Warren Spector's new game (codename: "Epic Mickey"?)

[Soln]

still.  It's like GM saying let's start putting sails on our 4x4's.

[Prospero]

Disney used to be willing to take artistic chances. Fantasia has wonderful dark imagery, and Destino was a delightfully trippy little film. Neither match up with the Disney we know now. If Specter is as big a fan of Disney as he seems to be, then it's not shocking he might channel a bit of Walt.

[Sky]

[Severian]

[AutomaticZen]

It's true, this being a Wii game is unacceptable.

Some places are reporting that GameInformer have left all mention of Wii exclusivity off their article and site. So there may be hope for the future.

[Lucas]

Nice :)

http://gameinformer.com/b/features/archive/2009/10/12/sketching-mickey-the-time-lapse-video.aspx

In the meantime, we’ve put together this short film for your enjoyment – a three-minute time-lapse video shortened from a half-hour of drawing by one of the character artists at Junction Point. As you watch Mickey come to life on the page, you’ll also get your first glimpse at a potential enemy in the game – one of the robotic Beetleworx. Keep your ears open as well to hear some of the great music from the upcoming game.

http://gameinformer.com/games/disney_epic_mickey/m/disney_epic_mickey_media/24611.aspx

[Strazos]

Holy hell I wish I could draw.

[schild]

http://www.4colorrebellion.com/archives/2009/10/15/epic-mickey-seeing-is-believing/

Looks like shit in game. Thanks, Nintendo.

[UnSub]

Every time I see the name "Epic Mickey", I think Warren Spector is making a date rape game.

Nothing I've heard has proven this hypothesis wrong thus far.

[Merusk]

Holy hell I wish I could draw.

All it takes is practice. Drawing is easy, creativity is hard.

[MisterNoisy]

http://www.4colorrebellion.com/archives/2009/10/15/epic-mickey-seeing-is-believing/

Looks like shit in game. Thanks, Nintendo.

Wow.  It looks like they just replaced Spyro with Mickey Mouse.

[funcro]

I don't think tech is enough to explain the difference between those scans and the previous concept art.  It's a change of artistic direction.  It looks like Junction Point got corrected by corporate.

[UnSub]

I don't think tech is enough to explain the difference between those scans and the previous concept art.  It's a change of artistic direction.  It looks like Junction Point got corrected by corporate.

Gee, who'd ever think that Disney wouldn't want a title where Mickey is a mutant cyborg spider? 

[Tebonas]

Seems I won't have to borrow my sisters Wii after all. After the buildup that was quite underwhelming.

[Sky]

I wonder if they'll include the shark Warren is jumping over.

[Goreschach]

Has he actually done anything worthwhile since Deus Ex?

[Sky]

Thief:DS was good until it wasn't. Even though it went kablooie with the stupid AI, it was worth it for the game up to that point.

[Severian]

Long interview with Spector about Epic Mickey here: gameinformer
A lot of it is him recounting early Disney history, but plenty of detail too about his recent history and his aspirations.

I mean literally I was standing outside [the E3 press conference] on the steps with with a pen and a contract, and I had my phone to my ear and I was talking to my lawyer with one hand, and I was talking to my agent with the other hand, and it’s like there are 300 journalists in there...

[MisterNoisy]

The reality is that we started Wii development in 2008, but before that we were a PC, PS3, and 360 title.

http://www.officialnintendomagazine.co.uk/article.php?id=12784

[KallDrexx]

So, has anyone gotten a chance to play this yet?   My gf's roommate and I are thinking of getting it.

[Rasix]

Reviews are so tepid for this. 

[Yegolev]

Under the tree.  Will report next year, I expect.

[Hawkbit]

I was going to pick it up for my 5yr old, she's getting decent at Mario so I figured this would be okay.  The reviews harp on the camera, and that is one thing that will disinterest my daughter from games - if it controls poorly she'll put it down and not pick it back up.

So, at some point it will be $20 and I'll buy it for her for fun.

[KallDrexx]

My girlfriends roommate got this for Xmas.  The camera and controls are terribad.  I tried it out for 3 minutes and put it down before I threw the wiimote at the tv.  I'll stick with my ps3 backlog.

[UnSub]

"If reviewers want to give us a hard time about it because they're misunderstanding the game we made, it's not for me to tell them that they're wrong, absolutely not. But I wish people would get it out of their head that we made a 'Mario' competitor, because we didn't." - Warren Spector

I think the full quote is worth reading, but that's the heart of it.

[schild]

This is very clearly not the same man that made Deus Ex, System Shock, etc. Something happened in the last decade.

[Lucas]

This is very clearly not the same man that made Deus Ex, System Shock, etc. Something happened in the last decade.

So fuckin' true.

[Soulflame]

My eldest (14 now) played this for half an hour.  She walked through a door, had it close behind her, and was not able to open it from the other side.  She was irritated because she still had two or three tasks to complete on the other side, and had no way to go back and complete them, short of restarting.  So far as I know, she shut it off with the intent of playing it later, and hasn't played it since.

[Yegolev]

This is very clearly not the same man that made Deus Ex, System Shock, etc. Something happened in the last decade.

I'd disagree with Specter and say that Epic Mickey is at least Psychonauts with a good/evil slider (does Tim Schaefer consider Psychonauts a platfomer?).  If it was Mario with a good/evil slider, it would be a far better platformer.  Specter is dead-on about trying to appeal to more than one playstyle and that merging them is hard, but sometimes you don't want to try to merge certain things because they will always produce retard spawn.  That said, I've played games with far worse camera control... just not in recent history.

If Specter thinks everyone gets third-person cameras wrong, someone needs to give him a copy of God of War.  The thing is, GoW doesn't also blend in situations where you have to enter first-person mode, like when you're looking to see if you missed something to dissolve or if you're navigating a cramped room.  He could have refined the camera more if he had focused his game design a bit more, in my feeble opinion.

It does have some appeal but I keep wondering if I've gotten to the real game yet.  I left off at Asia in the "it's a small world" ride but I think there is a "town" later on, if I can get to it.  Hopefully there will be an option to revisit previous areas to collect pins, otherwise I'm going to be sad.

My son likes it, but not as much as Kirby's Epic Yarn, which is fucking awesome.  No camera problems or good/evil slider.

[Lucas]

Layoffs:

http://www.joystiq.com/2011/01/24/source-epic-mickey-dev-suffering-layoffs/

[Jeff Kelly]

So games that sold nearly 2 million units worldwide so far are now considered flops? At least the story for the layoffs is that is't due to Tron: Legacy and Epic Mickey being huge flops. I don't know about Tron but despite its failures Epic Mickey has sold nearly two million units which at least to me seems strong.

[Teleku]

How was Tron a flop?  It made back all its money in the first two weeks, prompting the studio to green light two more sequels....

[Jeff Kelly]

Tron, the tie-in game, not the movie. since the layoffs concern Disney's game division I didn't mention that explicitly.

[LK]

I thought the most impressive thing about the Tron game was the massive Tron logo that they used for their trade show booths. The game though? Eh.

I think they wanted to make a game for kids with a property that's decidedly not for kids.

I wonder how Tron 2.0 did vs. Tron: Legacy: The Video Game: The Cash-In.

[Lucas]

Update: HUGE layoffs :(

http://www.joystiq.com/2011/01/24/disney-interactive-layoffs/