Featured Community Plugin - This Week in Videogames
This post is part of a series, featuring the incredible work of plugin authors who grow the TRMNL plugin ecosystem with every contribution. The TRMNL team has individually selected these plugins and authors to be featured.
This Week in Videogames
Community member Martin Rapavý (Discord: martin2097) created the This Week in Videogames plugin; here are their words on how it was created.
Why did you want this plugin to exist?
What I love the most about TRMNL is the emphasis on slowing down. Every day, we are bombarded with all sorts of news, and most of it is pure fluff. I also love following gaming news, which also suffers from low-quality, clickbaity, ad-filled content. So it was like a revelation for me when This Week in Videogames came into existence—curated, ad-free, and written by actual humans. From there, it seemed like a perfect match to bring this content to TRMNL.
Why were you the person to make it?
I have followed TWIV since its beginnings, and it has been my main source of gaming news, so I think that made this choice so obvious for me.
What was your process for creating the plugin?
My daily job is in the AI field, but I work in a bank, so I don't have many opportunities to try AI agents in an unconstrained environment. Because of that, I wanted to try Claude Code's current capabilities enhanced by the TRMNL MCP server. In the end, it did some of the rough work for me. For the backend and data transformations, it's really great, but when it comes to visuals, it really struggles with creating "beautiful" stuff. So in the end, I spent most of my time in the Visual Editor, tuning every parameter to get the best look.
What, if any, challenges did you face while creating it?
Crafting a beautiful layout for landscape OG and landscape/portrait X means 12 layouts you have to take care of. And that is... a lot of layouts! 😅 But I hope I got the best out of every screen size, and no matter if you own a TRMNL OG or a TRMNL X, you'll enjoy the most beautiful display!
Did you learn anything that you want to apply to future or past recipes?
gap--auto and gap--distribute can save you a lot of tinkering when the length of the content varies.
Is there a tip you would give to a new plugin developer?
I have 2 tips:
- The look of the plugin matters. Show it to your wife, kids, mum, dad, or neighbours. Do they understand what they're seeing? Do they like it? Most of us programmers feel that if it works and has super sophisticated code behind it, we've done a great job. But presentation is equally important, if not even more important.
- Don't forget that some TRMNL users are not programmers or even tech people at all. It's great to give users a ton of room for customization. But what's even better for most users is when it's already beautiful out of the box! Choosing what looks best is a hard decision, but trust me—it will push you forward and make your plugin better.
What part of the TRMNL Framework, Liquid filters, or other documentation was most helpful?
Don't underestimate the TRMNL Framework. It looks really great, and knowing all of its capabilities gives you much more freedom to imagine what you can build. 100% of my plugin's look is made using TRMNL Framework components, and I really love it. Working within meaningful constraints can be really beneficial.
What is your favorite plugin that someone else created and why?
As you've probably figured out by now, I'm naturally drawn toward the visual side of things. Weather Glance, Formula 1 – Race and Standings, and Flip Clock are all really beautiful plugins that I admire.
What was your biggest enemy?
Off-by-one pixels.
