Playdate review: WarioWare as a gaming handheld

digitaltrends.com:

If WarioWare were a video game system, it would be the Playdate.

Created by Untitled Goose Game publisher Panic, the niche handheld takes the energy of Nintendo’s fast-paced “microgame” series and bottles it up into an unusual piece of hardware. It’s a pint-sized, banana-yellow Game Boy that only runs games with simple black-and-white graphics and is controlled via two buttons, a D-pad, and a crank. Yes, a crank.

Like WarioWare and its five-second minigames, the Playdate’s limitations become its main appeal. The developers creating titles for it are forced to think small, inventing the kind of pocket-sized games that have been all but driven to extinction as handheld devices become as powerful as PCs. It’s a return to gaming’s primordial soup. Those who buy in are subscribing to an alternate dimension where game design branches off from reality thanks to a wacky control gimmick.

The Playdate is a delightful video game handheld that’s perfect for the indie game enthusiast who values fun and creativity above all else. Though for those who don’t fall into that category, it might feel a bit like a pricey inside joke – one that deserves to have its picture in the dictionary right next to the word “niche.”

Just from a visual perspective, I fell in love with the Playdate the moment I unboxed it. From its bright-yellow plastic to its square design, it’s an adorable sight that instantly feels iconic. Even beyond its immediately gratifying aesthetics, I find myself impressed by the quality of the build. Its buttons have a satisfying, plasticky click to them, its miniscule speaker gets surprisingly loud, and the battery lasts longer than you’d expect. It may look like a cheap Tiger Electronics toy from the ’90s, but it’s only