One night, Mickey and Donald were practicing for their big magic act. One of the magic tricks surprised Donald, and he fell backwards, tripping over some scenery. Behind the scenery was a mysterious magic box with a drawn curtain.
"Oh, Boy! If it works, we can use this in our magic act!" said Donald.
"Uh, I don't know if that's such a good idea...." replied Mickey, noticing a strange glow behind the curtain.
But he was too late. Donald had already stepped inside. Poof! The curtain fluttered and Donald disappeared!
Mickey stepped inside to inspect the box and...Poof!, he disappeared too.
Booming laughter echoed as Mickey and Donald fell through the darkness, and an evil voice said, "You are good magicians in your world, but here in my world of magic, you'll have to learn many more tricks to find your way home. If you can find and defeat me, I will show you a way out of this magic box."
At the main menu, you can choose between Mickey and Donald, and you can also input a password, check out the sound test and even change the controls between four different configuration. I will be using Control Type 1. Left and Right let you move around, A lets you run when held down, B lets you attack and C lets you jump. Also, holding Down and pressing C lets you crawl. Honestly, I wish you could double tap Left or Right to run rather than hold a button down, as it is more awkward on one of Sega's controllers from that era as opposed to the NES or Super NES controllers to hold down a button to do that, and it forces you to use two fingers.
You'll start in the forest. Attack the guards when they charge at you, and make sure your magic cloth touches them completely. If the sparkles touch them, they will simply stun them, but it will help defeat them or other enemies if you can't get close enough. When the leaf enemies wake up, hit them, too.
If you crawl under the branch at the start by holding Down and pressing C (under default controls), you'll get the question mark bag that you can't normally get. These bags contain either a card you can grab to get closer to a 1-Up, a piece of candy that refills one hit or a cake that refills all your hits. In this case, it's the cake. You start with five hit points, but you can go all the way up to eight, and if you lose all your hits, you'll lose a life, or as the game calls it, a try.
The mosquitoes will dive at you when close enough. Hit them or avoid them as they dive.
The log seesaws will launch you into the air when you jump on the high end.
Enemies will spawn behind you sometimes. Watch your back.
At the start of the second section, Donald will be whisked into the air when he jumps into the flower. You'll have to jump from leaf to leaf on the beanstalks, and if you want to stay at the top path, you'll need to jump from leaf to leaf and watch out for moving platforms. You'll find all the good stuff on the top path, as that is where the power-ups will be. If you fall down, you'll still hit the ground. You can use the magic cloth to attack the plants stuck in the ground to get them to sprout up, and you can use them as platforms from there.
You'll soon enter a cave. Go up at the start for one unit of health, and avoid the holes in the web platforms, as you will fall straight down into a bottomless pit with no way to control your character.
The spiders near the web walls act much like the block snakes from [i]Super Mario World[/i], as its web trail is like a moving platform that you can take to get to the other side. Thankfully, the spider producing it does not hurt you.
The boss here is a giant spider. It just moves around. When its back is visible, hit it with the cloth. If you see its underside, wait for it to leave the screen before attacking again. Interestingly, this boss doesn't attack you; he just moves around. After six hits, you'll beat the boss and get the ability to produce and ride a flying carpet.
In the next level, when you approach the cliff, Mickey will try his new magic. When he extends his arms and says "Alakazam," press A, B or C. You'll produce a magic carpet.
When you approach the cliff, Mickey will try his new magic. When he says "Alakazam," press A, B or C. You'll produce a magic carpet.
From here, keep pressing C to stay afloat, and hold Left on the Control Pad to keep yourself from moving as fast, or advance further with Right. You cannot attack while flying, so avoid everything except the question mark bags.
Donald then drops onto a leaf on a waterfall going down a mountain. You'll need to stay on the leaf and jump over obstacles while also crossing bridges that will fall down as you walk across them. Pressing C lets you jump straight up while still being above the leaves, though you will have to use the Control Pad sometimes. You will have to duck under things such as rock formations and flames that show up in the caves, however, as anything that can harm you will instantly cost you a life in this section.
You'll then be jumping from cloud platform to cloud platform. The cloud platforms with all the curves on them will break apart when you stand on them (the others don't), and the clouds with the faces will move forward. If you see birds, attack or avoid them before they attack you, and watch out for those tornadoes.
The cloud piano keys produce notes as you move around, and the notes will sometimes turn into top hats that give you 1-Ups, candy for health or even cards. Sometimes, they will turn into bombs. The bombs damage you. Don't run into bombs.
The boss here is a statue with six blocks. When you approach the exit, the wheel will start turning, and one by one, the block that is on top will turn into a gray dragon that looks like Puff the Magic Dragon. Avoid the fireballs by jumping over them, then attack when they leap forward.
You'll then learn how to make a magic bubble. Interestingly, you activate it much like you did the magic carpet, and from here, you can use Left and Right on the Control Pad to move and press the jump button continuously to stay afloat. You'll then be using your magic to create a magic bubble immediately.
In the third level, you'll be using the Control Pad in conjunction with the jump button, which you'll need to press repeatedly, to swim. You won't be able to attack while underwater, so your best bet is to avoid enemies at all costs, especially the small black sea urchins on the floors and ceilings.
If you see a wall of bubbles, there will be a clam nearby. Face away from the clam in order to get the clam to approach you. It will stop at the wall of bubbles and neutralize it.
You'll soon enter a cave. When you try to crawl inside, however, Donald won't fit. You'll be forced to go back, and when you do, you'll be rocket upwards out of the water. From here, you'll need to jump from island to island while also jumping on inner tubes and fighting fish. Some of the inner tube platforms will deflate and sink into the water when you land on them. Some of these platforms move, and others still will be shot into the air so you can land on top of the palm trees. The cans spin, but you can stand on them without worrying about being spun off into the water.
The blue card gives you temporary invincibility when you grab it, and it will be really useful here, since you'll need to jump off the very edge of the inner tube platforms to make some of the jumps. You'll eventually be able to cast a spell that takes you back underwater and to the sunken ship.
Aside from the starfish, you'll have to dodge some tridents. Some will drop down when you get under them; others will drop down a tad sooner. You'll also have sawfish coming out of the floor. They are like swordfish, but their bills are saws. Hit them when they pop up, and go slowly when you hear them pop up.
You'll have to run across the narrow area near the end to avoid drowning in the water that fills the corridor up.
The boss here is a shark. The shark is harmless when you only see its fin, but when it surfaces and comes after you, that is when you want to attack and avoid. After a second pass where you can only see its fin, the shark will dive down, leap at you and then chase after you for a second again. You can hit it while it is in the air.
You'll then learn how to teleport to another box. When you head left after this, you'll be sucked out of the water and you'll end up in an over-sized library.
We're back in the over-sized library! Castle of Illusion introduces this level theme, but this game revisits it a bit. The ink stamps will walk towards you, the fountain pens will fly at you, and the protractors will pounce on you.
The tubes of green paint squirts out green paint that slows you down if you walk into it, and the tiny green staples act as trampolines when you jump on them.
Be careful getting that 1-Up, you'll have to move quickly in mid-air to get that extra life. Also, when going up the cork board with the pins that act as platforms, watch out for that flying fountain pen.
You'll soon drop into a jar of sugar cubes. Go to the other end, and be ready to stun the cubes that leap back and forth. If you want, you can go back for the extra life to get another one.
After the jar of sugar cubes, you can enter two doors and enter a whole new area. If you can ride the measuring tapes that leads back and forth on the way, you can get some more health. Here, you'll face wolves that charge at you, eagles that dive at you and rocks that bounce around. Amazingly, the wolves, eagles and rocks are made up of letters that spell the word that they are supposed to represent, which pre-dates
WordWorld by several years. If you see switches on the floor, hit them with the cape to get some pick-ups. One of them also lowers a drawbridge that leads into the castle at the end.
After this, you'll soon enter a cookie tin that leads to the candy world. Once again, this game revisits some things that were done in Castle of Illusion while adding some new ones.
The gummy planes will fly at you, and the gingerbread men will throw candy canes at you. The wafer enemies take two hits to defeat and just move back and forth.
The cloud platforms will move forward when you stay on them. Use them to get over the collapsible bridge and continue with the level.
The green plants will twist you around if you land on them, but they don't hurt you. They only stun you.
Donald's version of the level is mostly the same, but the part where you ride the bottle cork up into space doesn't show up for Donald like it does for Mickey, so you just go straight to the gelatin platforms that you're supposed to sink through.
Near the end, you can go left for an invincibility card. The gelatin blocks are soft and you will sink through them; you'll want to do that to reach the boss.
The boss is an evil witch who will fly around, dive at you and cast magic. Her patterns are really easy, and you can easily tank hits while absolutely decimating her. Beating her will give you the magic to command cards.
Before you enter the door, jump left over it for two cards and a piece of candy for health, then enter the door to enter an Alice In Wonderland-esque level for the final level of the game.
If a card guard is throwing hearts at you, it is an enemy you can defeat; otherwise, be ready to walk up to it and press the jump button when Mickey extends his arms towards it.
The Mad Hatter chess pieces jump around. The black ones hop in place, while the white ones jump towards.
The bells on the trees will slide you around when you get them moving by leaping on them, so be ready to get where you want to go.
For the moving card platforms that you'll need to make, be careful when you jump, as you can get carried a little further than you would like and you risk falling into the bottomless pit.
At the end of the first section, you'll have to jump one of six dies. The correct one is the two, but if you jump on the five, you'll go to a bell tree for some hidden power-ups.
The next section has you in a maze. You'll have to go through the maze in a specific way in order to find the exit. Go up to the third level, then attack the bird with a sawblade for a beak. You'll open up a hole to an alternate version of the maze. Drop in, then go up to the fourth level and defeat the jack-in-the-box enemy to get a springboard. Jump on the springboard to get back to the normal version of the maze and defeat the sawblade bird, then jump in the hole and go up to the fifth level. Go right, defeat the springboard enemy, then get on the springboard and defeat the sawblade bird. Jump in the hole, go right and you'll find the exit.
You'll then be in the final section. When the witch in front of you at the start creates holes in the floor, be ready to run and jump over where the circles they drop to form the holes with land. There will be some Mad-Hatter looking enemies, but they can be easily defeated.
Go right after the first set of stairs for a hidden passage in the wall that leads to a cake.
Hit the button near the curtains to illuminate the area where the curtains are. This allows you to see the enemies behind them and see where you are going when behind them.
After the second set of stairs, wait for the carriages to meet before jumping forward and attacking in mid-air to take out the witches. The third will come at you from behind on the stairs.
Jump in the box. Hold Right on the elevator so you can land on solid ground when the elevator breaks off and drops.
From here, you'll be fighting more card guards and other enemies. For best results, duck when fighting the card guards. Some of them will come from behind, so be on your guard. Crawl under the platform with the bag under it for a 1-Up. Be careful at the stained glass windows; enemies will show up near them.
You'll then face a giant Pete whose eyes will follow you around as the platforms in the center go up and down. Don't touch the white clouds below, and watch out for the Pete reapers as you attack the face. After enough hits, you'll beat Pete and you'll leave the World of Illusion to perform a magic show. You've won!
