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What's a suitable font for Japanese-language text in a western-style comic?

Comic sans serif doesn't seem to handle Japanese. (I deliberately chose it in part to be contrarian, and in part because it is a cartoon, but please don't flag this question as "offensive content!")

I'm currently looking at Hiragino Maru Gothic Pro, as it seems more rounded than the other Hiragino fonts available in my program (Acorn).

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For a block of text(speech) Hiragino Maru Gothic Pro is a great choice. For shorter text for emphasis(onomatopoeia e.g.) I recommend Hiragino Kaku Gothic Std font, part of OS X.

Hiragino Kaku Gothic Std

A good place to get inspiration is from manga. You will notice most manga don't actually use "cartoony" fonts.

Edit: I forgot to mention that you should pair up the Japanese and the English fonts with similar styles. Serif with Serif, Sans Serif with Sans Serif.

enter image description here

For example, if you're using serif for english text, then Kozuka Mincho Pro is good. For sans-serif, Kozuka Gothic Pro.

If you're looking for really kawaii(cutesy) fonts, then get KF Himaji. Kiroji(dl), Uzura(dl) and Azuki work too.

enter image description here

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    +1 for the incredibly useful matching of Japanese and Western fonts. Jun 28, 2011 at 0:29
  • Great answer thank you. Do you by chance have any recommendations for Chinese fonts used in comic books that are on iOS?
    – Ser Pounce
    Nov 19, 2014 at 6:10

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