Game Development Reference
In-Depth Information
TYPEFACES AND FORMATTING
Make your text easily readable. The minimum height for text displayed on a screen
should be about 12 pixels; if you make the characters any smaller, they became less
legible. If the game will be localized to display non-Roman text such as Japanese,
12 pixels is the bare minimum, and 16 pixels is distinctly preferable.
If you're going to display a lot of text, learn the rules of good typesetting and use
typefaces (fonts) that have been specifically designed for reading on a computer
screen, such as Verdana. Use mixed uppercase and lowercase letters for any block of
text more than three or four words long. Players find text set entirely in uppercase
letters difficult to read; besides, it looks like SHOUTING, creating a sense of
urgency you might not want. (On the other hand, in situations that
do
require
urgency, such as a warning message reading
DANGER
, uppercase letters work well.)
Choose your typefaces with care so that they harmonize both with the theme of
your game and with each other. Avoid using too many different typefaces, which
looks amateurish. Be aware of the difference between
display fonts
(intended for
headlines) such as Impact, and ordinary
serif
and
sans serif
fonts (intended for
blocks of text) such as Times or Arial, respectively.
Avoid
monospaced
(also called
fixed width
) fonts, such as Courier, in favor of propor-
tional fonts, such as Times, unless you need to display a table in which letters must
line up in columns. For other uses, fixed-width fonts waste space and look old-fash-
ioned and unattractive.
This chapter has already mentioned sound briefly, but this section presents more
detail, addressing several topics: sound effects, ambient sounds, music, dialog, and
voiceover narration.
Keep music, sound effects, and recorded speech in separate files, and play them
back through separate channels on the machine. Always include a facility that
allows the player to adjust the volume level of the music independently from the
volume level of the other audio effects—including turning one or the other off
completely. Many players tire of hearing the music but still want to hear the sound
effects and other sounds. Bear in mind that not all your players will have perfect
hearing, and the more control you can give them, the better. See “Accessibility
Issues” in the Appendix, “Designing to Appeal to Particular Groups.”
Sound Effects
The most common use of sound in a game is for sound effects. These sounds corre-
spond to the actions and events of the game world—for example, a burst of gunfire
or the squealing of tires as a car slides around a corner. In the real world, sound