3 ms·

Fontemon: Video Game in a Font

128 points by susam 3y ago

thejarren 3y ago
This is really delightful. I lost it when my Fontemon started to Capitalize.
jkingsman 3y ago
Well that's just damn creative!! I love it. There is a technical blog post [0] detailing the mechanics if anyone's interested. [0]: https://github.com/mmulet/code-relay/blob/main/markdown/HowIDidIt.md https://github.com/mmulet/code-relay/blob/main/markdown/HowI...
- mmulet 3y ago
  Thanks for your kind words and for sharing this link, you beat me by a couple minutes!
mmulet 3y ago
If anyone is interested about how this was made, I wrote a blog post about how I made fontemon and which type features I used: https://github.com/mmulet/code-relay/blob/main/markdown/HowIDidIt.md https://github.com/mmulet/code-relay/blob/main/markdown/HowI...
Minor49er 3y ago
I love not just how hacky this is, but also all of the hilarious little Minnesota jokes throughout it. (Though I don't know if the map is meant to look like the state is packing, if you know what I mean.) Really enjoyed this!
junon 3y ago
Having made some wacky ligature fonts before and knowing how wild fonts are, I cannot imagine how tedious this was and how much of a lunatic (I say this in the most endearing way possible) the author must be. It's very firmly in the realm of mad science. This is mindbogglingly incredible work. I love it.
amelius 3y ago
See, you don't need Turing completeness to make interesting stuff.
- zinekeller 3y ago
  While apparently Fontemon is pre-computed (https://github.com/mmulet/code-relay/blob/main/markdown/HowIDidIt.md#choices https://github.com/mmulet/code-relay/blob/main/markdown/HowI...), font files are Turing complete (https://gwern.net/turing-complete#fn4 https://gwern.net/turing-complete#fn4). The grandfather of computer fonts, PostScript (as implied in the name) is a computer programming language in itself (but optimized for drawing stuff to be printed in paper), and TTF, OTF (both font formats) and PDF (document format) are also Turing-complete. Fun (or scary, depending on how you look at it) fact: the TrueType hinting language (which is not based on PostScript) is in of itself another Turing-complete language, so in TTF files there are two separate Turing-complete languages (the PostScript-based one and the hinting language). This is the reason why Microsoft in the '90s begs you to not install fonts willy-nilly.

128 points by susam 3y ago

This is really delightful. I lost it when my Fontemon started to Capitalize.

Well that's just damn creative!! I love it. There is a technical blog post [0] detailing the mechanics if anyone's interested. [0]: https://github.com/mmulet/code-relay/blob/main/markdown/HowIDidIt.md https://github.com/mmulet/code-relay/blob/main/markdown/HowI...

mmulet 3y ago
Thanks for your kind words and for sharing this link, you beat me by a couple minutes!

mmulet 3y ago

If anyone is interested about how this was made, I wrote a blog post about how I made fontemon and which type features I used: https://github.com/mmulet/code-relay/blob/main/markdown/HowIDidIt.md https://github.com/mmulet/code-relay/blob/main/markdown/HowI...

Minor49er 3y ago

I love not just how hacky this is, but also all of the hilarious little Minnesota jokes throughout it. (Though I don't know if the map is meant to look like the state is packing, if you know what I mean.) Really enjoyed this!

junon 3y ago

Having made some wacky ligature fonts before and knowing how wild fonts are, I cannot imagine how tedious this was and how much of a lunatic (I say this in the most endearing way possible) the author must be. It's very firmly in the realm of mad science. This is mindbogglingly incredible work. I love it.

amelius 3y ago

See, you don't need Turing completeness to make interesting stuff.

zinekeller 3y ago
While apparently Fontemon is pre-computed (https://github.com/mmulet/code-relay/blob/main/markdown/HowIDidIt.md#choices https://github.com/mmulet/code-relay/blob/main/markdown/HowI...), font files are Turing complete (https://gwern.net/turing-complete#fn4 https://gwern.net/turing-complete#fn4). The grandfather of computer fonts, PostScript (as implied in the name) is a computer programming language in itself (but optimized for drawing stuff to be printed in paper), and TTF, OTF (both font formats) and PDF (document format) are also Turing-complete. Fun (or scary, depending on how you look at it) fact: the TrueType hinting language (which is not based on PostScript) is in of itself another Turing-complete language, so in TTF files there are two separate Turing-complete languages (the PostScript-based one and the hinting language). This is the reason why Microsoft in the '90s begs you to not install fonts willy-nilly.