name for itself in high quality niche synthesizers… Panic is also building an SDK and visual editor, and the games are included and time-released, so there’s a lot of software to fund too.
exolymph 5y ago
Wait till you hear about LVMH.
paxys 5y ago
What's the appeal of a Supreme t-shirt, a Star Wars collectable figure, an NFT, a designer handbag? This is simply a famous brand which has looped in famous game creators and media contacts to generate buzz, and they are catering to people with a lot of disposable income who are into consumer tech – so, the exact demographic of this website.
- 1270018080 5y ago
  They're all very soy outside of the handbag. It hits that type of person whose entire identity is consuming.
- no_time 5y ago
  >What's the appeal of (...) an NFT? I genuinely don't get it to this day. I can understand clothing because it's a status symbol and a very visible one usually. I can understand a collectible because its a physical object that atleast looks interesting. An NFT (to me) is a fundamentally flawed concept because it's trying to introduce the concept of ownership into a space that doesn't work like the physical world. Maybe I'm just overthinking and it's yet another money laundering scheme that has some media hype around it.
kemayo 5y ago
This reminds me a lot of the famous Slashdot iPod comment: "No wireless. Less space than a nomad. Lame."[0] ...but, seriously, the selling point is the experience plus some fairly nice fit-and-finish. They're advertising it hard on the inclusion of a season of interesting games from notable developers in the price. Certainly, you could pirate a whole lot of ROMs and play them on that retroid device, but that's a different appeal. [0]: https://slashdot.org/story/01/10/23/1816257/Apple-releases-iPod https://slashdot.org/story/01/10/23/1816257/Apple-releases-i...
- BoorishBears 5y ago
  Let's be real... this isn't an iPod/Dropbox moment. This is every bit as pretentious as it seems, and literally requires a high price attached to it for it's target market... But that's ok! It's no different than a ton of other fields that thrive on a certain level of ironic pricing. It's no different than paying $500 for foam slippers that retailed for $75 that claim to be designed as affordable footwear for the masses and intentionally look as weird as physically possible(Foam Runner) Or spending $200 dollars on a literal clay brick: https://stockx.com/supreme-clay-brick-red https://stockx.com/supreme-clay-brick-red. - This is like the tech version of a Supreme collab. People are even geeking out over Panic being involved in the comments here. Ironically a lot of the people I can picture buying this also look down on that type of thing, but it's all coming from the same roots.
  - kemayo 5y ago
    Yes, I very much doubt that this will be a vast consumer success like the iPod/Dropbox/etc. (Though since they've already sold through their initial run, it's probably going to be a success for Panic! at least.) But the meat of the issue isn't related to ultimate success, it's that the famous Slashdot comment, and the grandparent here, aren't getting the point -- they're caught up in a feature list comparison, and missing the holistic element. The iPod was worse than a Nomad in the metrics people were using to compare MP3 players at the time; it was just also a better product. Of course, telling the difference between a refined product and a pretentious flash in the pan is famously difficult. But that's the theory of why you'd buy the Playdate instead of the Retroid. (My personal take is that it looks fun, and it wouldn't take many of those first 24 included games being decent to get it to a respectable value.)
shaunxcode 5y ago
constrained mediums yield unprecedented content.
- hypertele-Xii 5y ago
  Strangling the artist won't result a masterpiece. And even if it does, it's immoral to do so.
Valkhyr 5y ago
It has a very nice industrial design language and it's whimsical, a combination which appeals to some people I guess. I feel like I mainly see people interested in this who I'd consider casual gamers at most but who are into deep design (UI/UX/ID/Typography). Definitely not my thing though, and I don't get why anybody in the world is interested in a handheld like this when we have the Switch, tons of retro and Windows-handhelds, and above all the Steam Deck being released soon-ish.
AnIdiotOnTheNet 5y ago
I'm with you, I totally don't get the market for this. Then again, I'm an old curmudgeon who can't stand it when kids are playing ForkKnife on his lawn.
hyperionplays 5y ago
Yeah Agree, at that price I'd rather buy the Analogue Pocket... https://www.analogue.co/pocket https://www.analogue.co/pocket
- chronogram 5y ago
  Neat device. I wonder how durable it is compared to the rather kid-proof GBC. I can't find a single bit of prototype footage of it, only the renders.
matwood 5y ago
I mostly agree. I think it looks kinda neat, but not at that price. I remember when all the podcasters were pushing it last year and the buzz died off. Then when the buzz started again recently I thought it had already come out and faded away...guess not.
Tiktaalik 5y ago
Playdate plays new exclusive games by notable, acclaimed indie developers. The games appear on the device like magic through no effort of the user. Retroids plays decades old games and the owner has to scrounge around and find the roms illegally (as it is incredibly unlikely they have the means to rip their own).
- deleted 5y ago
  [deleted]
ant6n 5y ago
That retroid definitely has much worse marketing than the playdate. I read through the retroid website, and don't really know what it is. She sort of Android tablet with physical buttons? The Website mentions ROMs, but for what? Does it like come preloaded with some sort of game boy emulator?
bodge5000 5y ago
I get the feeling this has been incorrectly marketed, purposefully or not. At least for me, this feels like the natural evolution of Pico8 and other fantasy consoles. For that reason, the retroid isn't really comparable, and for that reason the price is worth it to me, even if it is very pricey.
rchaud 5y ago
The appeal is heavily tilted towards the Teenage Engineering branding and design.

dbeley 5y ago

There are exclusive games made by some famous people in the industry, and it features a new gaming device: a crank.

nimbius 5y ago
you could buy two retroids for less than the cost of this novelty garbage and you now have a multiplayer gaming experience and a linux environment with proven SDK's and interoperability but heres the dealbreaker: no crank. Nowhere does Playdate indicate it is anything but single player or that it currently has any games, but im sure 'some famous people' doing stuff is cool too.
- justwalt 5y ago
  The things have wifi and Bluetooth. Why couldn’t someone write a multiplayer game for the playdate?
- paulcole 5y ago
  > you could buy two retroids for less than the cost of this Yes! I could buy many assortments of things for the cost of a Playdate but I want a Playdate. It sounds interesting to me in a way that 2 retroids or 200 packs of gum doesn't. > some famous people' doing stuff is cool too. Yes! I find it interesting and a project I'm interested in supporting even if it ends up being disappointing.
- gpt5 5y ago
  Tell that to Nintendo
- cpmsmith 5y ago
  Their homepage[1] is pretty up-front about it: > The Season. > Here's the truly unique bit. Playdate isn't just an empty system. Once you set up your Playdate, you'll start to receive two brand new games... every week. For 12 weeks. Having novelty doesn't make it garbage, and yes, paying for 24 new games to get made is generally more expensive than pirating Dreamcast ROMs. [1]: https://play.date/#the_season https://play.date/#the_season
  - nimbius 5y ago
    "The Season" is frankly just a season pass with more steps. until any of these games get made and reviewed, its an empty system that doesnt even ship with a game. FYI: NONE of the games listed on their season page have a release date.
    - kemayo 5y ago
      Granted, this is taking them at their word, but they're certainly claiming that they'll be shipping two of those games every week for the first 12 weeks after the system ships. That's a release date, even if a slightly amorphous one keyed off of a specific event that we don't know the exact timing for yet.
    - philistine 5y ago
      They have failed to adequately explain this detail: the season starts when you power up the machine, delivering two games a week for 12 weeks. So the games release when they first start shipping the first units.
      - kemayo 5y ago
        Oh, that's interesting. I had been assuming it'd be a more universal release schedule. I wonder how the people getting their devices after the early orders have already received all the games are going to feel about it.
  - ChrisRR 5y ago
    I'd rather just pay for the games I'm actually interested in
- teawrecks 5y ago
  A retroid is an off-the-shelf quad core CPU running android and an emulator. The playdate is an actual custom console platform inspired by retro designs. Modern consoles are so powerful that an indie dev is rarely limited in what they can do, which might sound like a good thing, but there's a reason Orson Welles once said, "the enemy of art is the absence of limits". Think of it like a film maker spending more money to use old film/lenses. Yeah, using the phone in their pocket and windows movie maker would be cheaper and higher quality, but that's not the point. I am also very curious what MP experiences will be possible with the WiFi/BT on a retro handheld.
- emptyparadise 5y ago
  https://hard-drive.net/spend-80-snes-classic-can-install-emulators-raspberry-pi-never-shut-fuck/ https://hard-drive.net/spend-80-snes-classic-can-install-emu...

warglebargle 5y ago

it’s also designed by teenage engineering, which has made a name for itself in high quality niche synthesizers… Panic is also building an SDK and visual editor, and the games are included and time-released, so there’s a lot of software to fund too.

exolymph 5y ago

Wait till you hear about LVMH.

paxys 5y ago

What's the appeal of a Supreme t-shirt, a Star Wars collectable figure, an NFT, a designer handbag? This is simply a famous brand which has looped in famous game creators and media contacts to generate buzz, and they are catering to people with a lot of disposable income who are into consumer tech – so, the exact demographic of this website.

1270018080 5y ago
They're all very soy outside of the handbag. It hits that type of person whose entire identity is consuming.
no_time 5y ago
>What's the appeal of (...) an NFT? I genuinely don't get it to this day. I can understand clothing because it's a status symbol and a very visible one usually. I can understand a collectible because its a physical object that atleast looks interesting. An NFT (to me) is a fundamentally flawed concept because it's trying to introduce the concept of ownership into a space that doesn't work like the physical world. Maybe I'm just overthinking and it's yet another money laundering scheme that has some media hype around it.

kemayo 5y ago

This reminds me a lot of the famous Slashdot iPod comment: "No wireless. Less space than a nomad. Lame."[0] ...but, seriously, the selling point is the experience plus some fairly nice fit-and-finish. They're advertising it hard on the inclusion of a season of interesting games from notable developers in the price. Certainly, you could pirate a whole lot of ROMs and play them on that retroid device, but that's a different appeal. [0]: https://slashdot.org/story/01/10/23/1816257/Apple-releases-iPod https://slashdot.org/story/01/10/23/1816257/Apple-releases-i...

BoorishBears 5y ago
Let's be real... this isn't an iPod/Dropbox moment. This is every bit as pretentious as it seems, and literally requires a high price attached to it for it's target market... But that's ok! It's no different than a ton of other fields that thrive on a certain level of ironic pricing. It's no different than paying $500 for foam slippers that retailed for $75 that claim to be designed as affordable footwear for the masses and intentionally look as weird as physically possible(Foam Runner) Or spending $200 dollars on a literal clay brick: https://stockx.com/supreme-clay-brick-red https://stockx.com/supreme-clay-brick-red. - This is like the tech version of a Supreme collab. People are even geeking out over Panic being involved in the comments here. Ironically a lot of the people I can picture buying this also look down on that type of thing, but it's all coming from the same roots.
- kemayo 5y ago
  Yes, I very much doubt that this will be a vast consumer success like the iPod/Dropbox/etc. (Though since they've already sold through their initial run, it's probably going to be a success for Panic! at least.) But the meat of the issue isn't related to ultimate success, it's that the famous Slashdot comment, and the grandparent here, aren't getting the point -- they're caught up in a feature list comparison, and missing the holistic element. The iPod was worse than a Nomad in the metrics people were using to compare MP3 players at the time; it was just also a better product. Of course, telling the difference between a refined product and a pretentious flash in the pan is famously difficult. But that's the theory of why you'd buy the Playdate instead of the Retroid. (My personal take is that it looks fun, and it wouldn't take many of those first 24 included games being decent to get it to a respectable value.)

shaunxcode 5y ago

constrained mediums yield unprecedented content.

hypertele-Xii 5y ago
Strangling the artist won't result a masterpiece. And even if it does, it's immoral to do so.

Valkhyr 5y ago

It has a very nice industrial design language and it's whimsical, a combination which appeals to some people I guess. I feel like I mainly see people interested in this who I'd consider casual gamers at most but who are into deep design (UI/UX/ID/Typography). Definitely not my thing though, and I don't get why anybody in the world is interested in a handheld like this when we have the Switch, tons of retro and Windows-handhelds, and above all the Steam Deck being released soon-ish.

AnIdiotOnTheNet 5y ago

I'm with you, I totally don't get the market for this. Then again, I'm an old curmudgeon who can't stand it when kids are playing ForkKnife on his lawn.

hyperionplays 5y ago

Yeah Agree, at that price I'd rather buy the Analogue Pocket... https://www.analogue.co/pocket https://www.analogue.co/pocket

chronogram 5y ago
Neat device. I wonder how durable it is compared to the rather kid-proof GBC. I can't find a single bit of prototype footage of it, only the renders.

matwood 5y ago

I mostly agree. I think it looks kinda neat, but not at that price. I remember when all the podcasters were pushing it last year and the buzz died off. Then when the buzz started again recently I thought it had already come out and faded away...guess not.

Tiktaalik 5y ago

Playdate plays new exclusive games by notable, acclaimed indie developers. The games appear on the device like magic through no effort of the user. Retroids plays decades old games and the owner has to scrounge around and find the roms illegally (as it is incredibly unlikely they have the means to rip their own).

deleted 5y ago
[deleted]

ant6n 5y ago

That retroid definitely has much worse marketing than the playdate. I read through the retroid website, and don't really know what it is. She sort of Android tablet with physical buttons? The Website mentions ROMs, but for what? Does it like come preloaded with some sort of game boy emulator?

bodge5000 5y ago

I get the feeling this has been incorrectly marketed, purposefully or not. At least for me, this feels like the natural evolution of Pico8 and other fantasy consoles. For that reason, the retroid isn't really comparable, and for that reason the price is worth it to me, even if it is very pricey.

rchaud 5y ago

The appeal is heavily tilted towards the Teenage Engineering branding and design.