The original Epic Mickey, released in 2010, was a magical experience and one of the most creative and underrated platformers of its time. The Wii-exclusive game was a dark, twisted version of the cartoon character we all know and love. The game was a journey through long and well-known series and characters with a sci-fi twist. This popular game recently received a revamp treatment by Purple Lamp Studios, who also worked on another great remaster, Spongebob Squarepants: Battle for Bikini Bottom Rewatered. So expectations were obviously high.
The game has been lovingly crafted and restored to look and work great on modern consoles, with Mickey Mouse using paintbrushes, thinner and paint to repair the wasteland, and Oswald the Rabbit We reunite to find out why we’re not Mickey Mouse’s biggest fans.
different mickey
Originally, the game was considered very dark at the time of its release. The game’s writer and director Warren Spector acquired the rights to the characters and worked closely with Disney Animation on the cutscenes. These focus on Mickey’s mischievous side, giving gamers the option of having Mickey save the Gremlin (one of the game’s helpers), or accessing the treasure chest to send the Gremlin plummeting to his death or trapping him forever. Gave you a choice. . This presents a moral choice not one typically associated with the famous mouse.
You control Mickey Mouse as you move through the wasteland, moving to different areas via a projector screen. To access these different areas, move through side-scrolling mini-levels themed after various Mickey Mouse short stories, including Mickey and the Beanstalk, Steamboat Willie, Plutopia, and my favorite, Alpine Climber I will. They are beautifully detailed and the remasters of these levels are the best looking parts of the game.
dark and twisted story
The overall story is a bit complicated and messy (in a good way). As wizard Yen Sid works on a recreation of a classic Disney story, his magic mirror opens a portal into which Mickey flies. The Mouse unleashes an enemy known as the Blot who wreaks havoc and tears the Wasteland apart, and Mickey is forced to dive into its world and use a paintbrush and paint thinner to repair the damage caused and prevent further damage.
The attraction here is traversing dark, twisted versions of classic Disney films and various theme park rides from this era. Unlike Kingdom Hearts, the fusion of these ideas is unique and twisted enough to stand on its own, separate from the other entries the Mickey Mouse franchise has been a part of. Mickey’s companions have other characters that he discovers and rescues after his encounter with Oswald.
perfectly remastered
The difficult part of remastering a game is making it fit into the 2024 landscape. Luckily, full 4K 60FPS processing here puts it on par with the latest platformer games in this space. There is also an emphasis on traversal in both 3D and 2D environments. Mickey gains better traversal with longer jumps and the ability to walk faster, as well as a dash move that can also be used on main levels and traverse areas.
In the later stages of the game, more enemies will swarm around you. In older games, this was a bit frustrating, but now Mickey has a new ground pound ability that makes these much easier to eliminate. The original controls for the Wii were nunchucks and a weirdly connected controller. So with these changes in the DualSense controller, it’s now much easier to precisely get the pain and thinness to cover the right surfaces.
final thoughts
Epic Mickey: Rebrushed feels like a heartfelt revival of a classic Wii-era game, made even better by receiving the full remake treatment. Purple Lamp Studios clearly shows their love for this title by lovingly recreating every area of this game, including the controls and the way Mickey traverses the world. Being able to notch the game up to 4K with solid performance at 60FPS (at least on the PlayStation 5 version) is the ultimate way to experience this classic title.
4 stars (out of 5)
Highlights: Beautiful restoration of deleted scenes and in-game visuals, updated controller for modern consoles makes controlling your paintbrush easier.
Cons: This game’s loading screens are surprisingly long
Developer: Purple Lamp Studio
Publisher: THQ Nordic
Platforms: PlayStation 4, PlayStation 5, Xbox Series X/S, Xbox One, Nintendo Switch, PC.
Available: Currently
Review was conducted on PlayStation 5 using a release code provided by the publisher.
