Ambrosia Software Web Board: [Xsera] What font to use? - Ambrosia Software Web Board

Hello everyone,

The Xsera team (with the help of some of the regular members of #xsera) have come up with a few possible fonts for Xsera. All of these candidates are free and available for use in Xsera. Alistair made a suggestion as well that some fonts may be used just for the title and larger uses, while others be used for the regular text in the game. Vote for the fonts that you would like to see in the game. Please note that this poll does not ultimately decide what font or fonts will be used in the game, but will help us decide which fonts are best. Each font is accompanied by a picture of what the font looks like in Xsera and a link to a site where the font is hosted.

All-purpose fonts:

The all-purpose fonts are intended for use anywhere in the game where small or medium sized fonts are used. As such they should generally be readable for smaller text.

Material Sans:
Pic: http://i198.photobucket.com/albums/aa187/a...aterialsans.png
Site: http://www.dafont.com/material-sans.font

Coolvetica:
Pic: http://i198.photobucket.com/albums/aa187/a.../coolvetica.png
Site: http://www.1001freefonts.com/Coolvetica.php

Prototype:
Pic: http://i198.photobucket.com/albums/aa187/a...a/prototype.png
Site: http://www.dafont.com/font.php?file=protot...mp;classt=alpha

Ageone:
Pic: http://i198.photobucket.com/albums/aa187/a...sera/ageone.png
Site: http://www.dafont.com/font.php?file=ageone...mp;classt=alpha

Title / Menu fonts:

These fonts should be more stylistic as they may be used for the largest text in the game.

Sneakout:
Pic: http://i198.photobucket.com/albums/aa187/a...ra/sneakout.png
Site: http://www.dafont.com/font.php?file=sneako...mp;classt=alpha

Vigilance:
Pic: http://i198.photobucket.com/albums/aa187/a...a/vigilance.png
Site: http://www.dafont.com/font.php?file=vigila...mp;classt=alpha

Xenogears:
Pic: http://i198.photobucket.com/albums/aa187/a...a/xenogears.png
Site: http://www.dafont.com/font.php?file=_xenog...mp;classt=alpha

Zrnic:
Pic: http://i198.photobucket.com/albums/aa187/a...a/zrnic.png
Site: http://www.dafont.com/font.php?file=zrnic&...mp;classt=alpha




Vote early, vote often!

This post has been edited by adam_0: 03 February 2010 - 12:53 PM

For title fonts, you ought to see if you can track down a font that looks similar to ITC Machine. If I recall, the "Ares" logo is typeset in ITC Machine and scaled to about 27% height.

At the moment my favorite is the Prototype font. I wasn't sure if you wanted us to pick two fonts (one from each set of four) or not, but I didn't find anything really appealing in the second set.

I still kinda like http://www.1001freefonts.com/AccidentalPresidency.php

But I remember something about how it looks weird squished down or something. One problem with a lot of fonts is that the lines are too thick and awkward.

As far as the other options, nothing too impressive. It'd be easier to decide if there was an actual screen shot of like a mission briefing or something where a lot of text from the game is represented. Also, I can't remember if Pallas's port of Ares had text in it, but if it did, couldn't it be used for this as well?

Yes, I set them to check boxes because I want you to pick all of the fonts that you like from both categories.

Personally, I favour "Ageone" for small text and either "Sneakout" or "Vigilance" for the menu font.

It would be nice to see the fonts being used during gameplay. (i.e. In the minicomputer, status indicators, message boxes)

The problem is, as you can see, that the fonts appear at different sizes on the main screen (when Xsera thinks it's drawing them all at the same size). We haven't fixed this yet, and the fonts don't look right at all in the minicomputer etc right now.

Oh, so you answer him and not me?

I see how it is.

Hmm. None of the fonts really appeal to me. (Doesn't stop me voting though).
I'd agree with Pallas' point here.

Also, have you considered using a pixel based font for small texts?

At this point, it's looking like we've received all the votes we're going to get. I declare Prototype and Sneakout the winners!


The way you phrased it didn't make sense. GameFreak's post did.

I apologize; I would have responded if I knew that's what you wanted.


This would require an entirely different system than what's currently in place for Xsera - not impossible, but it would be a bit more work. There are also pixel-to-ttf font converters out there (like Fontforge) which we are considering trying out to get some of the original Ares fonts back. These fonts will be standbys in the event that the Ares fonts don't turn out well.

We could just use a TrueType font that are designed to look like a bitmap font. There are a whole bunch here. Of course we would have to avoid scaling them in order to work right, so we would need to find one that is designed at the right size.

I misunderstood LCA... I thought he meant that we should use an actual bitmap font for the smaller stuff. We could probably use Fontforge (along with the fonts that Sfiera extracted) to get the same effect with the original fonts. We'll have to look into it more, though.

Oops, I sorta voted wrong by mistake. Subtract one from vigilance and add one to sneakout.

Sounds good.
The trick always is to get the best results from the least onerous amount of input.