Design Statement
Pulse Arena turns music into a duet with a boss. Every attack lands on the beat, so the beat is the warning: you learn a fight by listening, not by memorising. And you answer back. Firing on the beat builds a combo, so staying in rhythm is both your shield and your voice.

Our jam level, Moonlit Lotus, is built on the theme track itself, played unmodified. Lumi, a lotus spirit, drifts petals, rising bubbles and soft ripples across an aurora sky, and the fight breathes with the music's calm phrasing instead of punishing you.

Key choices: one readable danger colour, a tiny hitbox so near misses feel graceful, no song timer (the music loops until the fight resolves), and up to six friends fighting one boss together. A level editor lets anyone turn their own feelings about a song into a fight and share it: the same act of translation this jam asked of us.

Game Instructions (launch steps, controls, and gameplay overview)
Launch: on the game's itch.io page, press Run game to play in the browser (Chrome, Edge, Firefox or Safari; full screen with the button at the bottom right), or download the macOS build, unzip it and open Pulse Arena.app (it isn't notarized: if macOS blocks it, go to System Settings > Privacy & Security and choose Open Anyway). Start with Moonlit Lotus #thatgamejam, the first level in the list, and press Play. Sound on: the music is the game.

Controls (keyboard, all rebindable in Controls; gamepads work too):
- Move: WASD or arrow keys
- Fire: Space (press on the beat)
- Dash: Shift (short burst, you can't be hit while dashing)
- Burst: Q (when the Rhythm meter is full: clears nearby bullets and powers up your shots)
- Pause: Esc

Gameplay: dodge the boss's attacks, which all land on the beat, and shoot back. A press on the beat fires a strong beat shot, and beat presses in a row build a combo: double shots at 4, piercing at 8, FEVER at 16. Mashing or holding fire only chips. The boss's bullets block your shots, so pick a clear line. Each phase loops until the boss's health breaks; lose all your health and the fight restarts at once. Beyond the jam level there are more built-in fights, community levels, a level editor, and rooms where up to six players fight one boss together.

Gameplay walkthrough video
https://youtu.be/1xI9tF5duvY

Trailer / Other Additional Video Material (Optional)
https://youtu.be/1xI9tF5duvY

Did your project use any AI tools or assets? If yes, please specify.
Yes. The game's code was written with help from Claude. The music of the other built-in levels was generated with ACE-Step 1.5; the jam level, Moonlit Lotus, uses the theme track by Jason Grace, unmodified. The optional AI level designer in the editor uses Claude. The game's itch.io page states this too.