Talk:Will the O.H.R.RPG.C.E. ever be able to use a different size of font (e.g. 16×16 or 8×16)?

Kizul: “I don’t know why the O.H.R. wouldn't be able to support a larger font size just because it’s only 320×200. :/ I mean, just look at Esper Dream 2 — it’s an old Famicom game (whos screens are only about 256×224, if I remember right), and it uses a 16×16 font for textboxes (fortunately not on the Status Screen, though (it uses ordinary 8×8)). :)

And then there’s the Gameboy Color Dragon Warrior III — it uses 8×16 for textboxes, and it’s screen size is only a whopping 160×144! :D (Though again, it uses 8×8 for the status screen when you press the B button)

So, I guess that if 16×16 font were to be supported, it would only be for just plain textboxes and stuff, and maybe (optionally?) Attack captions (specifically for attacks where you wanted to make it look like the enemy’s taunting the heroes or something). That’s about all you CAN use it for at such a low res, really. :)”

Bob the Hamster: Right now, the system for arranging text on the screen is not flexible enough (read: almost entirely hardcoded pixel positions). Sometime in the distant future, after we have a working rectangle-set editor, and have ported all the interfaces over to use it, we might be able to think about font size changes-- but it is too far away to think about right now, so don't be holding your breath now ;)

Kizul: Awesome! Okay. :D

S'orlok Reaves: Rectangles are coming along nicely, right James? Are you thinking about allowing custom font sizes for Werewaffle?

The Mad Cacti: This is suspicious... you're not just asking because I said something, are you? :P Also, rectangles? Have you heard something about them, because nobody else has.

As for custom font sizes, I still don't see how it could be easily achieved without rewriting half the engine to support and flexibly make use of them. What ideas do everyone have? I only suggested the possibility at 640x400.

BTW, Werewaffle is coming really soon. I'm going to work to ensure that we get to release candidates within a week.

S'orlok Reaves: Oh, I thought all the custom menu improvements we've been seeing were done using rectangles... must've been mistaken. Actually, different-sized fonts were on my mind since I just re-coded a lot of menu code for the FMF. If they're coming up in the near-future, I'm just wondering how they'll be incorporated.

Hmm... if it'll take that much work, you might want to lump a whole bunch of font-related updates together (e.g., I know James was saying he wanted text boxes to have better word-wrapping).

Ah, we're getting Werewaffle soon? Nice.

The Mad Cacti: Yeah, I think it'd be a good idea to plan all new font/text features at once. Simon also suggested support for multiple fonts, which is something I'm looking forward to. And it would be neat to be able to change colour or even font halfway through a line of text - and there are other controls that could be embedded in textboxes like pauses when drawing.

It also just so happens that Fyre and I were discussed 640x400 support in the backends and/or a fork which made me suggest 8x16 or 16x16 fonts. While we're at it, we might as well have bitmapped fonts too.

So I guess fonts will cease to be a special graphics format. What I mean here is that we could do with a more flexible way to store graphics anyway.

S'orlok Reaves: Yeah, a lot of relics are disappearing after the port to Freebasic. Multiple fonts would be awesome, as would more complex control sequences like you mentioned. This will probably get my vote after the Werewaffle release, if we do another feature-vote. :)

Patsen: Arguably, you could set up a larger font by simply making the characters 8x16, and require people to write the letters in two halves. It would be hard to type, but people have done more creative things with fonts, I'm sure. That'll work for now.