Text font

[AlWesker]

Referencing to this on #6

_"Take a look at the most recent version - I have rearranged things and now we can have 370 tiles per screen, so the SNES logo fits easily. In addition, I have produced an entirely bitmapped title screen using proportional width fonts which allows us to fit text in more comfortably. What do you think?

I think my version is a proof of concept - a real artist can do a much better job. It's also worth considering if we should remake the preceding screens in the same way - all the text could fit in a single screen. Static starfields are an option too. It's (ab)using our copious free space, we are spending a few KB for every such screen."_

Do you think it would be possible to change the text font of the game for one more closer to what you intend to use for these screens? To make for text consistency. Plus, that text font that Syrox Developments usually used for some of their games (The Jungle Book uses it too) is maybe a little ugly. Using a font similar to what the other Battletoads games used (including the SNES version of Battletoads in Battlemaniacs) may be better.

I have to see if I find accurate rips of any of these text fonts. No luck looking for them at the moment. If not, then maybe we can use similar ones are they look like pretty standard text fonts.

[maxim-zhao]

A font which looks good monospaced won't look good proportional, and vice versa. I was hoping there might be a suitable font to use from the original game, but it looks like it just uses block capitals with serifs.

[AlWesker]

I guess this is because the font used on the Master System version is slightly stylized while the fonts that Rare usually used for their Battletoads developed games/ports (ie, this Master System version wasn't developed by them) isn't? Maybe would be worth a try still.

[PyronsLair]

Wesker take a look at this font in upper ocidental chacarecters.

http://www.zeldagalaxy.com/wp-content/img/sprites/nes/zelda2/font.png

Its easier to read and the shadow color for each character can change to give personality..

queen = dark blue D bird = orange ToADS = green

[AlWesker]

Yeah, I suppose that font can be a good match for the one that RARE usually used on the other Battletoads games. What do you think Maxim, could we use something like that?

[maxim-zhao]

Changing font colours per character might be tricky - we'd have to keep switching palettes. The Zelda font is very nearly just the Namco font. I'd rather take another Battletoads game as the reference, though. Finally, the game loads the font in a bunch of places so we'd have to be careful to fit in with them - it may be a little tricky.

[PyronsLair]

We can draw or use another font but the custom shadow per character it's a cool feature, or we can do a full color font for every stance. Palette cycle is not a problem , you just need to order it in the same way. So I can order the last two shades to make the font colors.. So in every screen we allocate the font / shadow color that we want use for it. Works well

Em ter, 31 de jul de 2018 19:47, Maxim notifications@github.com escreveu:

Changing font colours per character might be tricky - we'd have to keep switching palettes. The Zelda font is very nearly just the Namco font. I'd rather take another Battletoads game as the reference, though. Finally, the game loads the font in a bunch of places so we'd have to be careful to fit in with them - it may be a little tricky.

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[AlWesker]

The idea with the colors looks a cool concept but for some reason I'm not very convinced of it. Maybe it's because the Battletoads games were very simplistic on that feature and I'd rather stay like those, I suppose. Plus, you mostly have the visual cue of who's speaking so maybe it's an overcomplex feature to achieve on the technical point with no real benefit, or what's what I think.

Changing the font itself to one more closer to the typical simplistic font of the other Battletoads games, now that's something I'm really interested about.

[maxim-zhao]

Ok, let's try to rip one. Most emulators have a tile viewer which should make it quick and easy to rip.

[AlWesker]

Got it. Battletoads in Battlemaniacs SNES font.

[PyronsLair]

SmS fonts are ugly as hell, i think using colors or not we can improve the fonts anyway..

any cool font that fits in game will be a nice improvement, because the cool thing is show that sms is not limited like NES =D

2018-08-01 12:07 GMT-03:00 Maxim notifications@github.com:

Ok, let's try to rip one. Most emulators have a tile viewer which should make it quick and easy to rip.

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[maxim-zhao]

We can afford to use a colourful font, as there's a whole palette reserved for it. However, I'm not sure it's helpful for readability, and believe me I've spent years trying to find or make a better 8x8 font. Using greys (for antialiasing) is OK but only around manually placed pixels, a straight unhinted rasterisation of a nice font will be an unreadable mess. Most classic fonts stick to 1bpp to save space and maximise contrast. Making it readable on a GG screen in SMS mode is a whole other impossible problem.

In the end I think it's good to get a font that is reasonably clear but with a little personality beyond the usual NAMCO/SEGA font.

What do you think about lowercase? I think we have the space, and it does help with readability. Take a look at the font we used for Phantasy Star: https://www.romhacking.net/?page=translations&action=images&id=1069&imageid=1 for example.

[PyronsLair]

I'm more in the way of fonts like axterix

http://www.vgmuseum.com/pics3/Asterix%20-%20Ingame%201.gif https://fontstruct.com/fontstructions/show/1507856/asterix-sms

2018-08-01 18:37 GMT-03:00 Maxim notifications@github.com:

We can afford to use a colourful font, as there's a whole palette reserved for it. However, I'm not sure it's helpful for readability, and believe me I've spent years trying to find or make a better 8x8 font. Using greys (for antialiasing) is OK but only around manually placed pixels, a straight unhinted rasterisation of a nice font will be an unreadable mess. Most classic fonts stick to 1bpp to save space and maximise contrast. Making it readable on a GG screen in SMS mode is a whole other impossible problem.

In the end I think it's good to get a font that is reasonably clear but with a little personality beyond the usual NAMCO/SEGA font.

What do you think about lowercase? I think we have the space, and it does help with readability. Take a look at the font we used for Phantasy Star: https://www.romhacking.net/?page=translations&action= images&id=1069&imageid=1 for example.

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[maxim-zhao]

Have a look through https://nfggames.com/games/fontmaker/lister.php to see if something is inspiring. Personally I like lowercase - it makes it much easier to read words if they have shape - but sadly it's unusual to find, even in arcade games.

[AlWesker]

For some reason I'm more bound to minimalistic. Maybe to be as accurate as possible. I prefered to use the SNES Battlemaniacs font but the Phantasy Star one and lower case may be good alternatives as they are also minimalistic. If you think it will benefit to the reading, then go ahead with that one if you may. Other fonts like the Asterix one I see it's complex and rather similar to the current font the game arleady has.

[maxim-zhao]

I've coded to allow an easy font swap. The SNES font is missing at least three used characters: "(", ")" and ":". Lowercase will be more work.

[PyronsLair]

I think that in end we are losing time.. we have decided before that this port will follow the snes original.. so the fonts must like the original if possible.

If we can handle it on the game, we can try reduce them t fit in our project.

2018-08-02 6:05 GMT-03:00 Maxim notifications@github.com:

I've coded to allow an easy font swap. The SNES font is missing at least three used characters: "(", ")" and ":". Lowercase will be more work.

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[AlWesker]

"I've coded to allow an easy font swap."

Great!

"The SNES font is missing at least three used characters: "(", ")" and ":".

I jut noticed you actually added them from somewhere else and they look pretty fine to me.

"Lowercase will be more work."

Personally I'd rather stay like the SNES font is, especially if lowercase is going to involve you additional work.

[PyronsLair]

• There is some legal problems if we remove these screens ?

I really dosen't like these publishers and others screens, and the game didn't got released outside of Brazil so.. for me.. we can remove it, and create our disclamer screen.. saying that is developed by virgin and realeased by tec toy, with a cool art and etc..

2018-08-02 9:36 GMT-03:00 Albert Wesker notifications@github.com:

Oh right, the parentheses in the Master System version are used for the "Virgin Interactive Entertainment (Europe)" parts of the copyright screens, yeah. That's not something the SNES version did so hence the problem.

Do you think the ones from the Zelda/Namco font would fit well with the SNES font?

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[maxim-zhao]

I used the original font for the missing characters, but it's not a good match.

Of course we can remove it, but again it comes down to whether we're trying to make it as close to the SNES version as possible, or to make it as if the SMS version was polished a bit (which is how this thing started, I think - the SNES version is just a source for assets), or to make it how you wish it was. Why not replace the storyline?

Having said that, I already removed the unskippable wait on those screens - 6s + 6s + 3s, I think, and I would like to remove a wait at startup. Booting straight to the title screen is totally an option, or maybe just with a quick disclaimer splash as you suggest.

[PyronsLair]

Sorry, maybe i'm little confused (sorry for my bad english), but we are talking of different things a guess.

We already agreed that the way that we must follow is stay faithfull to the source (snes version) but of course, we have to make adaptations to make it possible and fit on sms hardware. So we must try import snes assets and adapt it to snes.

It dosen't incluse change storyline, levels, gameplay and etc..

Choose Rash for example dosen't affect the game, its just a improvement and a cool feature for SMS and GG because GG users dosen't have a option to play as Rash on Native hardware.

Remove the originals publishers (that didn't release the game) and other odd things its as cool step. I think for the role thing.. historical and etc.. a custom screen explaining the story behind it is much more cooler and informative for all community. To not be just a text screen i can try draw the toads playing sms..

but anyway it just my opinion.. and a ideia.. think about it

2018-08-02 11:51 GMT-03:00 Maxim notifications@github.com:

I used the original font for the missing characters, but it's not a good match.

Of course we can remove it, but again it comes down to whether we're trying to make it as close to the SNES version as possible, or to make it as if the SMS version was polished a bit (which is how this thing started, I think - the SNES version is just a source for assets), or to make it how you wish it was. Why not replace the storyline?

Having said that, I already removed the unskippable wait on those screens

• 6s + 6s + 3s, I think, and I would like to remove a wait at startup. Booting straight to the title screen is totally an option, or maybe just with a quick disclaimer splash as you suggest.

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[AlWesker]

"Of course we can remove it, but again it comes down to whether we're trying to make it as close to the SNES version as possible, or to make it as if the SMS version was polished a bit (which is how this thing started, I think - the SNES version is just a source for assets), or to make it how you wish it was. Why not replace the storyline?"

That's the idea for me.

I wouldn't remove the copyright screens nor modify them (aside from changing the font of course). The Master System version exists because Virgin licensed the porting deal to RARE and Tradewest and created it tasking it to Syrox Developments (which was an usual Master System/Game Gear developer for Virgin, they also did The Jungle Book and The Lion King). True, Virgin didn't end up releasing it in the end, but it's their developed port still. Actually TecToy didn't even bother to change anything regarding the internal game and what's more, in the Brazilian cover you still see the Virgin logo. So yeah, those references are necessary and should still be kept in my eyes.

The code that was added to skip the copyright screens is a good thing. We shouldn't touch those much more I think.

[AlWesker]

Also, making the game to boot directly on the title screen may screw the level select cheat code which is done at boot, so I believe that's not a good idea either. I say the game is pretty fine now in regarding the pre-title screens and I would just realocate the "Battletoads in" bit from the "Presents Zitz, Rash & Pimple in" screen to the title screen on top of the Battlemaniacs logo like we were discussing in the other thread.

[PyronsLair]

No problem, Its just a idea, changing the screen for a informative and cooler one is not same of remove the credits from Virgin. It's almost opposite in a different way. But don't give me attention, I'm taking too much.. I will left the content with you guys.

Em qui, 2 de ago de 2018 13:48, Albert Wesker notifications@github.com escreveu:

Also, making the game to boot directly on the title screen may screw the level select cheat code which is done at boot, so I believe that's not a good idea either. I say the game is pretty fine now in regarding the pre-title screens and I would just realocate the "Battletoads in" bit from the "Presents Zitz, Rash & Pimple in" screen to the title screen on top of the Battlemaniacs logo like we were discussing in the other thread.

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[AlWesker]

No, it's ok. Of course you can also comment and suggest, Pyron.

It's just that I agree with Maxim in that the aim is to polish the Master System version with mostly SNES content to have a "what if" scenario of what would have probably be this port if Virgin hadn't cancelled the release and left it unfinished. It's true that in some aspects there are enhancements being done or suggested like the Rash 1P aspect for example, but in the end we shouldn't go crazy about detracting too much the SNES or SMS scope of the hack, because it would turn out into something completely different.

But of course you are free to give comments and suggestions as part of the team you are. Don't feel bad or worry about it.

[maxim-zhao]

SNES font is done, I think we can leave it at that.