5 ms·

Game Font Forensics

140 points by ibobev 3y ago

remoquete 3y ago
Reading video game magazines when I was a kid always left me wondering about how those great effects were achieved. Games seemed to be way more mysterious back then, tiny black boxes streamed from tapes or floppies. I wonder if in 30 years time we'll be applying the same kind of forensics on today's games.
joshu 3y ago
The Golden Apple in Beneath Apple Manor was an actual Apple II drawing, with basic running in the little screen. I wonder what happened on the IBM version?
- viler 3y ago
  It draws you a 'Golden IBM PC' - and then the screen goes "well green, anyway"! At least if you're running it on a monochrome board (where it evidently expects that you're using the green-screen 5151 monitor) - haven't seen the ending in CGA. :)
UberFly 3y ago
These kind of IBM PC games were my first peek into pc gaming. While I don't have anything to add about font forensics, reading this brings back some awesome memories of this era and the wonder it brought with it. I can tell it's the same for the author.
- viler 3y ago
  It definitely is. Pretty amazing what you can still find out about this stuff after all these years, now that we can cross-reference and search data so easily (and that collectors, preservationists, and emulator authors are still coming up with previously unknown findings).
01HNNWZ0MV43FF 3y ago
Readers of this thread may also enjoy "Texture archeology", specifically this video about a stock image of cobblestones that was reused in loads of PS1 / N64 era games: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bsCN0Yx2Vbsa https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bsCN0Yx2Vbsa It was posted to HN twice with 0 comments so I figured I'd mention it here.
- kombookcha 3y ago
  For a similarly fun and unexpectedly twisty deep dive, youtuber Hbomberguy has a documentary on the history and origins of the now iconic Roblox "oof" sound. A rabbit hole that's way deeper than it has any right to be.
  - translucyd 3y ago
    Must destroy Tommy Tallarico /s
- hbn 3y ago
  There was a design on some pillars in Elden Ring that the community had heavily speculated on in terms of how it tied into the lore. Many believed it showcased the story of one of the game's central figures. Then someone found it in another game, turns out it was just a stock texture.
- ramses0 3y ago
  Watching, and AMAZING!
susam 3y ago
As someone whose initial exposure to computers was through IBM PCs, I find VileR's website[1] to be a treasure trove of BIOS/OEM fonts and related resources with impressive attention to detail. Inspired by IBM PC games from the 1990s, I aspired to create my own invaders-like game. However I had limited access to computers back then (≤ 70 mins/month). My knowledge of computer programming was very limited too. At that time, I could only manage to write a few simple text-based adventure games. Although 25 years too late, during the COVID-19 pandemic, I revisited that dream and spent a weekend writing my own Invaders game[2] using HTML5 Canvas. Initially, I used CanvasRenderingContext2D.fillText() to display text (current score, info screen, etc.). However, dissatisfied with the text rendering quality, I began looking for IBM PC OEM fonts online and came across the Oldschool PC Fonts[3] on int10h.org. After downloading the font packs from the website, I wrote a little Python script to convert them to bitmaps[4] (arrays of integers), and then used the bitmaps to draw text on the canvas using JavaScript, one cell at a time, to get pixel-perfect results! I eventually switched to a different font pack called Modern DOS[5] developed by Jayvee Enaguas. Nevertheless, given how extensive VileR's website is and how convenient the font preview tools[6] on the website are, int10h.org remains as my go-to website whenever I am doing any type of retrocomputing experiments for fun. [1] https://int10h.org/ https://int10h.org/ [2] https://susam.net/invaders.html https://susam.net/invaders.html [3] https://int10h.org/oldschool-pc-fonts/ https://int10h.org/oldschool-pc-fonts/ [4] https://github.com/susam/pcface https://github.com/susam/pcface [5] https://www.dafont.com/modern-dos.font https://www.dafont.com/modern-dos.font [6] https://int10h.org/oldschool-pc-fonts/fontlist/font?ibm_vga_8x16 https://int10h.org/oldschool-pc-fonts/fontlist/font?ibm_vga_...
- viler 3y ago
  Thanks for those comments, much appreciated. I'm still planning future updates to that font collection, and I'll probably include straight-up binary dumps of the characters, so you won't have to jump through hoops to convert them (although many of them are already available in this form at https://github.com/viler-int10h/vga-text-mode-fonts https://github.com/viler-int10h/vga-text-mode-fonts - all you need is a hex dump). Do the Modern DOS fonts have a particular advantage for you, in terms of implementation? If they do, let me know and I'll consider those improvements as well!
titchard 3y ago
Really great site - I can 100% recommend this book on the subject, really interesting https://www.counter-print.co.uk/products/arcade-game-typography https://www.counter-print.co.uk/products/arcade-game-typogra...
- viler 3y ago
  Yep, mentioned that in the intro to the article - recommended ++!
tsukurimashou 3y ago
thanks for reminding me for this website, adding it to me RSS feed right away
ahefner 3y ago
One thing I've wondered lately is about the 6x6 fonts (or perhaps one particular one) that I've seen in all kinds of old (late 80s to very early 90s) games, particularly on Amiga and MS-DOS platforms. The Atari ST had a 6x6 font in ROM (see https://fontstruct.com/fontstructions/show/876150/atari_st_6 https://fontstruct.com/fontstructions/show/876150/atari_st_6 for an example) and I think I've seen text that looks just like it in games that I know where developed first for the Amiga, as well as some early VGA DOS games. Maybe there's cases where artists were drawing graphics first on an ST, weird as that seems for an Amiga production - people have to use whatever tools they have at hand, so if that's an ST with Degas, Neochrome, or whatever, so be it. I considered maybe there was a similar font included with Deluxe Paint, but I can't find any indication of that. Perhaps instead a 6x6 character cell (leaving, really, 5x5) is just so constrained that there are very few ways to draw legible characters, and that's the reason for the uncanny similarity. Or perhaps the font got ripped and converted to some other format that was then passed around. I suppose I should start collecting examples of this font as I spot them, for comparison.
- ahefner 3y ago
  And a partial answer to this, my memory being jogged by the linked article's mention of Autodesk Animator (which I spent a lot of time with as a kid), is that Autodesk Animator includes a font SIXBYSIX.FNT appears identical to the Atari's 6x6 ROM font, to the extent I can find examples to compare. Ignoring the riddle of this or that Amiga game, this is a perfect link between VGA-era DOS games, for which I'm sure Animator (Pro) was often used for art, and the Atari ST, because Autodesk Animator is a direct descendant of the program Cyber Paint on the Atari ST (another program I spent a lot of time with as a kid), both programmed by Jim Kent. It's perfectly possible that one of the ST ROM fonts hitchhiked along in the conversion from ST to PC and started cropping up in PC games.
  - viler 3y ago
    Yeah, I should think that's exactly what happened. I was a big AA user too, but at that point in time I wasn't aware of the Atari ST connection (and hadn't ever seen an ST), so whenever I spotted that font in a game I just thought of it as "the Autodesk Animator font", and assumed that's what they used for the artwork. (Sometimes you could even spot tell-tale effects like that "countour gradient" thing, which would confirm it!)
pushfoo 3y ago
TL;DR: This post is great and it raises questions about automating phylogeny guesses about game components. I think I remember seeing a similar post about Chinese bootleg games for non-PC systems. The commonality was comparing pixel data to trace what the bootlegs had taken parts from. That raises a question: can we automate inferring the copying and modification of parts between older games? In biology, there's a similar technique. Phylogenetic analysis compares sequences to reconstruct evolutionary relationships between samples. From what I understand, it seems possible to do something similar for the pixel data of game assets. However, there are limits: you have to stay above a certain pixel size for results to have meaning. The lower your resolution, the more each pixel font looks the same. The same seems to be true for sprites representing in-game elements.
- rozab 3y ago
  Something I find interesting about computer fonts and stuff is how much they remain the same over time, down to the bit. In phylogenetics, the passing of time is measured by the molecular clock - the accumulated mutations that are constantly happening. In a game I'm reversing right now there's an arial8.tga which struck me as feeling completely timeless, or out-of-time. The game is from the year 2000, but this exact file could have appeared in any game over like a 40 year timespan.
  - bux93 3y ago
    Perhaps even longer. Arial dates back to 1982 and was meant as a metric-compatible lookalike for Helvetica which dates back to 1957, and is based on 1898's Akzidenz-Grotesk ; but of course at that time, filenames didn't yet have extensions.

140 points by ibobev 3y ago

Reading video game magazines when I was a kid always left me wondering about how those great effects were achieved. Games seemed to be way more mysterious back then, tiny black boxes streamed from tapes or floppies. I wonder if in 30 years time we'll be applying the same kind of forensics on today's games.

joshu 3y ago

The Golden Apple in Beneath Apple Manor was an actual Apple II drawing, with basic running in the little screen. I wonder what happened on the IBM version?

viler 3y ago
It draws you a 'Golden IBM PC' - and then the screen goes "well green, anyway"! At least if you're running it on a monochrome board (where it evidently expects that you're using the green-screen 5151 monitor) - haven't seen the ending in CGA. :)

UberFly 3y ago

These kind of IBM PC games were my first peek into pc gaming. While I don't have anything to add about font forensics, reading this brings back some awesome memories of this era and the wonder it brought with it. I can tell it's the same for the author.

viler 3y ago
It definitely is. Pretty amazing what you can still find out about this stuff after all these years, now that we can cross-reference and search data so easily (and that collectors, preservationists, and emulator authors are still coming up with previously unknown findings).

01HNNWZ0MV43FF 3y ago

Readers of this thread may also enjoy "Texture archeology", specifically this video about a stock image of cobblestones that was reused in loads of PS1 / N64 era games: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bsCN0Yx2Vbsa https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bsCN0Yx2Vbsa It was posted to HN twice with 0 comments so I figured I'd mention it here.

kombookcha 3y ago
For a similarly fun and unexpectedly twisty deep dive, youtuber Hbomberguy has a documentary on the history and origins of the now iconic Roblox "oof" sound. A rabbit hole that's way deeper than it has any right to be.
- translucyd 3y ago
  Must destroy Tommy Tallarico /s
hbn 3y ago
There was a design on some pillars in Elden Ring that the community had heavily speculated on in terms of how it tied into the lore. Many believed it showcased the story of one of the game's central figures. Then someone found it in another game, turns out it was just a stock texture.
ramses0 3y ago
Watching, and AMAZING!

susam 3y ago

As someone whose initial exposure to computers was through IBM PCs, I find VileR's website[1] to be a treasure trove of BIOS/OEM fonts and related resources with impressive attention to detail. Inspired by IBM PC games from the 1990s, I aspired to create my own invaders-like game. However I had limited access to computers back then (≤ 70 mins/month). My knowledge of computer programming was very limited too. At that time, I could only manage to write a few simple text-based adventure games. Although 25 years too late, during the COVID-19 pandemic, I revisited that dream and spent a weekend writing my own Invaders game[2] using HTML5 Canvas. Initially, I used CanvasRenderingContext2D.fillText() to display text (current score, info screen, etc.). However, dissatisfied with the text rendering quality, I began looking for IBM PC OEM fonts online and came across the Oldschool PC Fonts[3] on int10h.org. After downloading the font packs from the website, I wrote a little Python script to convert them to bitmaps[4] (arrays of integers), and then used the bitmaps to draw text on the canvas using JavaScript, one cell at a time, to get pixel-perfect results! I eventually switched to a different font pack called Modern DOS[5] developed by Jayvee Enaguas. Nevertheless, given how extensive VileR's website is and how convenient the font preview tools[6] on the website are, int10h.org remains as my go-to website whenever I am doing any type of retrocomputing experiments for fun. [1] https://int10h.org/ https://int10h.org/ [2] https://susam.net/invaders.html https://susam.net/invaders.html [3] https://int10h.org/oldschool-pc-fonts/ https://int10h.org/oldschool-pc-fonts/ [4] https://github.com/susam/pcface https://github.com/susam/pcface [5] https://www.dafont.com/modern-dos.font https://www.dafont.com/modern-dos.font [6] https://int10h.org/oldschool-pc-fonts/fontlist/font?ibm_vga_8x16 https://int10h.org/oldschool-pc-fonts/fontlist/font?ibm_vga_...

viler 3y ago
Thanks for those comments, much appreciated. I'm still planning future updates to that font collection, and I'll probably include straight-up binary dumps of the characters, so you won't have to jump through hoops to convert them (although many of them are already available in this form at https://github.com/viler-int10h/vga-text-mode-fonts https://github.com/viler-int10h/vga-text-mode-fonts - all you need is a hex dump). Do the Modern DOS fonts have a particular advantage for you, in terms of implementation? If they do, let me know and I'll consider those improvements as well!

titchard 3y ago

Really great site - I can 100% recommend this book on the subject, really interesting https://www.counter-print.co.uk/products/arcade-game-typography https://www.counter-print.co.uk/products/arcade-game-typogra...

viler 3y ago
Yep, mentioned that in the intro to the article - recommended ++!

tsukurimashou 3y ago

thanks for reminding me for this website, adding it to me RSS feed right away

ahefner 3y ago

One thing I've wondered lately is about the 6x6 fonts (or perhaps one particular one) that I've seen in all kinds of old (late 80s to very early 90s) games, particularly on Amiga and MS-DOS platforms. The Atari ST had a 6x6 font in ROM (see https://fontstruct.com/fontstructions/show/876150/atari_st_6 https://fontstruct.com/fontstructions/show/876150/atari_st_6 for an example) and I think I've seen text that looks just like it in games that I know where developed first for the Amiga, as well as some early VGA DOS games. Maybe there's cases where artists were drawing graphics first on an ST, weird as that seems for an Amiga production - people have to use whatever tools they have at hand, so if that's an ST with Degas, Neochrome, or whatever, so be it. I considered maybe there was a similar font included with Deluxe Paint, but I can't find any indication of that. Perhaps instead a 6x6 character cell (leaving, really, 5x5) is just so constrained that there are very few ways to draw legible characters, and that's the reason for the uncanny similarity. Or perhaps the font got ripped and converted to some other format that was then passed around. I suppose I should start collecting examples of this font as I spot them, for comparison.

ahefner 3y ago
And a partial answer to this, my memory being jogged by the linked article's mention of Autodesk Animator (which I spent a lot of time with as a kid), is that Autodesk Animator includes a font SIXBYSIX.FNT appears identical to the Atari's 6x6 ROM font, to the extent I can find examples to compare. Ignoring the riddle of this or that Amiga game, this is a perfect link between VGA-era DOS games, for which I'm sure Animator (Pro) was often used for art, and the Atari ST, because Autodesk Animator is a direct descendant of the program Cyber Paint on the Atari ST (another program I spent a lot of time with as a kid), both programmed by Jim Kent. It's perfectly possible that one of the ST ROM fonts hitchhiked along in the conversion from ST to PC and started cropping up in PC games.
- viler 3y ago
  Yeah, I should think that's exactly what happened. I was a big AA user too, but at that point in time I wasn't aware of the Atari ST connection (and hadn't ever seen an ST), so whenever I spotted that font in a game I just thought of it as "the Autodesk Animator font", and assumed that's what they used for the artwork. (Sometimes you could even spot tell-tale effects like that "countour gradient" thing, which would confirm it!)

pushfoo 3y ago

TL;DR: This post is great and it raises questions about automating phylogeny guesses about game components. I think I remember seeing a similar post about Chinese bootleg games for non-PC systems. The commonality was comparing pixel data to trace what the bootlegs had taken parts from. That raises a question: can we automate inferring the copying and modification of parts between older games? In biology, there's a similar technique. Phylogenetic analysis compares sequences to reconstruct evolutionary relationships between samples. From what I understand, it seems possible to do something similar for the pixel data of game assets. However, there are limits: you have to stay above a certain pixel size for results to have meaning. The lower your resolution, the more each pixel font looks the same. The same seems to be true for sprites representing in-game elements.

rozab 3y ago
Something I find interesting about computer fonts and stuff is how much they remain the same over time, down to the bit. In phylogenetics, the passing of time is measured by the molecular clock - the accumulated mutations that are constantly happening. In a game I'm reversing right now there's an arial8.tga which struck me as feeling completely timeless, or out-of-time. The game is from the year 2000, but this exact file could have appeared in any game over like a 40 year timespan.
- bux93 3y ago
  Perhaps even longer. Arial dates back to 1982 and was meant as a metric-compatible lookalike for Helvetica which dates back to 1957, and is based on 1898's Akzidenz-Grotesk ; but of course at that time, filenames didn't yet have extensions.