I Built Tetorica Retro Player

I built Tetorica Retro Player.

https://kyorohiro.itch.io/tetorica-retro-player

The original idea was simple.

I wanted to watch old videos and read ZIP-compressed comic archives with the feeling of an old CRT television or a retro game console.

That small idea eventually became Tetorica Retro Player.

The application can apply various retro-style effects to videos and images, including:

CRT display simulation
PC-98 inspired visuals
Game Boy style rendering
Neon mode
Lo-Fi audio processing
Radio mode

As development continued, many more features were added:

Comic Viewer
Recording
Window Capture
Chrome Extension
Audio Effects
Phosphor Dot rendering

One surprising part of the project was implementing the Phosphor Dot effect. While working on it, I eventually ran into the famous moiré problems discussed in the CRT shader community. I never expected to reach that level of detail when I started this project.

After spending a lot of time experimenting, I learned something interesting:

Accurate CRT simulation and enjoyable user experience are not always the same thing.

Sometimes a technically accurate effect is less enjoyable than a simplified version that simply feels right.

AI-assisted development allowed me to iterate much faster than I could have a few years ago. Features that might have taken months of spare-time development were implemented and tested in a much shorter period.

In the end, I achieved my original goal:

I can now enjoy old videos and comic archives with the retro look and atmosphere I always wanted.

For now, I consider Tetorica Retro Player complete and will move on to my next project.

Links

Code:
https://github.com/kyorohiro/tetorica-retro-player

Demo:
https://kyorohiro.github.io/tetorica-retro-player/

itch.io:
https://kyorohiro.itch.io/tetorica-retro-player

ChromePlugin:
https://chromewebstore.google.com/detail/tetorica-retro-player/clnpmlgahomdkphcpcajbemodneoecna

About the Demo

The demo uses publicly available materials from:

Comic Book + Candy #12 (1963)
https://comicbookplus.com/?dlid=28525

Big Buck Bunny
https://peach.blender.org/