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[tigrex]

Hi, all.

I've been toying around with my tileset a bit, and I came up with something that I hope will briefly entertain you.

I've had a long infatuation with Norse runes, off which Tolkien based the Dwarven language in the Hobbit and the Lord of the Rings.  I tend to use them for shorthand notes, if only to convince people next to me that I'm loco.

I can't help but think that if dwarves played dwarf fortress, they would want runes to show up on their +obsidian monitor+ and be carved into their =goblin bone keyboard=.  As such, I have modified my tileset to provide a dwarven perspective to DF.  Carved into your screen, this set will give your forts an archiac touch.

Now, understand:  this is unfortunately not going to be easy to read, unless you've fnurled around with them long enough.  So prolonged play with these will probably only strain your eyes and patience, but at least they menace with spikes of awesome.

The purpose of this set, then, is in part a belated April Fool's joke.  Play with it for 5 minutes, take some screenshots, and forget about it.  But more importantly, this has the unique ability to make DF look even more complicated.  So show it to your non-DF friends, and tell them you know exactly what's going on on the screen, and they will assume you have an IQ of 180.

So here's the PNG with the data:



And here are some screenshots.  Note I haven't changed the numbers, because even I know it will result in me going blind.   



Title screen.



Artifact description.



Viewing dwarf stats.  Incidentally, that's my luxury lava tower.

So, any comments, suggestions, etc, let me know.  I'm thinking of changing everything so that the form is dwarf rune, but the letters resemble english as much as possible.  What say you?

[Greiger]

I only ever used the basic 800x600 curses myself so I'm not the best judge of something like this.

That said I think this is awesome.  My friends already have no idea whats happening when I'm playing DF.  This would puzzle them even more.  Nice work.

[Sean Mirrsen]

This is perfect. Now make runes for numbers, brackets, quote marks, the two odd letters you've missed, and have the runes replacing capital letters be slightly bolder.

I recall using runes as a form of "secret language" some time ago. They're easy to memorize after half an hour of looking at familiar text, so no need to make them too much like english letters.

[Vucar Fikodastesh]

This is a totally awesome tileset, though i can't say I'll probably ever use it.

I also used the runes from the hobbit as a secret language when I was much younger, though no one I knew was the slightest bit interested in them, so I mostly just used them for sending secret messages to myself.

Does anyone have a link to a good online resource for these runes?

[DennyTom]

This is really great job!

I do not get why do you use some graphics. It would be much better when tiles with pictures are replaced with original letters in some rune font.

(hm ... why do I feel like I have written these sentences poorly?)

[Aldaris]

We should make a form of writing for each major race. I've got an alphabet lying around I memorized, but I don't have it digitally.
Still, this is absolutely awesome. Imagine being able to read Boatmurdered in this.

And implement this as a forum font...
TO THE SUGGESTIONS FORUM!

[Sean Mirrsen]

Well, having tile-sub-sets for only text would solve a great many problems. Having different tile-sub-sets for different races would be a very welcome bonus as well.

[Tigershark13]

I must say.. it looks bloody awesome (i particularly like the walls ) i'm considering working out how to use this on a long term basis

[Blakmane]

wow so cool! I too am almost considering just learning the language so I can be even MORE dwarfy! 

[Sinergistic]

Using a tileset like this becomes a challenge in and of itself.

Can you remember what is what?

[Deon]

Moreover, start to convert normal words to df language using these runes. This is where the fun starts.

[Martian]

Wow, this will make DF look even more like the matrix. My only nitpick is the numbers and the few other letters you missed.

I'm definitely using this. I'm going to use a familiar fortress with it to start with, in the hopes of learning it.

[Sean Mirrsen]

I wonder why you didn't use Medieval Runes...  They seem like a good set. Less dwarven maybe, but somewhat more fitting given the existing timeframe...

[tigrex]

I'll work on a version with numeric support, then.  Which letters did I miss, out of curiousity?  Capital O is needed for pillars, capital X has many uses and I'm still trying to find a happy medium for it.  As for the dwarven accented letters, they default to the pics such as levers, but I think there is a mod for the dwarf language file available.  Either way, I'm not sure whether I should replace the pics with runes...

And should anyone want the tiles without the runes, they're available on the Wiki.

[Sean Mirrsen]

I meant the "n" and "N" with the "~" on top of them. Now, I'm not entirely sure they're even used in any words, but I'm fairly sure they're not used for any creatures or items, so why not switch them too?

For numbers, use the the Devanagari numerals. They may be hell to reproduce for the smaller fonts, but look vaguely similar to medieval runes.