Spellcasting 101: Sorcerers Get All The Girls
Encyclopedia
The text adventure game Spellcasting 101: Sorcerers Get All The Girls is the first installment of the Spellcasting
series created by Steve Meretzky
during his time at Legend Entertainment
. All the three games in the series tell the story of young Ernie Eaglebeak, a student at the prestigious Sorcerer University, as he progresses through his studies, learning the arcanes of magic, taking part in student life, and meeting beautiful women.
The player character
is Ernie Eaglebeak, a teenager just out of high school living in the town of Port Gecko, pining for his sexy neighbour Lola Tigerbelly and struggling in a seriously bad relationship with his stepfather, Joey Rottenwood. A break-through in his miserable life comes when he gets accepted by the Sorcerer University, a prestigious university of magic. After a dashing escape from Rottenwood's custody, Ernie makes his way to SU and enrolls as a freshman.
The player learns magic, explores the university, reads the (rapidly deteriorating quality of) student newspaper, and can watch the University's (comedically pseudoscientific
) lectures which provide some backstory concerning the mythology of Peloria. In the meantime, Ernie is interested to know females such as the university president's daughter Gretchen Snowbunny' or Hillary, the young wife of his ancient advisor Otto Tickingclock. Suddenly SU gets attacked by mysterious foes who kidnap Tickingclock and take away the Sorcerer's Appliance, a powerful magical device which could become extremely dangerous in inappropriate hands. Ernie has to recover the device.
Equipped with his spell book and a magical guided surfboard, Ernie sets out on a mission to several islands on the Fizzbuttle Ocean in search for items that will aid him in getting into the sinister Fort Blackwand. And everywhere on the way he finds places where the Great Attachments required by the Sorcerer's Appliance to operate used to be located, but are gone now.
The islands visited are:
The player can learn spells and obtain items during his quest until Ernie can take on the challenge of the fort and confront the mastermind behind the theft of the Sorcerer's Appliance, who turns out to be Joey Rottenwood, his own stepfather. In a climactic final showdown Ernie manages to shut down the Appliance's self-destruct system by burying it, along with Rottenwood, under a pile of whale dung, and frees all the prisoners, including his presumed-dead real father.
At the epilogue, everybody returns to the University, where Ernie gets scolded for irresponsibility, given a hefty bill and abandoned by Lola, but he still gets to advance a year.
Spellcasting 101 is a text adventure game. However, much like all other games of this sort produced by Legend
it runs in graphics mode (up to EGA) and takes advantage of certain EGA capabilities. While the traditional type-your-command approach is still possible, one can also assemble commands from words displayed in lists on the screen by clicking on them with the mouse; second, a graphical representation of the present location is also displayed on the screen and certain operations can be performed by clicking on different parts of the image as well. Finally, a compass rose is visible on the screen at all times, which in addition to enabling movement by clicking on it shows valid movement directions for the present location.
Unlike many text adventure games, Spellcasting 101 uses sound - with sound card support for music and sound effects played over the internal speaker using the RealSound
technology.
, Leather Goddesses of Phobos
, Spellcasting 101 offers two gameplay modes of differing levels of sexual content. In the default, "nice" mode the females Ernie encounters have to be satisfied by such means as entertaining them, performing chores and so on, whereas in the "naughty" mode, such situations are resolved by sexual intercourse; the latter also replaces some of the images displayed by the game with more graphic (albeit not pornographic) versions.
Some of the sexual content is also present in "nice" mode and sometimes understanding them is important to gameplay (for example, at one point of the game, in preparation of a party Ernie receives a spell from a fellow student whose purpose is to increase bust size, and promptly uses it to transform a stone bust into a makeshift ladder).
of the gaming world, Larry Laffer
, most of the time he succeeds at his advances, with his "one true love" being seemingly the only woman he's never managed to get into bed.
Most other characters tend to get Ernie's name wrong, in which he is resembled by another adventure game protagonist, Guybrush Threepwood
.
There is much more to Joey Rottenwood than meets the eye. In spite of his superficially bad temper and a tendency to drink too much he appears to have almost infinite patience. Planning his revenge took him 30 years, not to mention the fact he went through the trouble of faking Ernie's father's death and marrying Ernie's mother to keep an eye on Ernie. Moreover, despite his abrupt departure from SU, Joey appears to possess quite good knowledge of magic. Much like Biff Tannen
from the Back to the Future
trilogy, he has a tendency to have his plans thwarted by getting buried under large amounts of dung.
Spellcasting (series)
Spellcasting is a series of interactive fiction games designed by Steve Meretzky during his time with Legend Entertainment. All the games feature the character Ernie Eaglebeak, a student at the prestigious Sorcerer University.- Games :...
series created by Steve Meretzky
Steve Meretzky
Steven Eric Meretzky is an American computer game developer, with dozens of titles to his credit. He has been involved in almost every aspect of game development, from design to production to quality assurance and box design...
during his time at Legend Entertainment
Legend Entertainment
Legend Entertainment was an American developer of computer games, best known for their complex, distinctive adventure titles throughout the 1990s....
. All the three games in the series tell the story of young Ernie Eaglebeak, a student at the prestigious Sorcerer University, as he progresses through his studies, learning the arcanes of magic, taking part in student life, and meeting beautiful women.
Story
The games take place in a fictional world called Peloria, which appears like a modern society, however magic has the place of science. Peloria is mostly occupied by the Fizzbuttle Ocean with islands where the player travels throughout the game.The player character
Player character
A player character or playable character is a character in a video game or role playing game who is controlled or controllable by a player, and is typically a protagonist of the story told in the course of the game. A player character is a persona of the player who controls it. Player characters...
is Ernie Eaglebeak, a teenager just out of high school living in the town of Port Gecko, pining for his sexy neighbour Lola Tigerbelly and struggling in a seriously bad relationship with his stepfather, Joey Rottenwood. A break-through in his miserable life comes when he gets accepted by the Sorcerer University, a prestigious university of magic. After a dashing escape from Rottenwood's custody, Ernie makes his way to SU and enrolls as a freshman.
The player learns magic, explores the university, reads the (rapidly deteriorating quality of) student newspaper, and can watch the University's (comedically pseudoscientific
Pseudoscience
Pseudoscience is a claim, belief, or practice which is presented as scientific, but which does not adhere to a valid scientific method, lacks supporting evidence or plausibility, cannot be reliably tested, or otherwise lacks scientific status...
) lectures which provide some backstory concerning the mythology of Peloria. In the meantime, Ernie is interested to know females such as the university president's daughter Gretchen Snowbunny' or Hillary, the young wife of his ancient advisor Otto Tickingclock. Suddenly SU gets attacked by mysterious foes who kidnap Tickingclock and take away the Sorcerer's Appliance, a powerful magical device which could become extremely dangerous in inappropriate hands. Ernie has to recover the device.
Equipped with his spell book and a magical guided surfboard, Ernie sets out on a mission to several islands on the Fizzbuttle Ocean in search for items that will aid him in getting into the sinister Fort Blackwand. And everywhere on the way he finds places where the Great Attachments required by the Sorcerer's Appliance to operate used to be located, but are gone now.
The islands visited are:
- The Island of Lost Soles where the player restores the cursed souls of its inhabitants,
- The Island Where Time Runs Backwards where he has to work hard to avoid destroying the universe with a temporal paradox
- The Island of Horny Women to finds out that there is such a thing as too much female attention
- The Restaurant at the End of the OceanThe Restaurant at the End of the UniverseThe Restaurant at the End of the Universe is the second book in the Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy comedy science fiction trilogy of five by Douglas Adams. It was originally published by Pan Books as a paperback. The book was inspired by the song "Grand Hotel" by British rock band Procol Harum...
where he witnesses the six stages of a life of a restaurant and - The Island of the Gods to find out that goddesses need love too.
The player can learn spells and obtain items during his quest until Ernie can take on the challenge of the fort and confront the mastermind behind the theft of the Sorcerer's Appliance, who turns out to be Joey Rottenwood, his own stepfather. In a climactic final showdown Ernie manages to shut down the Appliance's self-destruct system by burying it, along with Rottenwood, under a pile of whale dung, and frees all the prisoners, including his presumed-dead real father.
At the epilogue, everybody returns to the University, where Ernie gets scolded for irresponsibility, given a hefty bill and abandoned by Lola, but he still gets to advance a year.
Technical details
Legend Entertainment
Legend Entertainment was an American developer of computer games, best known for their complex, distinctive adventure titles throughout the 1990s....
it runs in graphics mode (up to EGA) and takes advantage of certain EGA capabilities. While the traditional type-your-command approach is still possible, one can also assemble commands from words displayed in lists on the screen by clicking on them with the mouse; second, a graphical representation of the present location is also displayed on the screen and certain operations can be performed by clicking on different parts of the image as well. Finally, a compass rose is visible on the screen at all times, which in addition to enabling movement by clicking on it shows valid movement directions for the present location.
Unlike many text adventure games, Spellcasting 101 uses sound - with sound card support for music and sound effects played over the internal speaker using the RealSound
RealSound
RealSound is a patented technology for the PC created by Access Software during the late 1980s. RealSound enables 6-bit digitized PCM-audio playback on the PC speaker by means of PWM drive, allowing software control of the loud speaker's amplitude of displacement. The first video games to use it...
technology.
Sexual content
Like the famous earlier risque work of MeretzkySteve Meretzky
Steven Eric Meretzky is an American computer game developer, with dozens of titles to his credit. He has been involved in almost every aspect of game development, from design to production to quality assurance and box design...
, Leather Goddesses of Phobos
Leather Goddesses of Phobos
Leather Goddesses of Phobos is an interactive fiction computer game written by Steve Meretzky and published by Infocom in 1986. Like many other Infocom titles, it was released for the IBM PC , Atari 8-bit, Amiga, Apple II, Apple Macintosh, Atari ST and Commodore 64 computers...
, Spellcasting 101 offers two gameplay modes of differing levels of sexual content. In the default, "nice" mode the females Ernie encounters have to be satisfied by such means as entertaining them, performing chores and so on, whereas in the "naughty" mode, such situations are resolved by sexual intercourse; the latter also replaces some of the images displayed by the game with more graphic (albeit not pornographic) versions.
Some of the sexual content is also present in "nice" mode and sometimes understanding them is important to gameplay (for example, at one point of the game, in preparation of a party Ernie receives a spell from a fellow student whose purpose is to increase bust size, and promptly uses it to transform a stone bust into a makeshift ladder).
Copy protection
The game features a two-part copy protection system, with the first one involving filling in the gaps in Ernie's enrollment records with information from the registration form and class schedule enclosed with the game, at the time of him enrolling at the university, and the second using the enclosed map to obtain co-ordinates for various locations Ernie must visit on the Fizzbuttle Ocean. The word list interface makes breaking the copy protection by trial and error possible.Ernie Eaglebeak
Ernie Eaglebeak is the protagonist. A somewhat nerdy young man in his late teens, he wants to become a sorcerer and win the heart of Lola Tigerbelly. Although inexperienced, he is a good magician, whose passion for the arcane arts is rivaled only by his enormous sex drive. Unlike another Don JuanDon Juan
Don Juan is a legendary, fictional libertine whose story has been told many times by many authors. El burlador de Sevilla y convidado de piedra by Tirso de Molina is a play set in the fourteenth century that was published in Spain around 1630...
of the gaming world, Larry Laffer
Larry Laffer
Larry Laffer is a fictional character and the main character of the Leisure Suit Larry series of games. He was created by game programmer Al Lowe.-Biography:...
, most of the time he succeeds at his advances, with his "one true love" being seemingly the only woman he's never managed to get into bed.
Most other characters tend to get Ernie's name wrong, in which he is resembled by another adventure game protagonist, Guybrush Threepwood
Guybrush Threepwood
Guybrush Ulysses Threepwood is the main character of the Monkey Island series of computer adventure games by LucasArts. The voice of Guybrush is actor Dominic Armato in the third, fourth and fifth games, as well as the enhanced remakes of The Secret of Monkey Island and Monkey Island 2: LeChuck's...
.
Lola Tigerbelly
Lola Tigerbelly is Ernie Eaglebeak's long-time neighbour and one true, secret love. The feeling is not mutual though, as the secrecy aside she is much more interested in athletic, jock-like and rich types than in her nerdy neighbor. She likes shopping and is very shallow, although beautiful.Joey Rottenwood
Joey Rottenwood is Ernie Eaglebeak's stepfather. He passionately hates Ernie and makes his life as miserable as possible, up to the point of having him be essentially a prisoner at his own home, living in a locked room with a straw mat for bed and a chamberpot for other needs, and planning to thwart Ernie's plan to enroll at the Sorcerer University. Initially portrayed as a run-of-the-mill drunkard hating Ernie just for being another man's son, Rottenwood eventually turns out to be the arch-villain of the game, having sworn revenge against the Sorcerer University after being kicked out for cheating, and his attitude towards Ernie is a result of a prophecy he had once heard stating that young Eaglebeak would foil his plans.There is much more to Joey Rottenwood than meets the eye. In spite of his superficially bad temper and a tendency to drink too much he appears to have almost infinite patience. Planning his revenge took him 30 years, not to mention the fact he went through the trouble of faking Ernie's father's death and marrying Ernie's mother to keep an eye on Ernie. Moreover, despite his abrupt departure from SU, Joey appears to possess quite good knowledge of magic. Much like Biff Tannen
Biff Tannen
Biff Howard Tannen is a character in the Back to the Future trilogy, serving as the primary antagonist of the first two films. He is played by Thomas F. Wilson in all three films as well as the ride, and Wilson voiced the character in the animated series....
from the Back to the Future
Back to the Future
Back to the Future is a 1985 American science-fiction adventure film. It was directed by Robert Zemeckis, written by Zemeckis and Bob Gale, produced by Steven Spielberg, and starred Michael J. Fox, Christopher Lloyd, Lea Thompson, Crispin Glover and Thomas F. Wilson. The film tells the story of...
trilogy, he has a tendency to have his plans thwarted by getting buried under large amounts of dung.
Gretchen Snowbunny
Gretchen Snowbunny is a daughter of the SU president Aaron Snowbunny. Having been hit by a number of intoxication spells at a student party she attended, she asks Ernie to escort her somewhere she can rest. At Ernie's room, the two proceed to have sex, but as Gretchen passes out Ernie ceases his advances, being a gentleman. Gretchen has a key to his father's office, and Ernie takes advantage of this fact by stealing it while Gretchen is asleep.Otto Tickingclock
Otto Tickingclock is a professor at the Sorcerer University and Ernie Eaglebeak's advisor. While apparently a great magician, his advanced age tends to get the better of him quite often by making him only loosely attached to reality and prone to falling asleep easily. Married to Hillary, whom he loves dearly.Hillary Tickingclock
Hillary Tickingclock is the wife of Professor Tickingclock, several times younger than him. She has a habit of having sex with her dinner guests once her husband has fallen asleep.Allusions
- After Ernie has escaped his stepfather's clutches, the narrator says "after a few days of hitchhiking [a subject about which this author has already written his fill]". This is a reference to Steve MeretzkySteve MeretzkySteven Eric Meretzky is an American computer game developer, with dozens of titles to his credit. He has been involved in almost every aspect of game development, from design to production to quality assurance and box design...
's work on the InfocomInfocomInfocom was a software company, based in Cambridge, Massachusetts, that produced numerous works of interactive fiction. They also produced one notable business application, a relational database called Cornerstone....
game The Hitchhiker's Guide to the GalaxyThe Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy (computer game)The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy is an interactive fiction computer game based on the comedic science fiction series of the same name. It was designed by series creator Douglas Adams and Infocom's Steve Meretzky, and was first released in 1984 for the Apple II, Macintosh, Commodore 64, DOS,...
(on which he collaborated with the author of the bookThe Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy (book)The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy is the title of the first of six books in the Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy comedy science fiction "trilogy" by Douglas Adams . The novel is an adaptation of the first four parts of Adams's radio series of the same name. The novel was first published in...
, Douglas AdamsDouglas AdamsDouglas Noel Adams was an English writer and dramatist. He is best known as the author of The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy, which started life in 1978 as a BBC radio comedy before developing into a "trilogy" of five books that sold over 15 million copies in his lifetime, a television...
).
- The title of chapter 6 of the game, The Restaurant at the End of the Ocean, is another Douglas AdamsDouglas AdamsDouglas Noel Adams was an English writer and dramatist. He is best known as the author of The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy, which started life in 1978 as a BBC radio comedy before developing into a "trilogy" of five books that sold over 15 million copies in his lifetime, a television...
reference - this time to the second part of the HHTTGThe Hitchhiker's Guide to the GalaxyThe Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy is a science fiction comedy series created by Douglas Adams. Originally a radio comedy broadcast on BBC Radio 4 in 1978, it was later adapted to other formats, and over several years it gradually became an international multi-media phenomenon...
cycle, The Restaurant at the End of the UniverseThe Restaurant at the End of the UniverseThe Restaurant at the End of the Universe is the second book in the Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy comedy science fiction trilogy of five by Douglas Adams. It was originally published by Pan Books as a paperback. The book was inspired by the song "Grand Hotel" by British rock band Procol Harum...
.
- The role-playersRole-playing gameA role-playing game is a game in which players assume the roles of characters in a fictional setting. Players take responsibility for acting out these roles within a narrative, either through literal acting, or through a process of structured decision-making or character development...
at Frogkisser Hall play the game of Malls 'n' Muggers, a reference to the real-world game Dungeons & DragonsDungeons & DragonsDungeons & Dragons is a fantasy role-playing game originally designed by Gary Gygax and Dave Arneson, and first published in 1974 by Tactical Studies Rules, Inc. . The game has been published by Wizards of the Coast since 1997...
.
See also
- Spellcasting 201: The Sorcerer's Appliance
- Spellcasting 301: Spring BreakSpellcasting 301: Spring BreakThe text adventure game Spellcasting 301: Spring Break is the third and last installment of the Spellcasting series created by Steve Meretzky during his time at Legend Entertainment...