Sideloading Playdate games

Anyone can sell or share their Playdate code and compiled games any way they wish. You could sell a Playdate game on your website, through an online game store, or another digital-goods marketplace. Playdate owners can sideload these games over a USB connection; or wirelessly, through our website.

Sideloading through the Playdate website

NOTE: Sideloading wirelessly is only available if you have a Playdate device registered on your account. Otherwise there’s no device to, well, sideload to.

The easiest option for most people will be to sideload a game wirelessly through the Playdate website. Here’s how you’d do that:

Log in to your Playdate Account at play.date.
Go to your Account page.
Go to the Sideload page.
Drag or select the .pdx game file (or zipped .pdx) to upload it.

The game will be uploaded to your Playdate account and become available to any Playdate you’re logged in on. Next:

Go to Settings on your Playdate.
Go to Games.
Refresh the list (this may happen automatically) and find the game you uploaded.
That’s it! Even if you reset your Playdate, or get a new one, you’ll be able to download this game from our server.

Sideloading over a USB connection

This option is primarily meant to be used by game developers.

Download the Playdate SDK.
Connect your Playdate to your computer via USB cable.
Unlock your Playdate.
Run your game in the Playdate Simulator by opening the .pdx file (not a zip file).
Choose Upload Game to Device from the Simulator’s Device menu. After the game is uploaded to your Playdate, it will start running automatically. The game will remain on your Playdate.

Data Disk mode

Alternatively, you can put your Playdate in “data disk” mode without installing the Playdate SDK. This will let you access its filesystem and copy the game file over.

NOTE: It’s possible to break the software on your Playdate by accessing the files on it directly. Please proceed carefully.

There are two ways to do this. One is:

Attach your Playdate to your computer via USB cable.
On your Playdate, go to Settings.
Go to the System section.
Choose Reboot to Data Disk and confirm.

Alternatively:

Attach your Playdate to your computer via USB cable.
On your Playdate, press and hold the following three buttons at the same time: Left, Lock (top edge of your Playdate), and Menu (round button in the top-right corner).
Hold the three buttons for a few seconds, until the screen reads Sharing DATA segment as USB drive.

Whichever way you used to put your Playdate in data disk mode, do this next:

On your computer, open the newly mounted PLAYDATE volume.
Open the Games folder.
Place the .pdx (not a zip file) into the Games folder.
Unmount the PLAYDATE volume.
The game should now be available on your Playdate.

Duplicate games?

If you sideload multiple versions of the same game, only the latest version will be available on your device. However, if you sideloaded through the Playdate website before February 2023, later versions of the game will appear as a new game. This is due to a change we made to how the games’ unique identifiers are handled, which will improve sideloading. If you want to remove the duplicate game:

Log in to your Playdate Account at play.date.
Go to your Account page.
Go to the Sideload page.
Click on both instances of the game and find the one with the older build.
On the older build, choose Delete and confirm.

Both versions will still be on your device. If you don’t need any saved data from the older version of the game:

Go to Settings on your Playdate.
Go to Games.
Refresh the list (this may happen automatically) and find the older version of the game you uploaded under MY GAMES.
The newer version will be listed higher on the list, and the older version will be below it.
Select the older version, choose Delete and confirm.

But if you have saved game data from the old version and you want to copy it over to the new version of the game, you can do that manually:

First, attach your Playdate to your computer via USB cable and put it in Data Disk mode as described above.
Open the Data folder. Note: You will need to launch the new copy of this game at least one time on your Playdate before the Data folder will appear.
Find the two versions of the game. The old one will be named user.XXXX.gameID and the newer will be something like user.XXXX.com.developer.gameID. Copy all the contents from the old version’s folder to the newer version’s folder.
Unmount the PLAYDATE volume.
You are now free to delete the old version from your device as described above.