Welcome to Shadowgate, and particularly this walkthru. This walkthru is
designed to ease you through whatever stumps you in Shadowgate. Keep in mind
that this walkthru contains not just hints, but explicit directions as well.
Don't come back unless you're absolutely stuck. Having said that, before
we begin let me touch on three major issues in Shadowgate. First of all, you
die often. Really often. (Even more than in Uninvited, for those who have
played it.) Save a lot (but use the Save As command, otherwise you will
overwrite your last save.) The next issue is light. This game takes place
well before Edison, so to see where you're going you'll need a flaming
torch. However, each torch has a limited life. Torches are stuck in the
walls of most of the rooms, and you can pick them up and bring them with
you, but you can't carry ALL of them, so knowing where another torch can be
found is crucial. Also note that a torch will flicker momentarily 6 turns
before going out (except the torch you start out with, which only lasts
about ten turns), so when you get the flicker, light another torch. The last
issue is secret doors. Not all entrances in this game are apparent, or even
shown in the Exits window. Sometimes a passage is hidden in a scene, or
moving a loose brick will uncover a hidden passage. Keep your eyes out for
them. Okay, let's go! Here we are, at the entrance to Castle Shadowgate.
But before you open the door, take a look at that skull. Well, there's no
welcome mat to hide a key under, so maybe the skull holds it. Open the
skull. Voila! Pick up the key. Now open the door (you won't need the key to
do it). And wouldn't you know it, it creaks (shades of Uninvited here).
Let's go inside. Now, the first thing to do here is light one of those
torches before yours goes out (that's OPERATE the lit torch on the unlit
one). You can now drop your torch and pick up the one in the wall. If you
like, go ahead and set fire to the rug (people who went through Uninvited
hitting every window with the battle axe will have fun here). The key won't
open the side door, but it will unlock the double doors, so unlock those and
go through. Here we are at another hallway. Grab the funny-looking
torch, and save here. We're going to do a couple of interesting things now.
First, light the funny looking torch and examine it. Greenish tint, eh? That
might come in handy soon, but we don't need it now, so don't save here. Now
pick up one of the candles, or the book. Whoops! Enjoy the funeral dirge
(soon it will start to drive you insane). Now open your saved game (funny
how the default is to start from the beginning, and not from a save file)
and don't pick up anything from the shelf. But just because we can't take
the book doesn't mean we can't read it... Open up the book. Aha! A key! Grab
that, and go back to the first hallway. Now we have the key to unlock
the other door. Do that, and go through (you can drop both keys now). You
now should be in a closet, and two nice armaments are sitting on the
shelves-a sword and a slingshot. Grab both (note that you can click on one,
and then hold down Shift and click on the other, and you will select both;
but release Shift before dragging them) and go back to the second hallway.
Look at the far wall. Something fishy about that stone there... open it.
A secret passage! Head through it. Now we are in a chamber with a large
exit. You can't get through that (go ahead and try it), but there is another
exit from this room. First pick up the arrow, and note which way it's
pointing. Hmm... that torch on the left wall won't come out. Perhaps it's
attached to something? Maybe if we pull it... Operate the torch (on itself).
Ta-dah! Another hidden entrance! Go down there now. Two bridges, but
which to take? For now, don't try to cross the rickety skull bridge. Stick
with the sturdy one. Uh-oh. Good time for a save. That wraith won't kill
you immediately (unlike everything else in this game), but will instead
curse you. This is to be avoided. There is a way to destroy the wraith. Like
many mystical creatures, the key to victory lies in the occult. In other
words, try some smoke. If you operate your torch on him, he shudders. Maybe
some particular kind of smoke? Green smoke? Fire up the oddball torch and
fry him with it. Now you can pick up the cloak and go thru the door (the
exit in the upper-right of the exit window is totally useless).
Cages? (More shades of Uninvited here) Don't bother trying to open them; it
can't be done. Instead, read the scroll on the shelf (you don't need the
scroll itself, just the information). This little rhyme basically states the
object of the game: to find the bladed sun, the silver orb, the staff of
ages, the golden thorn, and the platinum horn. We will be coming back here
later, but now let's leave through the top exit. Wait! You can't reach it?
Try climbing. The rope, in particular. But how to get it up there? Read the
sign. "EPOR"? What does that spell backwards? "ROPE"! Perhaps it's a magic
word... Say "EPOR" to the rope. Now we can climb it. Mirrors,
mirrors, on the wall, who's the bravest of them all? Anyway, right now you
can leave this room alone. Just open the back door and go through. Here
we have a bunch of coffins. Actually, most of them are safe to open. The
only one to avoid is the middle one on the left side. But the others, we can
open. Try the left front. Close call, there! Now the back right. Nothing...
the back middle, now. Those coins are useless; leave them alone. Now, the
right front. Ah, now things are getting interesting! That mummy is holding
something useful. But how to get it? Maybe we can remove the mummy's rags.
Don't bother trying to unravel them; burn them off with your trusty torch.
Now grab that scepter (it's not the Staff of Ages, by the way) and head
through the back door. Go through the right door. Theres a shark in
the lake! Don't worry about that yet. Go through the door on the far wall.
Those stones would be good ammo for the slingshot. Grab one and load it
(either operate it on the slingshot, or open the slingshot and put it in).
For a chuckle, try putting in something else while the stone is in the
sling. Now comes one of the nastiest parts of Shadowgate: a secret door. See
the black space under the waterfall (right of the rockslide, which is for
all practical purposes impassable)? Go through it. A secret room, and a
rock. Take a look at the rock. Try whacking it. Grab the bag revealed and
open it. Gems! (Uninvited players have a slight advantage here-the gems look
like the Blothney gem, and are used the same way.) Go back to the fork now;
we can't do much here yet. At the fork, take the left door. Ignore
the rat; we have better things to do than chase rodents. See the gem-shaped
hole in the door? A gem would fit in that nicely, wouldn't it? Put the
lightest-shaded gem in the hole (you can drag the gem over the hole, or
operate it on the hole). That sphere is not the silver orb, but is useful
anyway. Examine it. Brrrr! Pick it up and return to the lake (don't try the
trapdoor). Now we have to try to grab that object (a skeleton key, in
fact) from the skeleton. Swimming is suicidal (try it, if you desire and
have a save handy). Time to think here... the shark can swim in the water,
but if the water weren't water... Maybe if it were ice, he would be stuck.
But how can we freeze the water? The sphere! Operate it on the lake. Now how
do we get it back? Melt the ice a bit. Your torch will do nicely. Now take
the sphere and the key, and return to the pedestal room. Open the door and
go through. Oh boy. Time to save your place, because one false step and
you're fried adventurer. If you were to take something, the dragon at the
far end of the room would roast you. You need some way of blocking his fire.
What's here that can do that? The shield. Snatch it up (if it's too big, go
back out, drop some stuff, and come back; don't drop anything in here). Now
grab the hammer, the spear, and the helmet. We can't get any more here, so
leave (you can drop the shield now it's totally useless for any other
purpose). You can get more room in your inventory by wearing the helmet and
the cloak. Now it's time to head for the mirror room, where your adventure
really begins. One of these mirrors holds a surprise. But which one? The
middle one. Smash it with the hammer (nothing else will do it). Don't worry
about seven years of bad luck; you won't last that long if you don't do it.
The hammer will do you no good anymore, so drop it. Open the door and go
through. Whoa! It's locked, so use the skeleton key to get it open.
If you can't take the heat, get out of the kitchen--or find something
protective. If you aren't already, wear the cloak. That will enable you to
tolerate the flames. Now open the door. Uh-oh... it's a firedrake! This
creature feeds on fire. But if there's no fire... put out the fire with the
chilling ball. Whew! Now you can take off the cloak, and drop it too. Oh,
well, so much for that, but no time to waste, go through the door.
Cross the bridge. Wouldn't you know it, there's a troll guarding this
bridge. Don't worry about the toll (for a laugh, get the coins from the
coffin and pay the toll); instead, dispatch him with your trusty spear. That
will take care of him... for now. In any case, head on down the bridge.
Another nastie! This time it's a cyclops. Thirteen feet tall... kinda
reminds you of Goliath, doesn't he? So treat him the same way. Nail him with
the slingshot. Bull's-eye! He's out cold, but he's not dead. If you really
want to kill him, stab him with the sword. Neither the sword nor the sling
will be useful anymore, so drop them.There's a well here, too. Anything
inside? Operate the well on itself and find out? A bucket, but what's
inside? Open it up and find out. A metal glove (technically a gauntlet).
Hang on to that, but now open the door and enter another area of the castle.
This hallway, judging by the rug stretching across the hall, is the
entrance to the main area of the castle. Leave the broom here-you may or may
not need it, but if you do you can always come back for it. Go ahead and
burn the rug if you please, but don't waste too much time; let's head down
the front left passage. This library is pretty well stocked. The most
important book, though, is the one on the desk, so grab that. Also look
inside the desk. Take everything in there you'll need all of it. Now it's
time for a little light reading. The only book of interest to us is the
thick book on the bottom left shelf, third from the left. (However, go ahead
and read them all; there's some interesting and funny stuff in there.) Open
that book up and copy down the stuff about scrolls and books (a text editor
DA would be great for this, as well as for reading this walkthru).
Incidentally, while you're at it, read the scrolls and the big book. Terra
Terrakk and Instantum Illuminaris (yet another item borrowed from Uninvited)
are easy enough to decipher, but what about that book? You can't read it
right now, but don't trash that item yet. In any case, there's a gem-shaped
hole in the wall. Just slide in the medium-shade gem and go inside.
Here's another rug to burn, but that's not the important thing here. Look at
that globe. Try to open it. If we can't open it with our mortal powers,
maybe some more power would help... Remember "the key to the world"? Use the
Terra Terrakk scroll on the globe (brace yourself for some nasty puns, too).
Pick up the key (the bottle is a cure for the wraith's curse, which is there
so that people wouldn't have to know the obscure bit about the green smoke)
and close the globe. The rest of the stuff you can leave here, so go back to
the main hallway and take the far left passage. Welcome to the
laboratory. If you want to die, open the cage or drink some of the jars on
the shelf. If not, examine the stone on the floor. Doesn't that look like a
handle? Indeed, you can pull it. Operate the stone on itself (although Open
should work, it doesn't) and take the holy water. Now head downstairs into
the garden.
Examine the fountain. There's a flute in there. But the fountain is gushing
acid, so we can't get it or drink it (go ahead and try it, if you dare).
Maybe if our hand was protected from the acid, we could grab the flute. Put
the glove on and take the flute. Now it's time to remember one of the minor
rules of adventuring: "Use it where you found it." Play the flute (operate
it on itself) and pick up the ring. The flute and the gauntlet can both be
dropped, and there's nothing more here, so return to the main hallway.
Now let's explore the right doorway. Lots of nice stuff here, so pick up
whatever you like... uh-oh. I guess that wasn't such a good idea. Get out of
here before those hobgoblins rip you apart (there is no way to get the
stuff, which may be just as well). Instead, open the door and enter the
banquet hall. What could that be under the rug? Probably something
useful. We can't move the rug, so we have to remove it. This particular spot
is fun for the belligerent, because guess what-you have to burn the rug. Do
so, but don't bother taking the key-unlock the lower door (in the center of
the picture) with it. The other two keys you picked up here unlock the other
two doors, so get those open and get rid of those two keys. Now take the
door on the right. The picture of this room is very important. Either
save here, and use a distinctive name like "Sphinx", or take a screen dump,
and keep either one handy. In any case, this is a Sphinx, and (you guessed
it) it will ask you some riddles. There are a total of six riddles, and
which one is chosen is totally random. Try to figure them out yourself, but
if you're stuck, the answers to the riddles are listed below:
"Eyeless tho' that I may be...": Skull (from the library) "It has towns,
but no houses;" Map (from the library) "First I was burnt..." Horseshoe
(from the laboratory) "If you look at me..." Mirror (from the banquet hall)
"I at fires attend..." Bellows (from the study) "Long neck and no
hands..." Broom (from the mirror room) Once you know what the answer to
the riddle is, go back and get that object, and give it to the Sphinx
(dropping it will suffice). You may now go up the stairs into the
observatory. The scroll is useless, but the map is not so. Examine the
shooting star. It's not part of the map, so you can remove it. Take that,
and then open the map. That rod will be of use to you, so take it. Now let's
go up into the turret. That odd-shaped object on the floor is indeed the
golden thorn, but getting it is not so simple. Save here, and then pick it
up. Gee, I guess that beautiful lady isn't so beautiful after all... well,
there is a surefire way to kill a werewolf, and that is with a silver object
(usually a bullet). We don't have a bullet, but we have got that arrow, so
operate the sucker on the lady/werewolf. Now take the spike and return to
the banquet hall. Take the left passage now. This chamber seems innocent
enough, but... there's the platinum horn, there on the floor. Pick that up.
Maybe that wasn't so smart. This hellhound definitely will not let you get
near the horn while it's around. We ought to send it back to the devilish
place where it came from. And what better way to destroy a hell-spawned
creature than with holy water? Use that on the hellhound, then get rid of it
and get the horn. That's two out of five-not bad, but there's still a ways
to go. Climb the stairs. Another artifact! This time it's the bladed
sun, and this time a wyvern (a close relative of the dragon) is guarding it.
The solution to this puzzle is sort of a throwaway, so don't feel low if you
don't get it. Operate the shooting star on the wyvern. Now you can pick up
the bladed sun and go back to the banquet hall. Now take the middle
passage, and from there take the left doorway. The lightning is awfully
menacing, but we can control it. What better way to control lightning than
with a lightning rod! Typically such things are made of metals, such as
iron. We do indeed have an iron rod, so stick that in the hole. Blammo! The
hand seems to have something for you. Take the wand, and have a look at it.
A serpent on the side, huh? That may serve us well eventually. Take the
stairs down, but DON'T take the pot of gold; that's the oldest trick in the
book. The bag is safe, so you can get it. Now go up the stairs, back to the
hallway, and through the right doorway. Sir Doogan is quite dead, so
you don't have to worry about him. However, there are some neat things here.
Look at that panel on the right. Perhaps it's movable. Open it, and admire
the small hole. What would fit in the hole? Not a gem, but something a bit
smaller. Like a ring. Stick the ring in the hole. Now look at Sir Doogan. He
looks a little plain without a kingly object in his hand. What of yours
befits a man of such greatness? Try the scepter. Give it to Doogan. Aha! A
secret tunnel... head down it.
In the secret hallway under Doogan, watch out for the passage on the left;
going that way makes for a crushing experience. Instead, take the passage
straight ahead. The gargoyles will leave you alone as long as you don't try
to get past them, but that's fine for now; just take the side path.
Now we really need some magic. Remember the book? The book on magic stated
that books come with extra protections. What would help us read anything,
the book in particular? Maybe we need our eyes checked... but that's not
necessary; just put on the glasses and read the book. The stuff in the book
is important to keep, so copy that down. But "A bridge to form amidst
burning death, a demon to guard"? The lava seems pretty deadly to me. The
book is for this particular location. Use it on the demon, then drop the
book and the glasses and cross the bridge (toll-free, even). The
switches here will open the cylinder, but if you throw them in the wrong
combination the beastie in the hole will have you for breakfast, so think
before you flip. Now is the time for the saved game or screen dump of the
Sphinx' chamber. See those little lines on the staircase? Those lines are a
diagram of which switches to throw. Flip the right switch, the middle, then
the right again to open the cylinder. Take the silver orb. That makes four
out of five. Unfortunately, the fifth of the five is on the other side of
the troll's bridge, so we have to do some major backtracking here. Head back
all the way to the second hallway by double-clicking the back exit (the one
on the bottom of the exits window) and return to the bridge room.
What we seek lies across the rickety bridge, but it will fall under too much
weight, so drop everything but your lit torch and go across. The snake is
merely a statue, so don't panic. However, we have seen a snake before-on the
wand. Go back and get that, and go back across. Operate the wand on the
snake. Aha! The staff of ages! Take that, ditch the wand, and go back
across. Once on the other side, grab everything and go back to the "EPOR"
room. Look at the back wall closely. See the loose stone in the center.
Open it and go through. Here's the third gem-shaped hole, so stick your last
gem in it. The wizard's words are important, so keep a record of those. Take
the scroll as well, and read it. If you're puzzled, "Ulterior Humana"
translates to "Hidden Human". The scroll is an invisibility spell! That will
be really useful soon. Now go out, go up the rope and back to the troll
bridge. Cross the bridge. Well, the troll doesn't want you to cross. But if
he can't see you, he can't stop you! Use Ulterior Humana on yourself, and
stride past him. If you didn't kill the Cyclops before, he will be
aroused again, but you're still invisible, so no matter. Just pass him and
go back to the room with the gargoyles. An interesting fact about gargoyles:
they are extremely irritable to light. This gives you a good weapon against
them: Instantum Illuminaris. Use it on them, then go straight past them.
The door on the left is impossible to open, so don't worry about it.
Instead, turn the crank to open the well. Guess what? This is a wishing
well. Got any coins? Check the bag. Look at that big coin. Got a picture of
a well on it, eh? Toss that into the well. The wind means you may now jump
in the well, so do so. Here's the River Styx (yet another cliche; this
game thrives on them). Perhaps the gong is a service gong. Try banging it with
the mallet. That ferryman is Charon (the game calls it Kros), for you
mythology buffs. He wants a fare of one coin, so give him one of the coins
from the bag. Almost done! This is a good time for a save; dying is none
too difficult. The bladed sun looks like it would fit in one of those niches.
But which one? Remember the message in the book? "Where the sword is hung,
thou shalt put the key" or something to that effect. Stuff the bladed sun in
the left hole. Now about the staff. Recall the scroll: "Five to find, three
are one." Also recall "Three for the staff, one to be the key, and one to be
thy pathway." We need to put together some stuff, the staff being one of the
three items in question. Stick the orb and the staff together, then add the
spike to that. Ta-dah! The staff is now ready for action. Now how to get
inside. "One to be thy pathway." The only one of the five we haven't used is
the horn. Blow it. Besides a few eerie notes, you may now enter the
skeleton, and have a rendezvous with your destiny. Oh boy. Here's the
Warlock Lord, and there's the Behemoth (sounds kinda like a piece of heavy
machinery, doesn't it?) Now, annihilate the Behemoth by zapping him with the
staff. Kerblam! You've saved the world from a horrible fate. Enjoy the
winning music (I preferred the music for Uninvited, but to each his own) and
the princess (the game assumes you're male-one final cliche). Also don't
forget to print out a certificate of achievement, acknowledging your heroic
feat.
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Lord Hippo
