Panic recovers stolen Playdates worth $400,000 after lots of 'detective work'

Panic has recovered a bunch of stolen Playdates worth $400,000 after the purloined consoles were hastily dumped near a random restaurant.

"Did you hear the story about how $400k worth of Playdates were misdelivered by FedEx to a construction site near our warehouse? And then someone just... stole them? Seriously. Well, guess what got hastily dumped at a random restaurant this morning? Welcome back stolen Playdates!" tweeted Panic.

"More details—and likely a very good Playdate Podcast episode—in the future. For now, this was our best possible outcome, the result of lots of time and detective work. (Which, ok fine, we enjoyed.) The real question is, can we sell these as a limited edition? Playdate Hot™."

The stolen Playdate saga

We first learned about the apparent heist at GDC 2024. Panic co-founder Cabel Sasser went on a surprising sojourn during his GDC talk to explain four pallets of Playdate stock had vanished after being dispatched from the company's shipping center in Las Vegas. The company initially managed to retrieve two pallets, but the other two remained unaccounted for.

"We checked up on our inventory levels and it was a little bit short, and we contacted the shipping center and they're like 'yeah, weird. FedEx said they were delivered but we have no trace of them,'" said Sasser.

"'But another thing that you might want to know about that's weird, is that two weeks after your pallets went missing, two other pallets were delivered by FedEx to the construction site next door instead of our shipping warehouse.'"

Sasser said Panic knew the serial numbers of every missing unit, and noted that seven consoles had been registered to people who live in north Las Vegas.

The company is keeping its cards close to its chest when discussing how, exactly, it solved the whodunnit, but it seems the perps might have been foiled by an insatiable urge to crack open a few boxes and start cranking.

"Who said no boxes were opened and no Playdate systems were missing or sold? More on that in the inevitable podcast/write-up, as it’s a crucial part of how we got these back," said the company, replying to an X user who asked whether all the devices had been returned.

Underlining the importance of finding the missing consoles, Panic explained its insurance policy likely wouldn't have covered the theft. "We haven't written them off of inventory yet, and we never filed an insurance claim," it continued. "We're not even sure our insurance would cover this. So you can imagine we're glad they're back."