Japanese game makers are struggling to find affordable commercial fonts after one of the country’s leading font licensing services increased the cost of its annual plan from about $380 to $20,500 (USD).
As reported by GameMakers and GameSpark and translated by Automaton, FontWorks LETS shut down its game licensing scheme at the end of November.
The expensive replacement plan – offered through FontWorks’ parent company, Monotype – doesn’t even offer local pricing for Japanese developers, and comes with a 25,000 user-cap, which probably isn’t workable for Japan’s larger studios.
The problem is further compounded by the difficulties and complexities of securing fonts that can accurately write kanji and katakana characters.
“This is a little-known issue, but it has become a major problem in some circles,” wrote the CEO of development studio Indie-Us Games.
UI/UX designer Yamanaka stressed that this would be particularly problematic for live service games; Even if studios moved quickly and switched to a font available through an alternative licensee, they would still have to re-test, re-verify, and re-QA check content already in live and active use.
The crisis may eventually force some Japanese studios to rebrand completely if their corporate identity is tied to a commercial font they can no longer license.
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