The Playdate handheld gaming device with a 1-bit screen and a crank on the side is a cute and quirky device that is very different from other handheld devices. But it’s also been much harder to achieve.
Playdate began accepting pre-orders in mid-2021 and finally began shipping the device almost a year later. Since then, the company has shipped more than 70,000 games. But consumers who placed orders had to wait months for their Playdate to arrive. Now, the company can ship games to consumers within days of placing their order. . . at least when the $199 handheld is in stock (which it is right now).
The company says it has a limited number of items in inventory. Customers who place an order when inventory is low may have to wait a little longer to get their Playdate, but wait times will be much shorter in the future.
In other recent tech news from around the web, Mozilla is laying off people and scaling back some non-core products (including one that launched just last week), Nothing’s next phone launches in early March (and the company has released a developer kit that will let third-party apps tap into the LED lights on the back of its phones), and the developers of Ubuntu Touch have announced planned changes to their release schedule.
Mozilla is laying off another 60 people (about 5% of its employees) and is cutting or removing products like VPNs, Relay (email obfuscation), Hubs (3D virtual world), and Mastodon while continuing on Firefox.
The first Android 15 Developer Preview release could be coming as soon as Feb 15. A stable release isn’t likely before this fall, but once Google begins releasing builds to devs and beta testers, we’ll start to get an idea of what to expect.
The Playdate handheld gaming console is now “in stock,” meaning U. S. consumers who order one get it in about a week (instead of waiting months), while overseas delivery takes 2-4 weeks.
Nada unlocks a Glyph development kit that will allow third-party apps to take advantage of the LED lights on the back of the company’s phones for traditional effects.
Nothing Phone (2a) launches March 5, but it will only be available to customers in the US through a limited “developer program.” Specs and design haven’t been confirmed yet, but expect a cheaper alternative to the Phone (2).
Starting with Ubuntu Touch 24. 04, the UBPorts team plans to move from a semi-continuous release schedule to a steady release schedule with feature updates every 6 months and one-time releases every 2 months for bug fixes and security patches.
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