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[lollius]

That destroys somehow the feeling that they all are letters and stuff,but now i found out they are all pics omg >___< the leet feeling is gone!

But if the game graphic are just pics,then why choosed the producer pics from letters >_< it would be moar awesome with graphic pics
(I know there are tile sets out there who fix that) but I think the producer could done that in a faaaaaar better way,so why did he choose frkin letter pics >__<

[Musashi]

Don't know the creator of the game personally, nor his brother, but...
Maybe it's actually pictures and not real ASCII JUST SO we can easily mod skins for them, which would probably be more difficult to do if it were actual text? Or maybe it is a "placeholder" of sort, since Dwarf Fortress is still technically in alpha? Or is it a personal choice, or a way to force us to make our imagination work with the in-game descriptions?

[iceball3]

Don't know the creator of the game personally, nor his brother, but...
Maybe it's actually pictures and not real ASCII JUST SO we can easily mod skins for them, which would probably be more difficult to do if it were actual text? Or maybe it is a "placeholder" of sort, since Dwarf Fortress is still technically in alpha? Or is it a personal choice, or a way to force us to make our imagination work with the in-game descriptions?

Sounds about right.
Oh, and window resizing FTW.

[Reese]

so, um... what exactly do you think ASCII is?
(technically, it's the set of 128 characters that can be represented with 7 bits, or extended ASCII which is represented with 8 bits for 256 characters)

In any case, every computer since before the Apple][e has always stored text characters as images that are strung together to display information- the only difference here is that DF stores it's own font sheet instead of pulling it from the system it's running on (as is the case with most programs)

This only serves two function: consistency of look and feel across platforms, and ease of modding.

So far as that goes, most games store an internal font set that is used to display information in game.

So, yes, it is an image stored in a .png file, and yes that is still ASCII.

[Sean Mirrsen]

More specifically, I think it was made that way so that different resolutions could be used for the game's full window. Do remember that for most of its existence, DF was hard-limited to an 80x25 tile display, so only altering the dimensions of the tiles could make it fit into different resolutions without stretching. Doing something like that with system fonts is, as far as I know, not a job for the faint of heart.

[Lancefighter]

of somewhat related note, is it possible ot somehow make the boxes square instead of rectangles? I realize that rectangles are more font-y and all.. but square tiles make more sense spatially.

[McDwarf]

of somewhat related note, is it possible ot somehow make the boxes square instead of rectangles? I realize that rectangles are more font-y and all.. but square tiles make more sense spatially.

You have to change the font used to an identical but squarer font, but yes you can.

Code: [Select]

1) In the init.txt file in the data/init folder, look for
   [WINDOWEDX:80]
   [WINDOWEDY:25]
   [FONT:curses_649x300.png]
2) Change curses_649x300.png to curses_square_16x16.png
3) Save the init.txt file
4) ???
5) Profit


[Lancefighter]

so I just need a square font, got it.

[Vactor]

as to why toady one would choose to make a game like this..

The style of using ascii as symbolic representation of ingame objects is a throwback to some of the original computer games.  If you were to have ever played computer games in the 80's this would have a warm familiarity to you.  These original games were in fact strings of characters, rather than saved images.  One issue with perfectly emulating this is that screen refresh rates are wonky, and it restricts it's usability with graphics sets, as it would be run in a command line, rather than in a windows form.

[RandomNumberGenerator]

as to why toady one would choose to make a game like this..

The style of using ascii as symbolic representation of ingame objects is a throwback to some of the original computer games.  If you were to have ever played computer games in the 80's this would have a warm familiarity to you.  These original games were in fact strings of characters, rather than saved images.  One issue with perfectly emulating this is that screen refresh rates are wonky, and it restricts it's usability with graphics sets, as it would be run in a command line, rather than in a windows form.

As mentioned, those games back in the 80s ran off of saved images as well. The only difference is they were saved in the computer and the games drew them from there, while DF has it's own font folder and doesn't need to draw the text from the OS.

[Drakeero]

To be honest, I rather like the ASCII feel, nay love it.  I use the vanilla graphics instead of a tileset.

[Vactor]

as to why toady one would choose to make a game like this..

The style of using ascii as symbolic representation of ingame objects is a throwback to some of the original computer games.  If you were to have ever played computer games in the 80's this would have a warm familiarity to you.  These original games were in fact strings of characters, rather than saved images.  One issue with perfectly emulating this is that screen refresh rates are wonky, and it restricts it's usability with graphics sets, as it would be run in a command line, rather than in a windows form.

As mentioned, those games back in the 80s ran off of saved images as well. The only difference is they were saved in the computer and the games drew them from there, while DF has it's own font folder and doesn't need to draw the text from the OS.

he wasn't asking about if a font is an image, he was talking about using a text program to output text that can be understood as a visual interface vs a windows form with a gridded tile of .png images.  There is a difference here, i've programmed little command line games where the display is actually a series of assembled text strings outputted in the correct order to make a game map that can be traversed and manipulated.  It has a certain fun to it to be 'tricking' the basic interface into being a game. This very rudimentary style of programming is what i think helped DF's appeal for him, and he was disappointed to discover that it was actually a windows form manipulated to look like it.

[Shoku]

as to why toady one would choose to make a game like this..

The style of using ascii as symbolic representation of ingame objects is a throwback to some of the original computer games.  If you were to have ever played computer games in the 80's this would have a warm familiarity to you.  These original games were in fact strings of characters, rather than saved images.  One issue with perfectly emulating this is that screen refresh rates are wonky, and it restricts it's usability with graphics sets, as it would be run in a command line, rather than in a windows form.

As mentioned, those games back in the 80s ran off of saved images as well. The only difference is they were saved in the computer and the games drew them from there, while DF has it's own font folder and doesn't need to draw the text from the OS.

he wasn't asking about if a font is an image, he was talking about using a text program to output text that can be understood as a visual interface vs a windows form with a gridded tile of .png images.  There is a difference here, i've programmed little command line games where the display is actually a series of assembled text strings outputted in the correct order to make a game map that can be traversed and manipulated.  It has a certain fun to it to be 'tricking' the basic interface into being a game. This very rudimentary style of programming is what i think helped DF's appeal for him, and he was disappointed to discover that it was actually a windows form manipulated to look like it.

But it isn't.

Ok, maybe these days it is for the sake of speed but a string of "letters" going through the operating system to snag up the display bits to print it on the screen does the same thing as a string of letters going through the game folder to snag up the display bits to print it on the screen. There are no doubt things Toady could do to make it not work the same way but he obviously knows well enough how to work with strings so why would he?

[Vactor]

it isn't what? 

I'm also fairly certain that the display isn't using strings to generate the display, rather it likely has an array of objects that each have an id that associates it with a particular rect that is generated as a division of the selected .png's x and y dimensions.

I think the pointed difference is the idea that you are actually 'seeing' the text of the code on your screen (ala matrix), not that text isn't an image itself.  Of course it is only an issue of atmosphere, and as the op said, it lost a bit of the 'cool' factor to discover that it was, in fact, a quite modernly programmed game.

[Sean Mirrsen]

He can switch it to plain text mode if he so wishes. If he's on Linux.