Welcome to Modojo, 
DS Homebrew: The Men Behind the Madness
Written by Louise Yang on Wednesday, March 14, 2007
What kind of person spends hours and hours coding a game without any (or at least very little) monetary compensation? Louise Yang attempts to find out...
The main reason I like the homebrew scene is community participation. Some teams start a project because they felt a void that the project could fill, while others do it because they see a problem worth tackling. I contacted the developers behind four popular homebrews, Tetattds, Tower Defense, QWAK, and the Lemmings Project, to hear what they had to say about the fruits of their labor and the community.
Tetattds
http://blog.dev-scene.com/flatware/
Tetattds (Tetris Attack DS for people not in the know) comes from a homebrew group consisting of Sten, Jakob, Fredrik, Gustav and Thomas. I was able to get in touch with some of these guys to find out more about the project.
Modojo: So who does what on the team? Does everyone have their own separate tasks or do you guys all do a bit of everything?
Sten: Thomas programmed the core gameplay engine, and I programmed the system parts like graphics and network. I also drew the graphics, while Fredrik created the music and the sound effects. Jakob did various bits of programming and graphics, and Gustav helped out with more general programming issues and the build system. So it's a bit of each.
Modojo: What brought each of you into the homebrew community? Was it this project specifically or an interest in home brews?
Sten: The project started long ago when Thomas wrote a Tetris Attack implementation for Windows. It had all the core parts, and even a two player vs mode, but it lacked menus and sound. Also the graphics were ripped from the SNES version of Tetris Attack (just like in the first version of Tetattds). Personally I was interested in programming for the GBA because I think it is a fun platform to program for. I tried to convince Thomas to port the game but he wasn't interested in the project anymore it seemed. Later I started porting the game myself to the DS, and that got Thomas interested in the project again. So for me it was an interest in homebrew and for Thomas it was an interest in the project I guess.
Gustav: I would be lying if I didn't say that Sten was the reason I'm involved in this project. Personally I like problem solving and Sten likes to have somebody to bounce ideas with, which often happens to be me. Due to a pathological interest in programming in general I oftentimes cannot resist the temptation of not just coming up with a solution, but actually also implementing it myself. Therefore my contributions are severely scattered throughout the project and in many places I've probably "inspired" a solution without even knowing about it.
Jakob: Well I saw what Sten and Thomas had done and I liked it a lot. So I just started doing little things on the project that I felt I could do. Just helping out to make it a better game.
Modojo: Any plans for the currently unused top screen in single-player mode?
Sten: No, because if we add something there we cannot use it in multi-player mode anyway. Gustav has started thinking about how to write an AI, and of course we will use the top screen for the CPU player if something comes out of that.
Modojo: A lot of people are thrilled that there's a way to play one of their favorite puzzle games on the DS. The wireless play functionality just adds icing to the cake. How do you feel about the community's response to Tetattds?
Sten: We really enjoy the response from the community and that's one of the reasons we continue working on this project. I'm not really surprised about the reception because the game idea is great (we don't take credit for that) and we put a lot of effort in this version of the game. Also I must point out that the wireless play is not just icing on the cake, but for me that's the main feature. I prefer beating other players instead of beating my own records.
Gustav: Since I've been playing the original game against the AI lots of times (without actually getting good at the game) I cannot fully agree that a single player mode would not be useful. An enjoyable single-player game requires a good AI player to compete with though. Thus, this feels like a natural next step to me. On the other hand I don't even own my own DS, so I'm guessing that my real motivation is rather the programming challenge involved.
Jakob: Its real fun to see how the news spread on all of the news pages. Its real fun to see something you worked on being in the spotlight and people enjoying it. That and having something fun to play with your friends is my biggest motivation for doing the work.
Modojo: Now that the official Tetris Attack/ Panel de Pon has been announced for the DS, how do you feel?
Sten: I don't think it will matter. There is already an official GBA version, and the Gamecube version (in Nintendo Puzzle Collection) is already great in four player mode. We didn't write this because we felt there was something lacking, but because it was a fun project.
Gustav: I can only agree with Sten and further add that the project has to be fun in itself for me to get involved. Then, if other people show interest, that is the icing on the cake, but not the motivating factor.
posted 5 months ago