How to Play





Introduction

Mage Craft is a PC game created in 2003 by Darthlupi. You can find it along with Darthlupi's other creations at Darthlupi Designs.

Mage Craft has a lot of depth, but it can be difficult to get oriented and make progress early on. This is a guide to help you get started. It was written by clysm in 2003.


Controls

Your mouse cursor looks like this:



Use use the mouse to select options on the title screen and in menus.

In the game, use the arrow keys to move around and the mouse to aim and to cast spells. For spells that don't involve enemies (such as Mana Shield or summons), it doesn't matter where the cursor is.


Casting Spells

Because you have only your spells and no hand-to-hand weapons, one of the first things you need to learn is to keep your distance from enemies. When you encounter your first enemy, stay out of his reach (using the arrow keys) while keeping your mouse cursor trained on him (using the mouse). Hold the left mouse button to repeatedly charge and fire your Magic Missile.



You use Mana when you cast spells, and some require more than others. Mana refills over time.

The Casting meter shows how long you must wait before casting a spell. The meter's length varies for different spells.


Not Getting Killed

If your health runs out, you die. Certain items you collect refill your health.

Shields prevent you from losing health when you take damage. This meter is refilled using a spell.

In any area after the first, you can press Esc at any time to return to the map screen without losing any of the essence energy you have collected.

Similarly, although you can use the F5 and F6 keys to quicksave and quickload your game, you should not use these. You do not have a limited number of "lives" and When you die, you do not lose any of the essence energy you have collected.


Map Screen

When you get through the first area, you will see the map screen. The first thing you'll want to do here is click Save to save your progress. Red dots represent areas you can go to. Hover your cursor over one of them to see a description.




Learning Spells

You will encounter telling stones in various places. They look like this:



When you touch a telling stone, you are shown the elements needed for a certain spell.



In this example, represents the spell, and the three icons below it represent the elements you need to learn the spell. You should write this down. Even if it seems simple to remember, you can easily forget it in frantic areas or before you collect the necessary elements.

Pay attention to the placement as well as the elements. For example, the arrangement above is
[blank] [shield] [shield] [shield] [blank] [blank] [blank].


Creating Spells

From the map screen, click Spells to use the elements you have collected to build new spells.

The six rows of boxes you see show the spells you have created. Hover your cursor over a spell you have learned to see its description. Under this, you can see how many of each element you have collected. To build a spell, drag the correct elements into the squares at the bottom of the screen and click Create. This is when you need to remember what you learned from the telling stones.

The boxes numbered 1-5 show the spells assigned to the 1-5 keys on your keyboard. Click spells to assign them to the number keys. The order in which you click them determines the keys to which they are assigned. In the game, you can press these numbers to switch between the five spells you have selected. Your current spell is shown in the first box at the top of the screen.

Some spells summon allies to fight for you. When you summon a creature, you can give it one of three orders (attack, defend, or halt) by pressing the spacebar. The current order is shown in the second box at the top of the screen.


Becoming More Powerful

When you kill an enemy, its essence is left behind. Pick these up, as they allow you to increase your attributes between areas.



The number at the top of the screen next to the shows you how much essence energy you have collected. Pay attention to this number when collecting essences to see which enemies give you more points.

From the map screen, click Stats to use the essence energy you have collected to increase your attributes. At the left of each attribute is your current level. At the bottom of the Stats screen you can see how much essence energy you have collected and how much you need to use to increase one of your attributes.

Increase Health to extend your Health meter.
Increase Mana to extend your Mana meter.
Increase Shields to extend your Shields meter.
Increase Regen to speed up your Mana meter's regeneration rate.
Increase Cast Time to speed up your Casting meter and cast spells faster.
Increase Power to make your spells more powerful.
Increase Summon to be able to summon more powerful allies (don't worry about this one in the beginning).