Panic Sold Over 20,000 Playdate Consoles In 20 Minutes

Panic’s new handheld device, Playdate, received 20,000 sales in 20 minutes. Pre-orders will arrive in 2022.

Playdate is an exquisite handheld published by Panic. It is purposely made in a miniature size (74mm × 76mm × 9mm) in order to optimize convenience and portability. The retro-inspiring console only runs black-and-white games. Once players set up the controller, they will receive two new games every week, adding up to a total of 24 free games.

But that’s not all. According to the Playdate website, “We’re lining up more games, and we’re working on cool ways to distribute them.”

Despite its impressively small size, Playdate has everything a console needs. An advanced processor, Wi-Fi, Bluetooth and loudspeaker are all tightly packed into this design. There’s also a crank attached to the side. Players can spin the analog controller to dial in the scenes and actions.

Panic faced some technical issues on the website before the launch. Some customers reported that they couldn’t find their countries for delivery. Others experienced stock tracking errors and were greeted by a “Sold Out” notice when the consoles were still available. The issue was fixed shortly after and didn’t take huge a toll on the sales.

Due to the high demand from the current orders, subsequent pre-order will ship in 2022. “We’ve ordered 20,000 units for 2021, and we’ll make even more for 2022, adjusting production based on demand,” the website wrote.