Behind the scenes at “Epic Mickey” – Part One
After literally years of silence surrounding Warren Spector’s “Epic Mickey,” Disney and Spector are finally talking about the project – and they have a lot to say.
The company held a launch event recently in London, unveiling new details and offering a peek behind the thought process at how the game came to be. Over the next couple of days, The Cut Scene will be looking at what might be and what might have been with this reintroduction of the world’s most famous rodent.
Spector actually didn’t head to Disney looking to work on a Mickey game. He had two of his own projects at Junction Point Studios that he was looking to find a publisher for.
One, he says, was “a big, BIG fantasy game that I had been wanting to do for about 15 years. My wife and I created a world and a whole story arc for DC comics. They decided not to pick it up. I loved this world and the characters we had created.”
The other was a near-future science fiction-themed game. It was, hints Spector, a spiritual successor to “Deus Ex” in many ways.
“There were and still are ‘Deus Ex’ stories I would like to tell. That story is not done for me,” he says. “[For the sci-fi game] I sort of filed the serial numbers off. ‘Deus Ex’ was very much a game of the millennium.”
Spector says he actually tried to reacquire the rights to “Deus Ex” from Eidos, but was unsuccessful.
Neither of the two games is dead. When it bought Junction Point in 2007, Disney also acquired the rights to the titles.
Spector didn’t expect the hardcore gaming world to be particularly pleased when it heard he was making a Mickey Mouse game.
"I think people are going to be very surprised when they hear what I'm working on,” he told me in September 2008, when “Epic Mickey” was a complete mystery. “I'm sure a lot of the hardcore folks are going to be up in arms and I'm really looking forward to getting into that discussion with them.”
Ironically, the hardcore have been the biggest supporters of “Epic Mickey” so far. Mainstream audiences are much more intimidated by the idea of making any changes to the Mickey they’ve grown comfortable with over the years.
“I’m completely stunned,” Spector said last week. “I’ve been donning my armor and girding my loins and getting ready for battle. To be honest, I was a little disappointed [that the hardcore were so enthusiastic about the game] because I’m a scrappy guy and I like to fight.”
So far, Spector says he’s having a good time in the world of licensed content – especially since Disney has given him a fairly loose leash (though he does admit he has already been told he has gone too far once or twice with some of his ideas).
He already talks in broad strokes about a sequel – and how he’d like to incorporate the Wii Motion Plus into it. And he’s happy to consider other licensed products at the company. (Disney PR reps won’t let him list which ones he’d like to tackle.)
That said, don’t think Spector’s through creating his own worlds.
“I’m certainly open to doing more licenses, but one of the things that Disney is about is creating things that can translate to new media,” he says. “So I think a ‘balanced diet’ is a good thing.”
Up next: Creating Oswald the Lucky Rabbit and why you won't hear Mickey speak
Chris Morris reports on the business and culture of video games and offers analysis of recent events and industry trends.
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Kudos to the Sombrero Kid for having a soul - i'm right there with you m8.
The other two of ya, give Spector a break and try and find your inner child beneath all that pessimism!
I can't find "liberating" anywhere on this page but your comment (and now mine :P )for a start, and I'm really interested to see a bit of creative license taken with the Disney franchises.
I agree with the disappointment of how bad DX2 was compared to the ludicrously glowing previews (and the good reviews which were odd), and that details are sparse on Mickey - but frankly there is a lot of decent buzz from 'the hardcore', the people with a bit of a sense of humour and a sense of fun who are also the 'hardcore' of video games as opposed to the mainstream of people who dip in and out.
Posted by: Will Hobson | November 03, 2009 at 01:46 PM
I think half the reason ws is making this game is to get away from people like you who can't see past the first person shooter genre, I'm more excited about this than I was about deus ex 2, which was a brilliant game incidentally, just not as good as the original. On a side note why would ws go back to eidos when they completely shafted him, like they have so many others?
Posted by: The Sombrero Kid | November 03, 2009 at 01:23 AM
It is not believable that 'hardcore' game fans are supportive of the Mickey game. It rings false and no amount of convincing will change that. Since hard facts are not provided we are left with the impression it is a thinly veiled self delusion. I recall others of that nature, something to the effect that Deus Ex 2 was better in every way than the original. These later turned out to be false, and admitted by Spector himself as fabrications used to save face during the launch of the second game.
It is sad to see a person of creative potential brought low by a perhaps significant but non-fatal mistake of producing a sub-par sequel. It is doubly sad to see Spector actually applaud his new position. It also rings hollow like a person praising the restrictions placed upon him as 'liberating'.
Posted by: James F. | November 02, 2009 at 10:57 PM
mickey? seriously, how do you get from a narrative driven kickass game like Deus Ex to kids disney waggle waggle game? Midlife crisis? Deus Ex wasn't just about guns, it had great plot with tons of interesting characters.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=F2Fwb8OrvSw
GET YOUR ASS BACK TO EIDOS MR.SPECTOR!
Posted by: meh | November 02, 2009 at 07:56 PM