Panic hits pause on the Playdate Stereo Dock, says it’s unlikely we’ll see it anytime quickly

The long-promised Playdate Stereo Dock is formally useless, at the least for now. After many months with the desktop accent stuck in development limbo, Panic has updated the product web page so it now not says it is “coming quickly,” however as a substitute that it’s been placed on pause indefinitely resulting from points with the Bluetooth expertise, the manufacturing facility that dealt with it and the rising prices of resolving all of it. The Stereo Dock, first announced in 2021, was meant to be a charging dock that doubles as a Bluetooth speaker (and pen holder), together with being a cute method to show your Playdate when it’s not in use. However, issues didn’t fairly work out as deliberate.

The Playdate crew mentioned it hit some sudden hurdles in making an attempt to convey the concept to life, and located that “making the Stereo Dock was nearly more difficult than making the Playdate itself.” The assertion explains:

It goes on to say that the crew labored to enhance the expertise, even shopping for the Bluetooth chipset supply code in hopes to repair the problems, to no avail. Whereas there are “a variety of stunning completed prototypes,” Panic says “they weren’t excellent to make use of.” The official replace was foreshadowed in a social media alternate shared on Reddit earlier this month during which Panic’s Cabel Sasser, replying to a query concerning the Stereo Dock’s standing, mentioned it “turned out to be extremely exhausting for plenty of extremely dumb causes” and was placed on pause.

The crew says it’s now turning its focus wholly again to the persevering with manufacturing of the Playdate. There should still be an opportunity that we see the Stereo Dock in some unspecified time in the future down the road, however don’t maintain your breath. “Will it arrive sometime? We nonetheless hope so,” Panic mentioned. “Will it arrive anytime quickly? Unlikely.”