Update: An earlier version of this font used . (period) for syllable inversion. The new version uses _ (underscore) instead.
I haven’t even played this game yet, but I saw that it had its own writing system, so I decided to jump on creating a font for it!
First things first, here’s the download: Tunic Font v0.2 (ZIP)
This writing system is not a simple 1:1 cipher for English, but rather a phonetic script, so it requires some special considerations to use it correctly. As with my Zelda fonts, I decided to use custom ligatures1 to implement all the different symbols. These are the letter sequences to generate all 42 symbols:
The following table shows how these sequences are supposed to map onto English phonemes:
| a hat /æ/ | ar far /ar/ | ah law /ɑ/ | ey hey /e̩ɪ/ | e pet /e/ | ee meet /i/ |
| eer beer /ir/ | u sunny /ə~ʌ/ | er air /eɪr/ | i hit /ɪ/ | ie pie /aɪ/ | ir bird /ɜr/ |
| o toe /oʊ/ | oy toy /oɪ/ | oo toon /u/ | ou book /ʊ/ | ow how /aʊ/ | or more /or/ |
| b bat /b/ | ch chat /tʃ/ | d debt /d/ | f fret /f/ | g get /g/ | h hat /h/ |
| j jet /dʒ/ | k kid /k/ | l let /l/ | m met /m/ | n net /n/ | ng king /ŋ/ |
| p pet /p/ | r rat /r/ | s sat /s/ | sh ship /ʃ/ | t tent /t/ | th thin /θ/ |
| dh this /ð/ | v vet /v/ | w wet /w/ | y yet /j/ | z zit /z/ | zh casual /ʒ/ |
| – vowel carrier | , , | . . | ! ! | ? ? | _ syllable inverter |
To write using this font:
- Type whatever you want to write phonetically, using the letter combinations above. Use only lowercase.2
- Vowels are designed to overlap the preceding consonant. To write a vowel on its own, use a
-(hyphen) to create a blank line to attach the vowel to. Example: “eye” would be written-ie - To create an inverted syllable (vowel first) write it backwards, then add an
_(underscore) after. Example: “ant” would be writtenna_t
Finally, here is an example text putting together everything discussed above:
“All human beings are born free and equal in diginity and rights. They are endowed with reason and conscience and should act toward one another in a spirit of brotherhood.”
Article 1, Universal Declaration of Human Rights
Thanks for reading, now go forth and make cool stuff!
Credit Due:
- Thanks to Andrew Shouldice et al. for creating Tunic!
- Thanks to Reddit user oposdeo for sharing this reference sheet!
Footnotes:
- Some programs (notably MS Paint and WordPad) do not support custom ligatures, but most do. I have personally tested LibreOffice Writer, GIMP, and Affinity Photo, and they all work. I’m sure Word and Photoshop work as well.
- The characters outside the basic Latin alphabet are mapped to the appropriate IPA Unicode symbols. If you are comfortable writing using the IPA, this font should support it. Note however that many of the letters within the basic Latin alphabet are mapped in a nonstandard way, so you’ll have to account for that (e.g. “j” = /dʒ/, “a” = /æ/, etc.)
This font is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License.