Well I needed some sprites to do some experiments on the 2600, so I decided
to use some japanese characters... then I decided, "what the heck, let's
make an entire hiragana font."
If you want to add an exotic touch to your Atari 2600 programmes I've made
a font that includes all the hiragana characters (these are characters
that are used to spell native japanese words, as opposed to katagana
characters that are used to spell words borrowed from other languages).
Now I've set up the punctuation and other things to be used in the traditional
japanese writing style, right to left, top to bottom...
e l l w w T
n i o o h h
g k o u a i
l e k l t s
i d
s i i i
h n t s
.
This is okay because for the 2600 it would be easier to display japanese
writing this way. Using the "six digit score routine" would really work
great for printing japanese text. The only thing is the marks that
give you the alternate pronounciation of a character had to be a seperate
sprite placed beside the root character (since the sprites are only 8 bits
wide I couldn't incorporate the marks into a single character with the root).
For ease of use I restricted myself to 8x8bit blocks for the fonts. It was
extremely challenging to make hiragana characters that are readable in such
small packages, but I think I've pulled it off (although some characters
might need to be written in context to be fully recognizable. nu and me
were particularily hard to pull off, so was no picnic either).
I'll be making a set of katagana fonts (which will probably be more useful,
and much easier to make) later. But here's the font set now if anyone out
there wants to use them, please help yourself.
-----------------------------------------------------------------------------
;Japanese Hiragana Font For The Atari 2600
;Copyright 1998 Chris "Crackers" Cracknell
;Usage Rights released into the Public Domain
;all these characters are stored UPSIDE-DOWN! It's easier to read them
;into the program that way.
a .byte %00111100 ;A - pronounced "ah" as in
.byte %01001010 ;fAther
.byte %01001010
.byte %00110010
.byte %00011100
.byte %00010000
.byte %00111000
.byte %00010000
i .byte %00100000 ;I - pronounced "e" as in
.byte %00110000 ;skI
.byte %01000000
.byte %01000000
.byte %01000010
.byte %01000010
.byte %00100100
.byte %00100100
u .byte %00011100 ;U - pronounced similar to "oo" as in
.byte %00000010 ;cOOl
.byte %00000010
.byte %01000010
.byte %00111100
.byte %00000000
.byte %00001000
.byte %00010000
e .byte %00100110 ;E - pronounced "a" as in
.byte %00010100 ;pAy
.byte %00001000
.byte %00001000
.byte %00111000
.byte %00000000
.byte %00001000
.byte %00010000
o .byte %00110100 ;O - pronounced "o" as in
.byte %01010010 ;gO
.byte %00110010
.byte %00011100
.byte %00010001
.byte %00010010
.byte %00111000
.byte %00010000
ka .byte %01000100 ;position dotdot second sprite to the
.byte %00101010 ;right to make ga
.byte %00100010
.byte %00100010
.byte %00010010
.byte %01111100
.byte %00010001
.byte %00010010
ki .byte %00111100 ;dotdot makes gi
.byte %01000000 ;smallya below makes kya/gya
.byte %01001000 ;smallyu makes kuy/gyu
.byte %00010000 ;smallyo makes kyo/gyo
.byte %01111100
.byte %00010000
.byte %00111000
.byte %00010000
ku .byte %00000100 ;dotdot makes gu
.byte %00001000
.byte %00010000
.byte %00100000
.byte %00100000
.byte %00010000
.byte %00001000
.byte %00000100
ke .byte %00101000 ;dotdot makes ke
.byte %00100100
.byte %01000100
.byte %01000100
.byte %01000100
.byte %01001110
.byte %00100100
.byte %00100100
ko .byte %00111100 ;dotdot makes go
.byte %01000010
.byte %00000000
.byte %00000100
.byte %00011110
.byte %00100000
.byte %00000000
.byte %00000000
sa .byte %00111100 ;dotdot makes za
.byte %01000000
.byte %01001000
.byte %00010000
.byte %00010000
.byte %00111000
.byte %00010000
.byte %00010000
shi .byte %00011000 ;dotdot makes ji
.byte %00100100 ;smallya makes sha/jya
.byte %00100010 ;smallyu makes shu/jyu
.byte %00100000 ;smallyp makes sho/jyo
.byte %00100000
.byte %00100000
.byte %00100000
.byte %00100000
su .byte %00010000 ;dotdot makes zu
.byte %00001000
.byte %00011000
.byte %00101000
.byte %00011000
.byte %00001000
.byte %00111110
.byte %00001000
se .byte %00011100 ;dotdot makes ze
.byte %00100010
.byte %00100000
.byte %00100000
.byte %01100100
.byte %00110100
.byte %00101110
.byte %00100100
so .byte %00001100 ;dotdot makes zo
.byte %00010000
.byte %00001000
.byte %00111100
.byte %00100000
.byte %00010000
.byte %00001000
.byte %00110000
ta .byte %01000000 ;dotdot makes da
.byte %01001110
.byte %01000000
.byte %01001100
.byte %00100010
.byte %00100000
.byte %01110000
.byte %00100000
chi .byte %00001100 ;dotdot makes di
.byte %00000010 ;smallya makes cha
.byte %00000010 ;smallyu makes chu
.byte %00010010 ;smallyo makes cho
.byte %00011100
.byte %00010000
.byte %00111000
.byte %00010000
tsu .byte %00011100
.byte %00100010
.byte %00000010
.byte %01100010
.byte %01010010
.byte %00001100
.byte %00000000
.byte %00000000
te .byte %00000100 ;dotdot makes de
.byte %00001000
.byte %00001000
.byte %00001000
.byte %00001000
.byte %00000100
.byte %01100010
.byte %00011110
to .byte %00111000 ;dotdot makes do
.byte %01000100
.byte %01000000
.byte %01000000
.byte %00111000
.byte %00010000
.byte %00010000
.byte %00000000
na .byte %00001010
.byte %00010100
.byte %00001100
.byte %01000100
.byte %00100100
.byte %00100000
.byte %01110010
.byte %00100100
ni .byte %00100000
.byte %00101110
.byte %01000000
.byte %01000000
.byte %01000000
.byte %01000000
.byte %00101110
.byte %00100000
nu .byte %00100101
.byte %01011010
.byte %10010110
.byte %10001010
.byte %01011010
.byte %00111100
.byte %00100100
.byte %01000010
ne .byte %00100010
.byte %11100101
.byte %10100010
.byte %01100010
.byte %00110010
.byte %00101100
.byte %00100000
.byte %00100000
no .byte %00110100
.byte %01010010
.byte %01010010
.byte %01010010
.byte %01010010
.byte %00110010
.byte %00001100
.byte %00000000
ha .byte %01000101 ;dotdot makes ba
.byte %01101010 ;pdot makes pa
.byte %10000110
.byte %10000010
.byte %10000010
.byte %10000010
.byte %01000111
.byte %01000010
hi .byte %00011100 ;dotdot makes bi
.byte %00100010 ;pdot makes pi
.byte %00100010 ;smallya makes hya/bya/pya
.byte %00100010 ;smallyu makes hyu/byu/pyu
.byte %00010011 ;smallyo makes hyo/byo/pyo
.byte %01010010
.byte %00100000
.byte %00100000
fu .byte %01001010 ;dotdot makes bu
.byte %10001001 ;pdot makes pu
.byte %01010010
.byte %00010000
.byte %00010000
.byte %00001000
.byte %00001000
.byte %00010000
he .byte %00000000 ;dotdot makes be
.byte %00000000 ;pdot makes pe
.byte %00000001
.byte %00000010
.byte %01000100
.byte %00101000
.byte %00110000
.byte %00000000
ho .byte %01000101 ;dotdot makes bo
.byte %01101010 ;pdot makes po
.byte %10000110
.byte %10000010
.byte %10000010
.byte %10000111
.byte %01000010
.byte %01000111
ma .byte %01101100
.byte %01010000
.byte %01110000
.byte %00010000
.byte %00111000
.byte %00010000
.byte %00111000
.byte %00010000
mi .byte %01100000 ;smallya makes mya
.byte %10100010 ;smallyu makes myu
.byte %10100010 ;smallyo makes myo
.byte %01100011
.byte %00111110
.byte %10100010
.byte %01100010
.byte %00100000
mu .byte %00001100
.byte %00010010
.byte %00110010
.byte %01010000
.byte %00110001
.byte %00010010
.byte %00111000
.byte %00010000
me .byte %00101010
.byte %01011001
.byte %01011001
.byte %01110101
.byte %00011110
.byte %00100100
.byte %00100100
.byte %00000000
mo .byte %00001100
.byte %00010010
.byte %00010010
.byte %00010000
.byte %00111000
.byte %00010000
.byte %00111000
.byte %00010000
ra .byte %00011100
.byte %00000010
.byte %00000010
.byte %01100010
.byte %01011100
.byte %01000000
.byte %00001000
.byte %00010000
ri .byte %00000100 ;smallya makes rya
.byte %00000100 ;smallyu makes ryu
.byte %00000010 ;smallyo makes ryo
.byte %00000010
.byte %01000010
.byte %01100010
.byte %01010010
.byte %01001100
ru .byte %00001100
.byte %00001010
.byte %00000110
.byte %00100010
.byte %00011100
.byte %00001000
.byte %00000100
.byte %00111110
re .byte %00100100
.byte %11100100
.byte %10100010
.byte %01100010
.byte %00110010
.byte %00101110
.byte %00100000
.byte %00100000
ro .byte %00011100
.byte %00000010
.byte %00000010
.byte %00100010
.byte %00011100
.byte %00001000
.byte %00000100
.byte %00111110
ya .byte %00100000
.byte %00100000
.byte %00100110
.byte %10100001
.byte %01100001
.byte %00111110
.byte %00101010
.byte %00100000
yu .byte %00001000
.byte %01001010
.byte %01101001
.byte %01101001
.byte %01011001
.byte %01011110
.byte %01001000
.byte %00001000
yo .byte %01101100
.byte %01010000
.byte %01110000
.byte %00010000
.byte %00010000
.byte %00011100
.byte %00010000
.byte %00010000
wa .byte %00100100
.byte %11100010
.byte %10100001
.byte %01100001
.byte %00110010
.byte %00101100
.byte %00100000
.byte %00100000
wo .byte %00001100 ;object marker wo
.byte %00010000 ;pronounced "o"
.byte %00010100
.byte %00001110
.byte %00110100
.byte %00101000
.byte %01110000
.byte %00100000
period .byte %00000000 ;japanese style period
.byte %00000000
.byte %00000000
.byte %00000000
.byte %00000010
.byte %00000101
.byte %00000010
.byte %00000000
pdot .byte %00000000 ;place this dot beside ha-ho
.byte %00000000 ;characters to make them
.byte %00000000 ;pa-po
.byte %00000000
.byte %01000000
.byte %10100000
.byte %01000000
.byte %00000000
dotdot .byte %00000000 ;two little dashes are placed
.byte %00000000 ;beside a character to give
.byte %00000000 ;it a different pronounciation
.byte %00000000 ;ka-ko/ga-go
.byte %00100000 ;sa-so/za-zo
.byte %01001000 ;ta-to/da-do
.byte %10010000 ;ha-ho/ba-bo
.byte %00100000
bquote .byte %00000000 ;japanese begin quotation mark
.byte %00000000
.byte %00000000
.byte %00000000
.byte %01000000
.byte %01000000
.byte %01000000
.byte %01110000
equote .byte %00001110 ;japanese end quotation mark
.byte %00000010
.byte %00000010
.byte %00000010
.byte %00000000
.byte %00000000
.byte %00000000
.byte %00000000
dblqotb .byte %00000000 ;japanese begin double quote
.byte %00000000
.byte %00000000
.byte %11100000
.byte %10100000
.byte %10100000
.byte %10010000
.byte %11110000
dblqote .byte %00001111 ;japanese end double quote
.byte %00001001
.byte %00001101
.byte %00000101
.byte %00000111
.byte %00000000
.byte %00000000
.byte %00000000
coma .byte %00000000 ;japanese coma
.byte %00000000
.byte %00000000
.byte %00000000
.byte %00000010
.byte %00000110
.byte %00000100
.byte %00000000
smallya .byte %00000000 ;small ya, added below i-dan to make
.byte %00000000 ;kya, gya, sha, jya, cha, hya, etc.
.byte %00000000
.byte %00000100
.byte %00000101
.byte %00001111
.byte %00000100
.byte %00000000
smallyu .byte %00000000 ;small yu, added below i-dan to make
.byte %00000000 ;kyu, gyu, shu, jyu, chu, hyu, etc.
.byte %00000000
.byte %00000010
.byte %00001011
.byte %00001011
.byte %00000110
.byte %00000000
smallyo .byte %00000000 ;small yo, added below i-dan to make
.byte %00000000 ;kyo, gyo, sho, jyo, cho, hyo, etc.
.byte %00000000
.byte %00001100
.byte %00001100
.byte %00000110
.byte %00000100
.byte %00000000
smlltsu .byte %00000000 ;small tsu, placed before a character
.byte %00000000 ;to double it's starting constanant.
.byte %00000000 ;ka + small tsu + ta = katta
.byte %00000010
.byte %00000001
.byte %00001001
.byte %00000110
.byte %00000000
-----------------------------------------------------------------------------
If anyone has wants to use japanese in a 2600 game and has questions feel
free to ask.
CRACKERS
(Now that was fun from hell!!!)
--
Accordionist - Wethifl Musician - Atari 2600 Collector | /\/\
*NEW CrAB URL* http://www.hwcn.org/~ad329/crab.html ***| \^^/
Bira Bira Devotee - FES Member - Samurai Pizza Cats Fan| =\/=
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