Playdate is a bizarre wearable gaming system coming up in 2020

By Colin Stevens

Panic Inc., known for its release of Firewatch and the upcoming Untitled Goose, announced Playdate: a bizarre yellow pocket system with cranks and weekly games.

Playdate uses a 2.7-inch black and white screen, 400×240, a d-pad and two front buttons, includes the above-mentioned crank controls, will include twelve new games and is expected to come out in 2020. Teenage Engineering is associated with Panic to design his crank.

The new games are kept secret until they appear on Playdate, but Panic revealed that creators Keita Takahashi (Katamari Damacy), Zach Gage (SpellTower), Bennett Foddy (QWOP) and Shaun Inman (The Last Rocket) are part of those who make games for the device. Some games use the crank only, while others do not use it at all. It can be stored on the side of the device when you are not using it.

An image (included in the slideshow above) shared by Panic showed the title screens of four games: Bennett Foddy Presents Zipper, Crankin's Time Travel Adventure, 360 and Executive Golf DX. Panic also shared a gif on Twitter Demonstration of the operation of the system with Time Travel Adventure, in which a preparer is late for a date and must be set up to get there in time. However, players need to time their movements to get there safely. If he is late, a woman in liquidation surprises him.

The device will be available in early 2020 and will cost $ 149, with the twelve games in Season 1 included in the initial cost. Interested people can register via a waiting list / email on Play.Date to be the first online to preorder the device as soon as it is ready.

To learn more about Panic, check out our article on Firewatch, in which we called the game developed by Campo Santo "amazing": "Firewatch is one of the best walk simulators thanks to its stellar writing, its direction artistic and its dubbing.

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Colin Stevens is a news writer for IGN. Follow on Twitter.