Super Mario RPG: Legend of the Seven Stars

General

 * Control pad: Walk
 * B: Jump
 * Y: Run
 * A: Talk

If you touch an enemy, you will initiate combat.

Combat
Combat may seem tricky at first, but quickly becomes intuitive. Your character will be surrounded by buttons (X, A, B, Y). These are as follows:


 * X: Item
 * A: Attack
 * B: Defense/Run away
 * Y: Magic

So if you want to attack, you will hit A. If there is more than one enemy, you then select which enemy using the control pad and hit A again. Then at the moment of impact, you should hit A one more time to attempt a "timed hit" to deal more damage. (You can also use any of the four buttons to defend against an attack at the moment of impact.)

If you want to use an item, you press X to bring up the menu, then you select the item using the X button again. If you are given the option of who to use the item on, you confirm that with the X button one last time. (There are no timed hits with items.) You always use the same button to continue an action until it is completed. If you start to use an item but decide to attack instead, before you confirm one last time, you would hit the A button to cancel using the item and start an attack.

You can use timed hits with many magic spells, including healing, but some instead work using repeated tapping of the Y button or by holding it down to charge and then release.

Level-up tips
When you level-up, you will be given the option of boosting your attack/defense, HP, or magic. One of the three will give you a larger boost than normal. How do you know which one to pick?

The answer is fairly simple. Divide your new level by 3 and take the remainder. If the remainder is zero, you'll get the biggest boost by choosing "attack". If the remainder is one, you'll get the biggest boost by choosing "HP". If it is two, you'll get the biggest boost by choosing "magic". This establishes this pattern:

Level 2: remainder 2 : Magic Level 3: remainder 0 : Attack Level 4: remainder 1 : HP Level 5: remainder 2 : Magic Level 6: remainder 0 : Attack Level 7: remainder 1 : HP Level 8: remainder 2 : Magic

And so on: Magic, Attack, HP, cycling over and over. You can also remember which one you chose last for that particular character (if it was the correct one) and simply choose the one over to its right. For instance, if you chose HP last, then you should choose "magic". If you don't remember what you chose last, well, now you know how to figure out what to choose. :)

Of course, you don't have to follow this pattern, but it will likely lead to the best results.