Compiling a game using the SDK

In the last article, I referenced two resources that I planned to use:

• This video by SquidGod
• Playdate's official SDK documentation

SquidGod's video

• I downloaded the SDK
• I downloaded the Github repo

But...all these files and instructions are for a Windows PC.

I'm on a Mac.

Inside Playdate document

Section 3.3 is about compiling a game.

It references a tool called pdc that is installed with the SDK.

I figured I would try using it in my Terminal to confirm I had it.

A common action in programs is to check the version number:

> pdc --version

I saw 1.13.0!

Success: I have and can use the necessary Playdate Compiler!

Compiling and running the Playdate Template game

Per the documentation:

• I need to use pdc to generate a pdx folder
• I do that by passing two arguments to pdc: 1. the source folder of the game's code, 2. a name for the pdx folder

The formula looks like this:

$ pdc MyGameSource MyGame.pdx

Inside VSCode, from the Terminal pane, I ran this command:

$ pdc ./source game.pdx

It successfully created the folder.

I opened it with Playdate Simulator.

I saw this:

I did it!

• I used the pdc command line tool to generate an executable pdx file that opened in the Playdate Simulator!
• I understood the official Inside Playdate documentation enough to accomplish my task!
• I'm well on my way to writing Lua code that I can compile into simple, silly Playdate games!