What's the deal with this font?

Often described as 'Japan's Helvetica', what's the story behind this commonly used font? I kept seeing it in Nintendo games or while visiting Japan, so I had to deep-dive into the typography world to find out what the whole fuss was about.

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This is my 198th YouTube video of all-time

[kHz]

I study Japanese at university, and I have two language teachers who are from Japan.
I asked them about latin script fonts, and why in Japan, only a few fonts seem to be popular, and they told me that it's also for clarity's sake - many Japanese people are not constantly exposed to the latin alphabet, making it harder for them to read text in a more exotic font, and Morisawa Shin Go and New Rodin make it easy for Japanese people, used to Japanese script, to read the latin alphabet.

[ThomasGameDocs]

Great video! I'd noticed the font in a bunch of games before, but I had no idea it was actually two different fonts by two different companies! Thanks for the great video - really well presented!

[envigraphy]

I worked as an UI Designer for several Japanese projects that very specifically requested the use of Morisawa Shin Go for their interface. I've always thought it had something to do with legal reasons since big Japanese corps are kind of anal about it. Never realized it had such significance in the culture.

[UTiTE]

ive always labeled it as the nintendo font and that one time i saw it in a music video i immediately went “ITS THE NINTENDO FONT!1!1!”

[SyncdeathWyvxrn]

The most obvious difference of A-OTF Shin Go Pro and FOT-New Rodin Pro is that they have different capital R glyphs.

[Nandonut]

I really wouldn't have known that it was in so many other places than wii games, but the font looks SUPER wii/wii sports to me! Interesting to know! :)

[KN-ckkd]

the use of the word <gothic> to refer to 'sans serif' Japanese fonts was a really intriguing detail to me- would love to know where that comes from!

[JulesKDev]

I never realized the font appeared so often in their games! I won't be able to unsee it now!

[coastalriddle]

Thanks for not starting the video with "Ah, the Wii!" or some other pointless introduction to the history of the Wii. Appreciate the concise vid!

[supremekirb]

Looking at Wii U era games, it’s pretty clear how this font is just EVERYWHERE. Even to the point where for the longest time I thought Nintnedo had some sort of internal policy at that time to use “the Nintendo UI font” for UI wherever possible. Thanks for putting this little mystery to rest!

[SneedTheSeed]

Short, well edited and interesting. Video doesn’t overstay it's welcome nor has any unnecessary filler, this is certainly a 5/5 star rating from me. Good job 👏

[xraider]

This and Highway Gothic (which is used on US Highway signs) are my top 2 favorite fonts and I use them a

[MrCheeze]

Also, to state the obvious... making a new font with Kanji is a MUCH larger task than just making one for the latin alphabet. So you're never going to have quite the wide font diversity that we have.

[fursuits]

I am a fulltime software engineer, a week after watching this video I decided to change my OS default, system and VSC font to Morisawa Shin Go.

It has boosted my productivity tremendously, I feel much happier and comfortable behind my pc. I always have played around with fonts but this one just feels so perfect to me.

It feels like I am playing a Nintendo game whenever I’m working, it’s crazy, all because of a font.

[Larry]

IT's kind of like the Namco font, every video game used it in the '80s and early '90s, and now it's used as a "retro game" font.

[lukass]

I really love the looks of Shin Go, it got that roundish-square type look. Very happy you made this video!

[klobiforpresident]

Okay, that setup and payoff with _Helvetica_ was both unexpected and great.

[samaiello]

I was very surprised to hear about Helvetica. In almost any academic setting, it’s always been Times New Roman, size 12, double spaced lines, and six space indents as opposed to pressing tab. I don’t think I’ve ever used Helvetica, hell, Arial is default in a lot of programs. Really surprised me, great vid!

[katt]

I appreciate this only being four minutes, so many people take a topic like this and stretch it to like 15 minutes somehow

[nomi-non]

On a practical level, it's likely also a time saver for UI designers. By having a font ready for CJK and Latin, if the text is already centered and positioned properly, you don't have to change fonts and redesign your UI for the new font when going between languages.