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Dark Messiah of Might and Magic Demo v1.0
ReadMe File
August 7th 2006
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GETTING STARTED
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System Requirements

Supported OS: Windows® XP
Processor: AMD Athlon™, Pentium® 2.2 GHz (3 GHz recommended)
RAM: 512 MB (1 GB recommended)
Video Card: 128 MB DirectX® 9-compatible video card (256MB recommended)
Sound Card: DirectX 9 compatible sound card
DirectX Version: DirectX 9 or higher
Hard Drive Space: 3 GB free
Peripherals Supported: Windows-compatible mouse and keyboard
Supported Video Cards:
NVIDIA® GeForce™ FX/6/7 families
ATI® Radeon™ 9/X families


Laptop versions of these cards are not fully supported.


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GETTING STARTED WITH THE DEMO
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MAIN MENU

Double-click on the desktop icon or click once on the icon in the Start menu to
launch the game.
Once the game has finished loading, the game menu appears to offer you the
following options:

- New Game
Starts a new single player game as Sareth

- Load game
Loads a single player game you have previously saved

- Options
Allows you to configure gameplay, video, audio and control settings

- Quit
Exits the game and returns to desktop


OPTIONS

The Option screen is split into five categories which you can access by clicking
the tabs at the top of the screen.

- Keyboard
Lets you reassign the controls for the keyboard

- Mouse
Lets you adjust the mouse sensitivity or invert the vertical axis

- Audio
Lets you
Adjust the global volume for the game,
Adjust the volume for the music,
Select the hardware/software acceleration (depending on the type of hardware installed),
Toggle the in-game text feature on or off.

- Video
The first time the game is launched, the program will determine what configuration
is best adapted to your system. However, you can adjust several video settings from
this menu (make sure your computer is able to support high quality settings).
For advanced users, you can click the “Advanced” button and customize your video
settings in more detail.

- Gameplay
This menu lets you toggle certain gameplay features on or off.
Bow Crosshair: Activate or deactivate the bow crosshair during the game.
Always display inventory belt: always display your belt items during the game.

- Difficulty
You can choose your level of difficulty when starting the demo by clicking the
"New Game" button. In Hard Mode, enemies are stronger and tougher than in Normal Mode.


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BASIC CONTROLS
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- Keyboard
Key Bindings on a "QWERTY" Keyboard:

W - Move Forward
S - Move Backward
A - Strafe Left
D - Strafe Right
E - Interact with the environment
F- Kick
Left Shift - Sprint
Left Control - Crouch
ALT - Walk
Space - Jump
TAB- Inventory and Skill Tree
1-0- Shortcuts to select the corresponding belt slot item or spell

- Mouse
Left Click: Attack / Cast spell.
Right Click: Hold to parry (when equipped with a bow, you cannot parry).
Mouse wheel: display and select belt items.


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ADVANCED CONTROLS
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- Power strike:
Press and hold the left click to adopt an offensive stance. Release the button to
deliver a powerful blow.
You have 5 different attacks depending on the direction you are moving when
charging your strike (left click ; forward + left click ; back + left click ;
right + left click ; left + left click).

- Fatality:
When you adrenaline bar is full, your next power strike will become a finishing move
that will slay most enemies in a single blow. The exact move depends on the body part
you aimed.

- Impale:
If your enemy is knocked down and you are close enough, your next power strike will
impale him to the ground. Most enemies will be killed by such a devastating blow.

- Enhanced magic:
When you adrenaline bar is full, your spells will have their effects highly increased.

- Counter:
If you parry the enemy just as he strikes you, you will put him off balance and create an
opening for your counter-attack.

- Interaction with environment:
You will sometimes face many opponents at the same time. In such a situation,
use the environment to gain the upper hand: destroy wood platforms to tumble things down
(crates, barrels, etc), kick your enemies backward to impale them on spiked traps
or push them over ledges, set fire to oil filled jars to turn the area into an inferno, grab
heavy objects and throw them at your opponents to knock them down. Possibilities are
countless so feel free to experiment different actions.


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ITEMS
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You will find many different items to help you progress during your journey.
They can be categorized as follows:

- Weapons: they can be sorted in four classes.

- Swords: powerful, very effective in face-to-face melee combat.

- Daggers: perfect for sneaking behind an enemy and gashing him with deadly wounds.

- Staves: not as deadly as swords and daggers but more effective against large groups
of enemies. Staves are more likely to knock your opponents down.

- Bows: inflict great damage from a distance.


- Armors and shields: improve your overall defense to absorb the damage you receive.

- Accessories: items with magical properties.
Consumable items: (health potions, mana potions, food, etc.)
use them to recover your health or your mana.

- Key items: you must find these items to progress throughout your adventure.
Keys open doors but don’t forget they can take various forms…


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TROUBLESHOOTING
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- Video Cards
It is highly recommended to check your video card manufacturer's
website and download updated drivers for your card. For your
convenience the addresses are listed here:

ATI: http://ati.com/support/driver.html
Nvidia: http://nvidia.com/content/drivers/drivers.asp


- ALT+TAB
Using the ALT+TAB key combination to switch between applications may
cause problems. We do not support the use of the ALT+TAB function.

- US Keyboard binding
In the demo of Dark Messiah, your keyboard will be detected as a US keyboard. If you have
an international keyboard, like the French keyboard, reassigning your keys will give you
the US equivalent. For exemple binding "W" to crouch will read "Z" in the
the keyboard options' menu.

French keyboard binding:
Z - Move Forward
S - Move Backward
Q - Strafe Left
D - Strafe Right
E - Interact with the environment
F- Kick
C - Crouch

- 800*600 Resolution
That resolution is not officially supported in the demo of Dark Messiah of Might and
Magic.

- 16/10 Screen Ratio
That Screen Ratio is not officially supported in the demo of Dark Messiah of Might
and Magic.