Latest build

Built automatically from main (45da7ca).

Magician's Quest: Mysterious Times, recompiled for PC. No game data is included: choose your own ROM (USA) on the
start screen and the game is built from it once.

Getting started: extract the zip somewhere you can write to and run MagiciansQuest.exe. Pick the Enhanced
preset for the recommended setup (one 16:9 picture, 60 fps, smoothed text and textures). F1 opens the settings.

What's in it

• One screen (16:9): the DS's two screens are two halves of one view, so they are joined into one wide picture.
  Where only the bottom screen has 3D (classrooms, shops, rooms) it fills the window, with the top screen in a corner
  (F3 or the right stick: small, large, hidden). Menus show both screens side by side. Empty far sides that the game
  never built are filled from the scene beside them (Settings > Video > Fill empty edges).
• Zoom (widescreen): where one screen fills the window (rooms, shops, classrooms), the camera comes in just
  enough that the picture is filled with what the game really draws, not empty sides (Settings > Video > Zoom).
• PC view (in testing, Settings > Video > Layout: PC view, OpenGL): one picture of the world from one camera
  instead of two DS screens: the town as one wide view with the sky above (one continuous scene: the near walls,
  planters and ledges now carry on past where the two DS screens met, with no line across the picture, under one
  fog, and no tear there while the camera moves: both parts are always of the same moment, at 60 fps; the sky's colour bands reach the window's edges, in town and in the beach, forest and Lovers Point; the forest by Charlie's Noodles no longer shows black wedges at the wide sides (the trees fade out softly); no band in a student's hair
  colours running to the window's edge when someone stands at the side of the view, as while fishing by the bookshop), rooms and shops filling the window, the
  bag and hand in the window's corners (only while the game shows them: not while fishing), the text box (with its choices and lists, however tall) at a sharp
  whole-number scale at the bottom (and so are menus with no text box under them, such as the post office's "Other
  player / Classmate / Exit", clickable there), and menus (the bag, the Start menu's pages: map, info, telegrams,
  friends, magic; the shops' catalogues and lists: Harrows' CD orders, The Emporium's sell list, Mon Paris'
  hairstyles; the telegram's recipients, the bell's composer, character creation) as a centred panel of both screens
  over the scene from before them (no longer with a curtain or a text box caught in it). While the game's keyboard is
  up (your name at enrolment, a telegram's text) you can type on your PC's keyboard: letters, digits, space,
  Backspace, Enter for OK. At the school bell's composer, your keyboard's home row plays its piano. Saving's "Please wait..." box shows
  alone where the text box is; your chanted words appear above your student; a click on the world (an insect with
  the net, a classmate) goes where you click, across the whole wide picture; the tournament's word panel sits over
  the auditorium; speech balloons beside the bag stay where they are. The scene dimmed behind a menu no longer shows the bag and hand icons;
  rooms' far sides past the room's own walls (the bookshop) fade softly into the dark instead of smeared streaks; a
  click just beside a speech balloon or a label goes to the world, not to it.
• 60 fps 3D on both screens, high resolution (up to 16x), widescreen (16:9 to 32:9) in every layout.
• Smooth 2D: text, menus and sprites upscaled with smooth diagonals instead of blocks.
• Upscale textures: the game's textures enlarged 4x with a pixel-art filter (crisp edges, smooth diagonals).
• Texture packs: Settings > Video > Dump textures saves the game's textures to textures\dump in the data
  folder; put edited or redrawn ones (1, 2 or 4 times the size, same names) in textures\load.
• Walk speed (only your character), text speed, quick transitions, fast forward (hold Tab).
• Your PC's clock is the game's: days, hours and seasons pass with real time.
• Pause in background (the game waits while you're in another window; not while connected to another player),
  and the mouse pointer hides while you play.
• Co-op from a new game: the game's own multiplayer (visiting each other's towns) over a LAN or the internet,
  from the first day. Settings > Network > Co-op between PCs: one player Hosts, the others Join (the host is found by
  itself on the same network; over the internet, type its address and forward UDP port 49251 to it). Start your
  games, go upstairs to the Gateway in the dorm, communications room, Multi-Card Play: the host picks "Come and play
  with me!", the others "Can we play together?". While connected, the first day's holds are lifted, so you can walk
  out into the host's town together right away, walk to the school (south past the shops, then up the slope to the
  striped gate). Walking into the school together starts the principal's welcome for both of you (the speech,
  the introduction to the class, the wand and hat), which ends the first day in each player's own save; the
  principal and teachers are there while you're connected, so you can take classes together. The café, the
  insect and fish books and the shops' CDs, part-time work and berry seedlings are open to visitors too. Two copies of the game on one PC find each other too. Details in
  docs/COOP.md.
• Co-op: one town, and each other. While connected, everyone plays in the same town: what one player changes in
  the host's town (its flags, its people's state) reaches the others within a second, over a channel of our own beside
  the game's link. And the players can talk to each other: face the other student and press A for a chat (it raises
  your friendship once a day; at a point you become friends, and both see it) or to ask how you're getting along. The
  friendship is kept beside each player's save. One talk at a time: if you both press A at each other, the host's
  talk goes on and the guest sees " is talking to you." once (no more pile of "came over to talk" boxes).
• Co-op: every incantation. While connected, the summons and transforms (World Tree, Candyman, Werewolf,
  Homunculus, Familiar, Golem, Charm) and Connect doors, Sweet dreams, Make peace, Sit by me, Honor student and
  Mushroom work as they do alone, instead of "cannot be used during wireless communications", and so does Phantasm
  in the dorm's washroom: the fortune-teller comes to the one who called her (a visitor's first meeting leaves the
  host's town as it was). The other player sees it: " cast the Golem incantation!", with the sparkle at you when you're
  together. What an incantation changes in the town (a mystery's step, the mushrooms) is decided by the host's town,
  so a guest's cast reaches everyone. Rainbow, Flower rain and Rainmaking are cast together as the game does it.
• Co-op: the same insects. While connected and in the same place, both players see the host's insects: the same
  bugs in the same spots, resting, crawling and flying off together (they fly off when either player comes close).
  A bug is caught once: if you both swing at it, the host's game decides who got it, and the other sees it vanish
  into the partner's net. A butterfly a visitor swings at in the open is no longer lost to both players over the
  internet (the partner's net swing no longer catches it on the other console), and a visitor who leaves "You caught
  ...!" open no longer crashes. Mushrooms are the host's town's too.
• Co-op: the same fish. While connected and in the same place, both players have the host's fish: the same
  ripples in the same spots of the river and the sea. A fish that goes for one player's lure swims to that lure on
  both screens, and a fish is hooked by one lure only (if you both fish for it, the first lure it was asked for gets
  it). What you catch is yours: it goes into your bag, and the fish swims off to another spot on both screens (a
  visitor's catch used to leave it where it was).
• Co-op: best friends, or a couple. Casting Friendship or Declare love together (the game's own two-player
  incantations) now brings the two of you closer, as it would with a classmate. Once you're close enough, talking to
  the other student offers an invitation to Lovers Point at a time you pick; they answer Yes or No on their own
  screen. Be there together at that hour and a scene of your own plays on both screens: one of you speaks from the
  heart, the other chooses "Let's be a couple!", "Let's be best friends!" or "Can we wait a little?" (the players
  decide, not the game). Best friends and couples can hang out (a couple's moments are a little warmer), and there's
  a gentle "Go back to being friends" with a confirm. Both PCs keep the same record.
• Co-op: give each other items. Talk to the other student and choose "Give an item": your bag opens, pick
  something, and it goes into their bag ("You gave the Beige Wardrobe to Bea!" / "Bea gave you the Beige
  Wardrobe!"). It's an exchange: if their bag is full you keep it, and if anything goes wrong on the way it comes
  back to you; if the connection drops on the way, it's sorted out the next time you meet. Items the game won't let you give away stay yours, and the first
  gift of the day brings you a little closer.
• Co-op: shopping as a guest. Shopkeepers can be talked to across their counters while you're connected, so a
  guest can order and pick up CDs at Harrows, buy berry seedlings at Daisy's and take on part-time work at The
  Emporium, with their own money, into their own bag.
• Co-op: connect at once. Settings > Network > Connect automatically (As host / As guest): as soon as you're
  free to move after loading, the visit starts by itse...