Hacker News Reader

Comment by resoluteteeth | Hacker News Reader

Bitmap fonts may not be copyrightable (in the US at least) due to a quirk of copyright law:

https://www.crowdspring.com/blog/font-law-licensing/

> Generally, copyright law in the U.S. does not protect typefaces.

> Fonts may be protected as long as the font qualifies as computer software or a program (and in fact, most fonts are programs or software).

> Bitmapped fonts are considered to be computerized representations of a typeface (and are not protected by copyright law).

> On the other hand, scalable fonts (because they are incorporated as part of a program or software) are protected by copyright.

View on HN

This would explain why that 8-bit arcade font (it's in numerous Namco and Atari games) that's everywhere in 70's and 80's arcade games was everywhere.

I thought the same, but this book [0] absolutely staggered me by the creative ways people made 8 by 8 fonts

[0]: https://www.amazon.co.uk/Arcade-Game-Typography-Pixel-Type/d...

I used to sketch 8x8 bitmap fonts on graph paper using circles four to a square when I was in junior high. I spent a lot of time trying different combinations.

Well also there aren't that many ways to make a legible font using 8x8 (actually less, for spacing) pixels :-P

That font has some unique characteristics (such as the lopsided S and 8). It's not like the Signetics based font from Apple I/II which is very basic, for example.

Also if you look at all the ways letters and numbers have been drawn in C-64, NES, Genesis, and SNES games; there's lots of room for creativity and design even in an 8x8 space.

FWIW, the reason all of the vertical elements in the C-64 font are two pixels wide is to compensate for raster blur on televisions that were common at the time.

If you made a vertical line only one pixel wide, on many televisions like the Panasonic I used it would be nearly impossible to see.

And while color monitors of the day were an improvement, they still weren't what we would consider acceptable today. I eventually upgraded to a Commodore CM-141, and single pixel vertical lines still weren't great.

I made an 8x8 font that was inspired by Broadway [1] and it ended up in most of the company's video gaming machines back in the 80's.

[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Broadway_(typeface)

Don't leave us hanging! Tell us more, which games, which company?

Reply on news.ycombinator.com