If I understand your question, it is not mutually exclusive, and there are physical devices that can run Pico-8, for instance, GameShell and RaspiBoy. Certainl

If I understand your question, it is not mutually exclusive, and there are physical devices that can run Pico-8, for instance, GameShell and RaspiBoy. Certainly, you can build your custom device. Still, it is sort of derailing the original intention if you are making a game or participating in the demoscene and would like to focus on the development (or learning) aspect rather than porting and hardware. Game development is already hard. It could be a nice cherry on top to run it on the physical device; however, emulators are great to get started.