from Hacker News

The Diorama Engine

by grzm on 10/4/23, 8:14 PM with 38 comments

• by ecliptik on 10/4/23, 9:06 PM

  This is for the PlayDate [1], which is a fantastic handheld gaming system.

  Aesthetics really hit a lot of Monument Valley notes and would pair well with the systems crank to rotate the world.

  After reading the devlog and rest of the site I'm not entirely sure what the gameplay is, but looking forward to seeing more.

  1. https://play.date/

• by nightowl_games on 10/4/23, 9:45 PM

  Looks incredible! I was thinking about how to similate a 3d effect on an arduboy at one point. Great job, fun project, love the writeup.

  I'm pretty thumbsdown on the playdate as a disposable good, though.

• by bestouff on 10/5/23, 9:03 AM

  IMO the constant sortings are nearly useless. It just needs to have 4 list of sorted blocks, one for each 90° angle. Then it just re-sorts them all when an object moves (which would be very cheap), or if few objects move it can just paint them dynamically at the right time (also cheap). So at all times it has 4 presorted lists, and it chooses the right one depending on the camera position.

• by ChrisArchitect on 10/4/23, 9:34 PM

  add "for PlayDate" or something to the title for clarity

• by proee on 10/4/23, 9:14 PM

  Estimated ship date for Playdate is end of 2023 (per website). Have there been any updates from the company on this?

• by itronitron on 10/4/23, 8:51 PM

  Very nice aesthetic.