Exile is a computer fantasy role-playing game. If you’ve never played a game of this sort before, much of what’s going on will be very unfamiliar to you. This section provides an overview of how to do the most important things, so you don’t get too swamped with the details. Don’t worry - even though Exile II is complicated, once you can get around you will be able to pick up other things very easily.
Starting the game - In Exile, you will control a group (or “party”) of six adventurers (often referred to as PCs, for “player characters”). You will take these six people on adventurers, kill monsters, collect loot, and try to save the world. Each person has his or her own skills, abilities, and items.
To start the game, you need to get a group of six people. From the starting screen, press Create New Party, and read the introduction. When you hit done, you will be at the party creation screen.
Notice you have already been given six characters. You can now, if you wish, drop, recreate, or edit these PCs. For now, don’t worry about this. Just hit “Done” to start the game.
Moving around and getting stuff - You start in a town called Fort Ganrick, at the far northwest corner of the land of Exile. You’re in your bedroom. Use the keypad or click on the screen to move around. Look around a little bit.
There is a white spot on the floor where you start. These white dots mark “Specials,” special encounters.
Now it’s time to go get your equipment. Moving into a door opens it. Go out of the building you’re in and into the courtyard. Head east (right) and go into the rooms on the other side of the fort. There are lots of items there, ready for the taking. There are armor, weapons, and rations to use in your adventures.
Hit ‘g’ to pick them up. The item getting window will appear. Hitting the button by a PCs picture has that PC get stuff. Clicking on the name of an item gets it. Get everything.
Readying armor and weapons - Now that you have some armor and weapons. It’s time to put on your new gear. The rectangle to the upper right on the screen is where the statistics for your party are given. Hitting the arrow buttons (or keys) scrolls through the pages. You can see the abilities and items for everyone in your party. (Very useful shortcut - hitting a PCs number on the keyboard moves you to that PCs page. Hitting it again shows you that PCs inventory).
Go to one of your PCs inventory pages. Click on the name of, say, a suit of armor. The name of that item will now appear in italics. That means you’re wearing it! Click it again to take it off.
Suppose one PC has two suits of armor, and you want another PC to be protected. Go to the page of the PC with two suits of armor, and hit the ‘G’ button by one of them. This gives the item away. A window will come up asking who to give the item to. Click by the name of the PC to give the item to.
There! You’re equipped. Now, you can start meeting the people in the fort around you, or go out and kill something.
Talking to people - Hit ‘t’ and click on a person to talk to him/her/it. The talking window will appear.
You ask people about things by asking about single words (like ‘demon’ or ‘sword’ or ‘Exile’.) Don’t ask whole sentence questions (instead of saying “Where is the sword?” ask about ‘sword’).
Everyone responds to ‘name’ and ‘job’, so always start with those. Then ask the person about things he or she says in conversation. If JoeBob says “I’m out hunting for giant spiders.” ask about ‘hunting’ or ‘spiders.’ People won’t respond to everything they talk about, but they will respond to a lot of the things.
Talk to people in the fort. You’ll notice that most of the soldiers say the same thing. Be sure to talk to Cecile, the fort commander. She tells you about the mission you were brought to Fort Ganrick to do.
Finally, talking to people is how you will buy food and equipment. To see if someone has something to sell, hit the ‘Buy’ button.
Killing Stuff - Now it’s time to go out and fight. Might as well get used to combat - you’re going to be doing a lot of it!
You can find stuff to kill by either finding a dungeon (there’s a tricky one east of where you start, and another under Fort Draco to the southwest), or wandering around outdoors. When you get attacked, to strike back, simply move into the hostile monster. You’ll swing whatever weapon you have in your hand. The text area in the lower right will tell you how your attack went.
When you kill stuff, the dead monsters will often leave behind more items for you to get. Unfortunately, you won’t always know what these items are. There are, fortunately, people in towns who (for a fee) will tell you what they are.
Casting Spells - The other necessary skill for playing Exile II is casting spells: magical incantations which do all sorts of stuff. There are two sorts of spells: mage spells, which tend to do damage and help in combat, and priest spells, which tend to heal and improve the party.
Hit ‘m’ to cast a mage spell or ‘p’ to cast a priest spell. The numbered buttons to the number of left are used to select who will cast the spell. The green buttons in the lower half of the window are used to select the spell. The numbered buttons in the upper right are used to select who to cast the spell on (if you’re casting a healing spell, for example, on a wounded character).
There are seven levels of spells, each harder to cast than the spells in the level before. You start with characters able to cast most spells up to level 3.
Secret Doors - Some doors (in all sorts of walls and in cave walls as well) are hidden. To search the walls, walk into it. If there is a secret door there, you’ll pass through the wall.
Go back to the storerooms in Fort Ganrick and try this. You may find some interesting surprises.
If you get stuck - Of course, it’s possible that you will still get stuck. Maybe you always get killed, or you can’t find any money, or something else. Should this happen, Exile II comes with a character editor, which can heal your characters and give them as much gold and food as they want.
If you can’t figure out where to go, read Tips For Getting Started, near the end of this manual. It tells you about all the starting dungeons, and when you should contemplate entering them. It also tells the locations of several good treasures.
This is only a brief overview, of course. It says nothing about training, or many important things about spellcasting. It will, however, get you moving, and once you’re getting around, you should find the rest falls into place very quickly.
So welcome to the wild world of Exile II! And good luck! Who knows? You may actually be able to make a difference!
