Another short and sweet Playdate game utilizing only the crank, Flipper Lifter puts you in control of an elevator system utilized by a colony of penguins. The elevator moves up or down by turning the crank, and you need to get the penguins to their desired floor before they get frustrated and storm off. There's no progression to this game, it's an arcade-style system where you try to move as many penguins as possible before time elapses. The difficulty comes as the number of possible floors increases over time. It's a pretty elegant system, and reminds me a lot of Mini Metro. It does lack the strategy of these sorts of games though, as there's not much else to it besides trying to group like-minded penguins together. However, it's a fun time and has good visuals and music, along with some clever touches, such as elevators being harder to move upwards the more full they are. Of the Playdate Season 1 games, this is probably my favorite thus far.

'Flipper Lifter' is a multi-floor elevator game that is more of a dexterity challenge than a puzzle one. You control the elevators with the Playdate crank. Penguins get on and then get off when they arrive at their floor. There are five different stages, all but the first you unlock when your cumulative high score reaches a particular threshold. There is nothing here but a 'forever mode' on whichever level you select. And the elevator/penguin movements are too sluggish and the door opening/closing too janky for this to be much fun at all. And, worst of all, high score is dictated less by your own skill and more by how conveniently located your penguins' destinations happen to be. Maybe if they had designed in shorter challenges on these stages and framed it with some kind of story, I might have had a better time? As it is, I unlocked the levels, played on all five, and now just don't care if these penguins ever get to their floors. They're probably still sitting there waiting for the elevator. Tough luck, birds. I quit!