Clue game type font free download

The quiz game show Jeopardy! is a great typographic test case. The program fills more screen and airtime with type than any other TV show in the US, and the effectiveness of that type is crucial to the success of the game.

First, that wacky logo. The iconic Jeopardy! title we know today first premiered in and is likely derived from a phototype face known as Anonymous, perhaps the same source as Annual, one of URW++’s many digitizations from the film font era.

The game board has undergone various changes over the last few decades but the relatively unsophisticated style has remained essentially the same. Since the s, the board’s categories and dollar levels have used different widths of Swiss , Bitstream’s version of Helvetica.

Besides the logo, perhaps the most recognizable type in Jeopardy! is on the clue cards. Though there are certainly more legibile typefaces than Helvetica Compressed, the categories and levels were clearly designed to make the type as large as possible without sacrificing too much clarity. The clues, on the other hand, don’t seem to account for either readability or space efficiency. They are set in all-caps ITC Korinna, a fairly ornamental serif with unusual Art Nouveau-inspired lettershapes. I suppose you could argue that the lack of repetitive forms aids legibility, but my guess is that the odd choice is merely a result of what was in style at the time — Ed Benguiat’s and Victor Caruso’s typefaces were certainly fasionable in the s and ’80s.

The “Daily Double” type is likely a modification of Square , Bitstream’s version of Eurostile. [Or rather Steile Futura Bold, see comments.]

The first Jeopardy! set for its syndication run was designed in by Henry J. Lickel. The last few incarnations of the set were designed by Naomi Slodki.