Support NeoGAF

[sn00zer]

This is not a "lets are talk about how shitty Epic Mickey was" thread

So what happened did we ever get the full story on why the drastic change from the original pitch? Where did the concept artists who made these end up? Is there any chance we will see games similar looking to this?

I remember when the concept art for the original Epic Mickey released, people, including myself, hyped this game into the stratosphere. The resulting game was less than spectacular and a far cry from the leaked concepts....so yeah lets talk about the Epic Mickey that could have been.

PSA: There is an artbook available for purchase! http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/1423148266/?tag=neogaf0e-20

 

[ThePoopDeck]

woah, this game could have looked seriously dark. well in terms of disney.

now this is creepy.

 

[Manabanana]

This is terrifying and amazing

 

[VanWinkle]

I dont know if I've ever seen a more disappointing divide between conceptual vision and eventual output.

 

[axisofweevils]

I recall Warren Spector saying they were concepts he submitted to Disney to see how far they'd let him go.

Update: Found the quote.

"There are a couple aspects to that. I think I've mentioned before, that I'm a big believer in finding out where the line is by pushing past it. There are lines that are on every project; every project exists in a creative box. For most of my games, I create that box and the team has to sort of work within it. In this case, there's a creative box that I create, and there's the creative box that Disney overlays on that. I know where my lines are, but I don't know where Disney's are. I had a lot of stuff generated that was very specifically designed to be provocative and to cross that line. I know it's too far -- or is it? You tell me. So it forces a confrontation or a decision. Some of what you saw was beyond the line, and so I learned something from it. Some of it was early design ideas that are no longer relevant. Some of it is stuff that's still in the game, and I'm not saying what."

http://www.1up.com/news/warren-spector-addresses-disparity-epic

 

[Riki]

There was actually an entire topic on these (before the game was announced).
And of course, once it was announced to be a Wii exclusive, that topic became a graveyard of bannings.

 

[Avinexus]

I was insanely excited about this game when this art showed up in an issue of GameInformer. Then come to find out the actual game looks nothing like it...

 

[Sadist]

Well some things made it in; animatronic Goofy and Donald were there, but less creepy.

Overall the concept art was just too edgy for a Mickey Mouse game, I guess Disney shot it down the moment they saw it. Can't have Dark Mickey creeping about in a nightmare Disney world.

 

[Arkos]

Whoa Zombie-Robot Goofy is ruining my childhood in an awesome way. I'll also say its a shame this game wasn't actually good, this art looks great

 

[Vashetti]

Concept art better than final game in new shocker.

 

[Mushroomer25]

It's such incredible concept art, but there really was nowhere for it to go. The original style was just insanely dark, and would have been brand suicide for Disney to sign off on it.

 

[sn00zer]

There was actually an entire topic on these (before the game was announced).
And of course, once it was announced to be a Wii exclusive, that topic became a graveyard of bannings.

I may or may not have been in those bannings

 

[Killer]

what it could have been.

 

[sn00zer]

Additional Concept Art http://conceptartworld.com/?p=14678

 

[Riki]

It's such incredible concept art, but there really was nowhere for it to go. The original style was just insanely dark, and would have been brand suicide for Disney to sign off on it.

Not so much. They've done dark Mickey before (though not to quite this extreme).
However, it was pretty obvious they were going after a younger crowd than Spector originally had in mind.

 

[Deleted member 80556]

If Disney had allowed Warren to do whatever he liked with Mickey this might have been a better game.

 

[Eusis]

Whoa Zombie-Robot Goofy is ruining my childhood in an awesome way. I'll also say its a shame this game wasn't actually good, this art looks great

The biggest shame to me actually is how we've gotten neither a lot of great platformers lately outside of Nintendo, or great Warren Spector games. If we could somehow have gotten the best of both mashed together albeit compromising (more open platformer, more streamlined RPG mechanics) we could've probably had an amazing game regardless of how dark it took Mickey. Instead, we got an average original installment and a possibly worse sequel.

 

[Elixist]

the concept art was truly fantastic on every level for me. I had many of the pieces as my wallpaper for a long time. It would be cool to see wehre the artists ended up.

 

[TriGen]

A game going in the direction of that concept art could have been amazing. But, I would guess they didn't want to scare children.

 

[Acerac]

That art looks incredible. I would have been on that day 1, a rarity with me and console releases these days.

 

[sn00zer]

If Disney had allowed Warren to do whatever he liked with Mickey this might have been a better game.

I still believe the technical limitations and audience of the Wii severely cut out a lot of the artistic potential

 

[Soriku]

The Dark Souls of Mickey Mouse

I wanted the game but skipped it because it wasn't supposed to be that good. I would've liked a longish and dark adventure game where you could go to these areas, they'd be open (being interconnected would've been nice), and you could just explore them, but...yeah

 

[Riki]

I still believe the technical limitations and audience of the Wii severely cut out a lot of the artistic potential

Weren't they also under a lot of pressure to get the game out? I think development time was cut short for some reason.

 

[Eusis]

I still believe the technical limitations and audience of the Wii severely cut out a lot of the artistic potential

I honestly wonder if he even had a great team, at least one for platformers. Maybe they could've done a great job with something else, but there they were just sort of average and failed to notably improve by most accounts for the sequel.

EDIT: Though as noted they were also under pressure to get a game out, and Disney probably just isn't a really good game publisher. Probably why they acknowledged this and have resorted to primarily licensing again, though it was a shame to kill LucasArts like they did.

 

[Amir0x]

one day i will love to see an attempt by a developer to do something like this, and also not make a steaming turd in the process

 

[Wilsongt]

The original concept art was truly amazing... What could have been...

 

[Doctor Ninja]

I reckon these were part of the original pitch for Epic Mickey and then somehow the game was shifted to the game we know today, so much wasted potential

 

[Y2Kev]

The actual game was so bad. The camera. Ugh. The gameplay. Ugh. God. What did they do?

 

[Jacobi]

one day i will love to see an attempt by a developer to do something like this, and also not make a steaming turd in the process

Maybe we'll see a new oddworld game some day. I also loved the artwork and the game felt just like a bad n64 j'n'r gameplay-wise.

 

[apana]

I still believe the technical limitations and audience of the Wii severely cut out a lot of the artistic potential

Well then you would be wrong. None of the major complaints about the game when it released had to do with the Wii. The game actually looked pretty good as far as graphics go, it was just undercooked and not made well. Warren Spector had a huge number of people and he couldn't get it done, much of it was outsourced I believe. Games like Twilight Princess and Mario Galaxy among many others were made on the Wii, give me a break.

 

[mantidor]

Concept art is always so misleading, specially for games that are barely being developed, these pieces did more harm that good at the end

 

[Kandinsky]

I adore Epic Mickey, so I'm not even mad.

 

[73V3N]

I still believe the technical limitations and audience of the Wii severely cut out a lot of the artistic potential

So that's why Epic Mickey 2 was so great.

 

[Pallad1um]

Amazing artwork, the game itself can't (and doesn't even try) to make it justice.

 

[Chev]

So what happened did we ever get the full story on why the drastic change from the original pitch? Where did the concept artists who made these end up? Is there any chance we will see games similar looking to this?

I remember when the concept art for the original Epic Mickey released, people, including myself, hyped this game into the stratosphere. The resulting game was less than spectacular and a far cry from the leaked concepts....so yeah lets talk about the Epic Mickey that could have been.

Long story short, we have no idea if this was "the original pitch". It was merely the concept art that first leaked. Could've been design explorations, could have been a pitch, could've been tons of things. Concept art is often very different from the final product.

 

[Hedge]

There was actually an entire topic on these (before the game was announced).
And of course, once it was announced to be a Wii exclusive, that topic became a graveyard of bannings.

Why would it turn into a graveyard of bannings because of it's status as a Wii exclusive? :0

But my gosh, the land between familiar childhood fantasy and macabre horror always frightened me the most, so this is reeeaaallly creepy to me. xD

 

[Chittagong]

This is probably the most inspired, compelling concept art I have ever seen. When I first saw it I was in awe, amazing creativity and an utterly compelling surrealist world. What a shame.

 

[Eusis]

So that's why Epic Mickey 2 was so great.

Wii was still lead platform there actually. So, yeah, Wii would've held everyone back because Junction Point only worked on the Wii version.

But we're not talking having to develop on DS or PS1 here, the Wii probably shouldn't have seriously held anyone back for gameplay design, not unless Epic Mickey was going to be some sprawling open world adventure and even that was introduced and made popular on hardware weaker than the Wii. Audience is a concern, but that was probably more for how dark they took the game than anything else. Controls though... I can't fully write those off admittedly, but strictly for platformers we did see games like SMG so something better could've been done.

 

[SovanJedi]

Some of that concept art was realised in the game in some way; that image with Mickey dangling off the broken steeple in front of the Phantom Blot's face (which I had never seen until now) is pretty similar to one of the last sections in the original Epic Mickey, where

Spoiler

the real Blot would follow you and demolish one of the towers you'd climb up.

Not exactly the same, though. And yeah, it's a crushing disappointment that the final game didn't go anywhere near the level of darkness some of the more infamous concept art did.

Now that I read Spector's explanation on why that art was created (and rejected) I can fully appreciate its existence now - and, subsequently, turn a lot of my frustrations towards Disney themselves for shying away from what could have been a seriously interesting game conceptually, as well as probably making the quote-unquote moral choice system really elucidated and almost completely meaningless to the game in general. It's still Warren Spector's and Junction Point's fault that the game had shit camera, dull missions and repetitive platforming sections though, so I assume that the super-dark setting would have only helped it to a certain extent.

 

[Amir0x]

The actual game was so bad. The camera. Ugh. The gameplay. Ugh. God. What did they do?

It's probably the most infuriating game from an execution perspective I've ever played. So many good ideas MIRED in just constantly garbage execution.

"Oh man, you can make a good or a bad choice... none of it amounts to shit."
"Oh man, there are 2D sidescrolling platforming segments... which are embarrassingly simplistic and have complete shit jumping physics and controls."
"A more darkly toned Disney experience... crushed under the weight of last-gen engine limitations."
"Make it a 3D Platformer where the camera sucks ass!"
"Make novel use of the wiimote where 90% of the wiimote actions suck ass!"
"Use a wide catalog of compelling Disney portfolio characters but use none of them in a compelling fashion!"

Maybe we'll see a new oddworld game some day. I also loved the artwork and the game felt just like a bad n64 j'n'r gameplay-wise.

Oddworld games are some of my secret loves.

Stranger's Wrath is a legit good Oddworld game though

 

[DICKS AHOY]

Honestly a lot of the black and white charcoal sketches seem way too over the top and intentionally EDGY to have fit in whatever Epic Mickey was supposed to be that well. I still really love some of those other pictures though like the paint thinner war scene or Monstro being converted into a giant cartoon-hand-powered battleship. That feels like much more effective re-appropriation of classic Disney iconography than just having melting skulls or rotting zombie robot zombie corpses or whatever.

I don't really like the fairly generic style the final game had in comparison, and didn't feel it fit the subversive nature of the game's plot.

EDIT: Also EM being a Wii-exclusive didn't magically make its artstyle change to something more kid-friendly and marketable during development, jesus christ people.

 

[Andrew Korenchkin]

I can't help but think that this game lost something special while it was being developed. Man, I feel sorry for Warren Spector.

 

[apana]

Some of that concept art was used for the Wii game. The game wasn't ultra kiddy or anything, it still had a dark and somber feel to it. Concept art is not the same as making a game. You can find brilliant concept art and brilliant fan art all over the web.

 

[Black Door]

The actual game was so bad. The camera. Ugh. The gameplay. Ugh. God. What did they do?

So many people (perma) banned in all of the lead-up to release. And for what?

 

[MemoryHumanity]

I feel like I've seen most of these before?

 

[CheesecakeRecipe]

A glance through the "What if" machine.

 

[scitek]

I feel like I should give Epic Mickey an honest go one of these days. I get the sense it may be one of those ok-but-not-great games that gets unfairly shat on, but there's only one way to know if that's the case.

 

[Savitar]

I remember seeing those when the game was first spoken of, people were crazily hyped based on the artwork, no one thought such a game could be made!

And in so many ways it sadly turned out to be true.

 

[Lijik]

I honestly wonder if he even had a great team, at least one for platformers. Maybe they could've done a great job with something else, but there they were just sort of average and failed to notably improve by most accounts for the sequel.

EDIT: Though as noted they were also under pressure to get a game out, and Disney probably just isn't a really good game publisher. Probably why they acknowledged this and have resorted to primarily licensing again, though it was a shame to kill LucasArts like they did.

I think these two aspects are what really hurt the project. You cant task someone with making a Mario Killer, and then not get the best of the best or rush them. From what I understand, Warren didn't have a full grasp on the finer points of platform design either. The sequel was rushed even more than the first

I also always feel like these discussions "cheat" on the art they show. One or two of the shown art in the OP have analogues in the final game and aren't too far off. Its always listed as "original pitch" but there'll be art from various stages of the Epic Mickey dev process.
Here's a version of Mickey they were considering through a chunk of development:

a mickey more akin to the above is definitely an indication of the art being earlier in the process like these paintings from Billy George:

Some of the art in the OP have a more standard looking mickey and are from the final form the game took.

Billy George also did these early concepts of the Blotlings:

Im having real trouble finding it now, but theres early concept art somewhere of the blotlings as these demonic looking mickey mouse esque monsters with torn red shorts.

Itd be interesting if at some point someone was able to chart the game from its thinktank pitch in 05 to release and get context for the art.

 

[Splatt]

Groooooooooaaaaaaaaannnnnnnnnnn

What could have been. Damn you Spector!