Fonts gone wonky

Jim W · October 31, 2002, 02:10

Just the other night, I was checking which of my trade goods would be best sent where, and discovered that the city and civ names were all in those squares the computer uses when it doesn't recognize the font. Numbers were still readable, and the brackets.

After a couple of tries, I realized it wasn't going to work.

Just this evening, I reinstalled Civ II, twice, but every time I got to building my first city, the title part, "City Name" was all in squares. The city name itself was fine.

Now, I've just recently installed some Unicode fonts on my machine, but I don't think that should be a problem. Unless the Microprose people invented their own fonts, and stored them in the section where something else goes?

I definitely have _not_ removed any fonts.

Any ideas?

I'd hate to have to play the game where I had to go looking manually at every foreign city to see who wanted what.

Jim

Mercator · October 31, 2002, 20:23

Civ2 uses (or refers to, anyway) the "Times New Roman" (used for most game text, including the city names), "MS Sans Serif", "Arial" and "System" fonts, I believe. You'd better check whether these are still in place. Or perhaps those new fonts have similar names and they're getting mixed up.

Civ2 definitely can't handle Unicode fonts (unfortunately

) , but just installing some shouldn't create any problems.

Unless... You have some sort of foreign language Windows version, or some sort of program that allows you to use them in Windows (aside from text editors).
I have Japanese fonts, but they're no good as application fonts, only Internet Explorer can properly deal with them.

Straybow · October 31, 2002, 20:38

Any of the European code pages should be handled by Civ2 no prob.

Jim W · November 1, 2002, 18:49

Quote:

Originally posted by Mercator
Civ2 uses (or refers to, anyway) the "Times New Roman" (used for most game text, including the city names), "MS Sans Serif", "Arial" and "System" fonts, I believe. You'd better check whether these are still in place. Or perhaps those new fonts have similar names and they're getting mixed up.

Civ2 definitely can't handle Unicode fonts (unfortunately

) , but just installing some shouldn't create any problems.

Unless... You have some sort of foreign language Windows version, or some sort of program that allows you to use them in Windows (aside from text editors).
I have Japanese fonts, but they're no good as application fonts, only Internet Explorer can properly deal with them.

Well, I have the standard North American version of Windows. I've double-checked on fonts, and I have all the ones named. And from the looks of "Fixed System," that's the one that Civ 2 can no longer read.

Which is interesting, because one would think that if Civ2 couldn't read it, there'd be a bunch of other apps that couldn't read it, leading to severe chaos all over.

The latest fonts I installed, just before the wonkiness, were a set of Syriac Unicode fonts. They're meant for Windows XP, but I have no intention of going that way. In fact, I hope to eventually go to Linux altogether, with perhaps a small partition for all the things that I can't make work from there.

Anyhow, I'd sure like to hear from anyone who has any notion as to what might cause this problem.

Jim

Scouse Gits · November 1, 2002, 21:18

Have any of the new fonts got the same name as the ones used in Civ? Sometimes the extension is not considered first...

The Sloshed Gits trying very hard to type........

Jim W · November 1, 2002, 23:32

Quote:

Originally posted by Scouse Gits
Have any of the new fonts got the same name as the ones used in Civ? Sometimes the extension is not considered first...

The Sloshed Gits trying very hard to type........

No, they all start out as SyrCom...

Jim

Straybow · November 3, 2002, 10:37

The chances are that installation changed something in the Windows Registry such that old Win3.1 programs can't find things they need. Have fun!

Jim W · November 3, 2002, 17:04

Quote:

Originally posted by Straybow
The chances are that installation changed something in the Windows Registry such that old Win3.1 programs can't find things they need. Have fun!

But I'm not using any Windows 3.1 programs. And the only one that's having problems is Civ 2.

Jim

Jim W · November 3, 2002, 17:14

Quote:

Originally posted by Straybow
The chances are that installation changed something in the Windows Registry such that old Win3.1 programs can't find things they need. Have fun!

But I'm not using any Windows 3.1 programs. And the only one that's having problems is Civ 2.

Jim

Scouse Gits · November 3, 2002, 19:08

Has there been any strange changes in the Win.ini file?

SG[1]

Jim W · November 4, 2002, 00:33

Quote:

Originally posted by Scouse Gits
Has there been any strange changes in the Win.ini file?

SG[1]

Sorry, I wouldn't know. I don't know what the win.ini file should look like.

Jim

Straybow · November 4, 2002, 00:53

Civ2 is a DOS/Win3.1 program even though it was finished after WinAlmost96 was inflicted upon us.