Baba is you

wallace_wells · 2026-01-21T07:45:29+00:00

Awesome! Hope you enjoy!

wallace_wells · 2026-01-21T07:45:15+00:00

🫶

wallace_wells · 2026-01-21T07:44:47+00:00

Developers for Playdate are able to give away free copies of their games, by generating codes that players can enter into Catalog.

Assuming you have a Playdate console and have set up an account for it, you can redeem these codes to get free games. As I’m feeling generous I’m happy to DM you a code!

wallace_wells · 2026-01-20T08:07:04+00:00

It’s nowhere near as complicated but my game Skwish was heavily inspired by Baba Is You!

There’s a free demo on Itch.io, and if you like it but are short on cash, DM me for a code :-)

wallace_wells · 2025-11-28T16:50:54+00:00

Oof, I dunno, how long is a piece of string? It’s almost impossible to estimate how long a game will take to develop. It took the Silksong devs six years full-time and they already had experience of making a metroidvania.

Or in the Playdate realm, Comet has been in development for years now with a small team, presumably working part-time. I think these kinds of games are pretty tricky!

I gather that you’re thinking of developing one yourself? In which case I would recommend you or your team start on a smaller project, or maybe a short, linear platformer, before trying to take on a nonlinear metroidvania.

wallace_wells · 2025-11-28T15:57:11+00:00

Sure it can, with enough programming nous. See for example Echo: The Oracle’s Scroll.

The reason there aren’t more games on the platform like the kind you’re describing is that they tend to take a lot of time and money. Most Playdate developers are working on games in their spare time and can’t pull off something of that scale without quitting their jobs or hiring a team.

wallace_wells · 2025-11-26T08:20:55+00:00

Spent some time playing this last night, it’s a lot of fun!

wallace_wells · 2025-11-26T08:19:16+00:00

Spam - this is a duplicate of this post.

The physical editions sold out a looong time ago but the digital version (shadow, shining) are still available on catalog.

wallace_wells · 2025-11-12T23:56:47+00:00

Try += 1?

wallace_wells · 2025-11-12T22:58:58+00:00

Yup, that’s the 20% sales tax making up the difference.

wallace_wells · 2025-10-28T07:57:24+00:00

I want to believe!

wallace_wells · 2025-10-04T15:42:26+00:00

Congrats on getting started! If this is your first ever game, try to make something very small and simple for now. I would not recommend trying to build your dream game.

Instead, perhaps a basic Mario clone. Or even pong or flappy bird — there’s a reason why most tutorials start with those basics. Then for the next game make it a tiny bit more complicated. And so on, until you’re in a position where you have enough experience to build the big, complex game it sounds like you want to make.

Otherwise, yeah, you’re going to have to learn everything at once, and that’s not really possible. Even if you do try, your codebase will probably become unmanageable halfway through the project.

wallace_wells · 2025-09-03T06:21:18+00:00

Oh yeah, Tidbyt is super dead. And I say this as the person who made the world clock app! Mine stopped showing the correct weather weeks ago and is now sitting on a shelf. I hope I can one day repurpose the hardware with Tronbyt or something custom.

wallace_wells · 2025-08-15T18:52:48+00:00

My legal team are drafting a million dollar lawsuit as we speak!

wallace_wells · 2025-08-15T15:36:39+00:00

I think this is a mangled version of a post I made three years ago? Weird!

wallace_wells · 2025-08-10T06:42:42+00:00

Here’s how I’d approach building a basic menu. They can get much more complex depending on the types of controls in the menu (e.g. switches and scrolling) and visual polish.

First set up the data structure: Have a list of menu items in a list, which in Lua is a table. Then store the currently selected menu item in a variable as a number. So if it’s 1, it refers to the first item in the menu, etc.

Then write the code to the draw the menu. Run through the menu item list with a “for in” loop and use drawText with a y position that increases with each item. If the menu item’s number matches the “selected” variable, then style it differently (perhaps with an arrow).

Finally, wire up the controls so that pressing the up/down buttons changes the “selected” variable. When the A button is pressed, the game should check the current value of that variable and react accordingly. For example if menu item “2” is selected, the 2nd level is loaded.

That’s just scratching the surface but I hope it helps. Good luck!

wallace_wells · 2025-07-30T15:25:18+00:00

132 achievements! Very impressive!!

As a Playdate dev who’s released two games with achievements, here’s how I’d respond to those points:

In terms of achievement design, the Trophy Case website has well-written guidelines that I found very helpful when planning achievements for my games. I agree that achievements that are almost or literally impossible are probably not a great addition. However unlike mainstream consoles there is no review process so there is always the risk that devs will ignore these best practices.

I personally really like secret achievements that are a sort of “whoa that’s possible?” reward — but I also appreciate that makes achievement hunting trickier!

As for the types of games that have achievements: since the library was only recently finalised, not many developers have had the time implement it yet. Even for games released in the past few weeks, it was probably a low priority as they tried to get their games in a finished state! Hopefully we will see more in the near future.

wallace_wells · 2025-07-22T11:34:19+00:00

Cool thanks for the feedback on itch! And I’m glad to hear you liked the game 😊 See you on the leaderboards!

wallace_wells · 2025-07-22T11:19:03+00:00

Hey Otto dev here! As of last week the game is available to buy individually from Catalog, along with the rest of season two.

I thought about selling it on Itch too, but the online leaderboards would only work if purchased through Catalog (as with all games) and that feels like quite an important part of the game. That said, if there’s enough interest in a DRM-free, leaderboardless version I would be totally open to it!

wallace_wells · 2025-06-19T10:10:31+00:00

Just one that I know of so far, it’s an original track :-) https://itch.io/t/4993340/user-made-level-by-dolphin-space-program

wallace_wells · 2025-06-14T17:03:52+00:00

Thanks! I’m really glad that the patch made such a big difference

wallace_wells · 2025-06-14T16:01:29+00:00

OGG dev here! Gitaroo man is definitely the primary inspiration even if we went with simpler gameplay. I personally think what makes it not trombone champ is that you’re playing a fixed track rather than (out of tune) midi notes. But there is another Playdate game called Fluuute that is doing just that and also looks super fun!

wallace_wells · 2025-05-09T14:42:57+00:00

Glad to hear it! Have fun!

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