INSTALLING MIA GOES FOR GREAT™ CD-ROM 1. Insert the Mia Goes for Great™ CD-ROM disc into your CD-ROM drive. 2. If you have the AutoPlay feature on for your CD-ROM, left-click on the install button and skip the next two steps. 3. If you don’t have AutoPlay enabled, select Start and then Run from the Windows Taskbar. 4. Type d:\setup.exe (d: refers to your CD-ROM drive. If your CD-ROM drive letter is not d: use the appropriate drive letter instead.) 5. Follow the instructions that appear on your screen. 6. To be able to play the game, you must also have DirectX 9.0c or higher installed on your computer. If you don’t have it, the installer will install it automatically. After installation is complete, you will find an icon for Mia Goes for Great™ on your desktop. You will also find an icon in the Mia Goes for Great™ menu item within Programs under the Start Menu in the Windows Taskbar. Click on either icon to run the game. STARTING UP On the Main Menu Screen, choose from three options: New Game: Lets you start a fresh game! Load Game: If you’ve already started playing, select a game off this menu. Quit: Exits the game. HOW TO PLAY Mia Goes for Great™ Mia St. Clair is an aspiring figure skater. Help her meet the many challenges she faces to be the best skater she can possibly be! In Mia Goes for Great, you play the role of Mia, a nine-year-old American Girl® living in a small American town at holiday time. There are lots of friends and family to see around town, skate practices to attend, and things to find. Let’s go! Moving around There are several ways to move Mia from place to place. If you point to a spot with your mouse and click on it, Mia will walk there. Or you can use the up, down, left and right arrow keys on your keyboard to directly control Mia’s movement. Talking to people Talking to people is easy! Just point to a person with your mouse and click. Mia will walk over to the person, and a box will open showing two or more lines of dialog. Select the line you want to say, and Mia will repeat that line to the character. A short conversation will follow. When a conversation is complete, you can choose another line of dialog to continue talking. The bottom dialog choice will always end the conversation. As the story unfolds, the things you can say to each character will change. New topics of conversation may appear if you show them some of the things in your backpack. Be alert for these changes, and keep talking to characters until they don’t have anything new to tell you. Listen carefully to what people say! You can learn a lot about how people feel, what they know and how they might be able to help you. And don’t be afraid to return to characters you’ve already met. They may have something new to tell you after thinking about your last visit. Examining objects There are many objects in the game that can be examined more closely. Your cursor will change to a small hand in a red circle when it passes over an examinable object. Look around carefully, and make sure you examine every object you can find. Some of them contain clues that you’ll need to finish the story. The Town Walk around and enjoy the beauty of wintertime in this small town. Some buildings you’ll be able to enter by clicking on their door. As you make your way you’ll see people and find places to visit. Soon you’ll know the town like it was your own. Your Backpack There is a backpack icon in the bottom-left corner of the screen. Click on it to look inside. Your backpack stores all of the items you will find over the course of the game. You can see the name of any item in your backpack by pointing at it with the mouse. When you click the LEFT mouse button while pointing at an item in your backpack, that item will be “picked up” by the mouse and attached to your cursor. Now you can manipulate the item in one of several ways: - You can “show” an item attached to your cursor to another character by pointing at the character and clicking. - You can “use” an item attached to your cursor on another object in the world by pointing at the object and clicking. - You can also “use” an item attached to your cursor on another item in your backpack by pointing at the item and clicking. If you want to return an item attached to your cursor to your backpack, click on any empty place in the backpack. Hint: If you click the RIGHT mouse button while pointing at an item in your backpack, Mia will say something to remind you what it is. New items will be added to your backpack frequently as you explore the story. A sparkle effect over the Backpack icon will alert you when this happens. Your Diary There is a Diary icon in the bottom-right corner of the screen. Click on it to open your Diary. Your Diary is an important source of information. Its contents will change and grow as you progress. Check the Diary often for ideas and clues. A sound and sparkle effect over the Diary icon will alert you when anything new is added. Two pages in the diary show a Things To Do list. Items are added to this list automatically as Mia learns about new tasks she must perform. If you’re not sure about what you should be doing, look at the Things To Do list in the Diary for ideas. Over the course of the story, Mia will gather information from a variety of people and places. Her written notes become visible in the Diary as they are collected, so you can look at them anytime. (Icons for important notes will also appear in your Backpack, so you can show the notes to other characters.) The Menu There is a Menu icon in the top-right corner of the screen. Click on it to open the Menu panel. Buttons on the Menu panel allow you to start a new game, load and save games, access various game-related options and quit. Consult your owner’s manual for more information on these functions. Playing Tips Go everywhere. Explore every corner of every available location. You never know where an interesting person or object may be found. Examine everything. Your cursor will change to a hand in a red circle when it passes over an interesting object. Find and click on these objects! Many of them offer clues that are vital to your success. Talk to everyone. Even the most humble-looking people may be able to help. As you speak with characters, new topics of conversation may appear. Follow these topics to learn as much as you can. Examining nearby objects may also give you new things to talk about with some characters. Show people things. Some characters may seem unwilling to help at first. They can often be persuaded by showing them some of the things you have collected in your backpack. Don’t worry, nobody will take anything away from you without permission. Keep an eye on your Backpack. Its icon will sparkle when new items are added. Don’t be afraid to try “using” any item in your backpack with any object in the world – or anything other item in your backpack! Keep an eye on your Diary. Its icon will sparkle as new bits of information are gathered. Take special note of the Things To Do list. It will remind you of some of the tasks Mia still needs to complete. Stuck? Talk to Mom! You can find Mom at Nelda’s or sewing in her living room. She’s always ready with advice, which changes as you progress through the story. She can also comment on nearly anything in your backpack if you show it to her. Play with friends! Sometimes an extra pair of eyes and ears can help you notice things you may have missed. Don’t give up! Sometimes you may feel completely stuck, with no idea what to do next. Don’t worry! Mia Goes for Great is a no-fail adventure story. That means that that the game will not let you put yourself into a situation where you can’t move forward. If you follow these playing tips carefully, you will always be able to figure out how to move forward to a successful ending. And don’t forget to have fun! TROUBLESHOOTING For optimal performance we recommend that you close any other applications that are running on your computer prior to playing Mia Goes for Great™. The quality and performance of this game principally depends on the capacities of your graphics card! We recommend you have the latest graphics cards with ATI and NVIDIA chipsets. We also strongly recommend that you obtain the latest DirectX compatible drivers for your video and sound cares. Using drivers that are not compatible with the latest version of DirectX can have unpredictable results. Updated drivers are typically available at no charge through your hardware manufacturer’s website. Popular video chipset manufacturers include: * ATI – www.ati.com * Intel – www.intel.com * Nvidia – www.nvidia.com For additional information on DirectX, please visit www.microsoft.com/directx/ UNINSTALLING Mia Goes for Great™ CD-ROM 1. From the Start Menu, search through the listed programs for the Mia Goes for Great™ folder. Right-click on the folder. 2. Select Uninstall to uninstall the program. 3. You may also do an uninstall by using the Add/Remove Programs on the Control Panel SYSTEM REQUIREMENTS Minimum • Windows® XP/Vista • Pentium® 4 1.4 GHz or higher processor • 512 MB RAM • DirectX® 9.0 or higher (included on CD) • 32MB DirectX compatible video card • OpenGL or DirectX compatible accelerated 3D video card • DirectX compatible sound card • 4X CD-ROM drive Recommended • 1.4 GHz Pentium® 4 or compatible • 1 GB RAM • nVidia or ATI accelerated 3D video card TECHNICAL SUPPORT Questions or problems? We’re here to help. For updates, answers to frequently asked questions and 24-hour Technical Support visit our web site at: www.valusoft.com or write to us at: ValuSoft, A Division of THQ Inc. 3650 Chestnut Street North, Suite 101A, Chaska, MN 55318 or call 1-952-442-7000 extension 4 or email us at tech@valusoft.com