I’m excited to announce the release of Project Ephemera, a demo disc developed for SYNTH jam. In it, you choose between three diverse demos that push the limits of a forgotten retro console. Ideally there’s a slice of ephemera for everybody with its included arcade shooter, walking simulator, and virtual instrument.

Throughout the jam I’ve published a series of blogs and playable builds that demonstrated my progress along the way. Overall I’m quite pleased with how the concept evolved, from a basic user interface devoid of content, to three very special experiences that I could waste hours playing. This release culminates my five-week journey with several game-changing improvements to Harmony Falls, as well as polish for the other two demos. Ideally, if time had permitted, I would have added MIDI controls to Secret Bread, and continued to refine the demos as needed.

It has been my pleasure to be your host for SYNTH jam. Whenever I host jams, I’m taken aback by how the community comes together and interprets the prompt with creativity and skill. Of course, this jam is no exception. I’m so very excited to play, rate, and review all of the submissions over the next week. Thank you for making this jam special!

Enjoy!

v1.0.0 changes

• General
  • Increased the base font size.
• Harmony Falls
  • Improved the color scheme generator.
  • Expanded the range of obstacle sizes.
  • Added variable game speed.
  • Spawned power-ups which affect game speed.
  • Synthesized sounds for the power-ups.
  • Filtered power-ups when occluded.
  • Applied a slowdown on game over.
  • Applied a lowpass filter on game over.
  • Let it continue generating music on game over.
• Melody Heights
  • Revised the audio mix for audibility.
  • Made fairies escape faster and farther.
  • Expanded dynamic range of terrain.
  • Applied wind simulation to particles.
  • Expanded terrain draw distance.
• Secret Bread
  • Rebalanced the geometry.
  • Increased variety of parameter combinations.
  • Randomized the scale mode each play.
  • Tweaked haptic and film grain effect strengths.