That's like saying you could play PICO-8 games on anything, because it's true, but the point is to impose limitations, not to make something you could never theoretically do with another device.

Like think about the PICO-8 version of Celeste, which can run inside the main game, but which never would have been made if the PICO-8 didn't exist, and all the other games made for that platform that wouldn't exist if that fantasy console had never been invented.

This is similar - by creating a console with very limited resources and I/O, you create a very limited set of expectations, and then it's easy to make games for it because Skyrim or whatever just isn't an option, so more people can make those games.

[–] [email protected] 3 points 4 days ago (4 children)

You're kind of arguing against yourself, here. If the point is to impose limitations in order to reduce choice exhaustion and foster creativity, then portable software like PICO-8 can do that just as well as a physical device, and creators will have a much larger potential audience.

I've often daydreamed (I'm sure I'm not alone) of making various kinds of electronic entertainment devices with very low specs as a challenge/creativity booster to myself and other creators. But I always come back to the realization that it makes much more sense, in a world where almost everyone has a powerful computing device with plenty of storage and a responsive colour display in their pocket, and constant Internet access, to implement them as software rather than hardware.

A handful of people may be excited enough by the physicality of a device like this that they'll buy it, but many more people will pass it by. Look at the proliferation of games for software-based formats like PICO-8, Bitsy, Inform, and Twine, compared to development on purely physical "low spec" devices like the PlayDate. Even real vintage systems are starting to become software-based formats; new games developed for them these days will often include an "emulator-friendly" version if they do anything particularly tricky with the original hardware.

[–] [email protected] 1 points 4 days ago (3 children)

It should be trivial to run the software on other devices because it will be so low-powered, so that problem disappears.

In fact you literally said so yourself. Is that a point in the system's favour or isn't it?

If the physical device is also cheap then I think this could easily take off.

[–] ApollosArrow 2 points 4 days ago (1 children)

I think you’re forgetting the thing that is also stopping me from doing a lot of random ideas myself. It’s an extra thing to carry.

I often think “man it would be great to use my sp again”, but I can just emulate on delta on my iPhone. It’s the reason I don’t have the PlayDate and why I also don’t have a dumbphone connected to my iPhone even though I’ve thought about it as well. People want to reduce instead of adding more. It’s the reason it still drives me crazy I have 5 remotes for my TV. People just prefer to get a device that can do the most. Hell my parents in their older age are now to the point they don’t care about PCs anymore, they just have a tablet they can add a keyboard to if they want.

All this is not to say this shouldn’t exist. But if it does I really do hope they take full advantage of the setup and do try to innovate and make creative games that would only exist there.

[–] [email protected] 1 points 3 days ago (1 children)

Then you are not the target market. Idk what to tell you, your personal opinion doesn't invalidate the whole concept.

[–] ApollosArrow 2 points 3 days ago

Isn’t that kind of how I ended my whole comment?

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