Disney Epic Mickey Q&A with Warren Spector, Part Two

Ruled by Oswald the Lucky Rabbit, Wasteland is the place where forgotten cartoon characters, concepts or attractions go. Disney Interactive Studios’ Wii-exclusive action-adventure platformer follows Mickey Mouse on his quest to escape from the magical world of Wasteland. Disney Epic Mickey is a game for all the family to enjoy, where the power of friendship is paramount and the player’s actions can change the world.

In Part One of our Q&A we discussed play style mattering, Disney fandom and becoming Wii-exclusive. Read on for Part Two where we talk about characters, collectibles and postmodern fairy tales with Warren Spector, head creative mind behind Disney Epic Mickey.

Nintendo of Europe: Tell us a little more about Oswald the Lucky Rabbit’s role in the game. Is he a villain?

Warren Spector: Oswald the Lucky Rabbit, Walt Disney’s first cartoon star, is Mickey’s older brother and while he’s resentful, he’s just withdrawn from the world. Oswald resents Mickey for stealing the life that should have been his - he thinks he should have been the most popular and successful character in the world - but a villain? No.

A lot of the game is about how characters want to be loved by an audience: when audiences leave them behind, like when black and white versions of characters are replaced by coloured versions, I couldn’t imagine Walt Disney just thinking of them as gone and forgotten. Instead the idea of the game is that the power of his imagination brought them to Wasteland, which Oswald ruled and made into a nice place where characters could wait until audiences were ready to embrace them again. So when Mickey’s mischief accidentally results in the devastation of his world, Oswald obviously has another reason to resent Mickey!

NoE: Are there any ‘forgotten’ characters from long ago that you are particularly pleased to have included in the game?

WS: There were a lot of characters waiting for audiences to remember them. Personally, I’m really psyched about the Gremlins. Disney and children’s book author Roald Dahl (who wrote Charlie and the Chocolate Factory) created these characters in World War II; way back when, Disney were working on a movie featuring them that never got made.

I held the storyboards from that movie in my hands and I just fell in love with those characters, so, it’s really kind of an honour to include them.

You’ve got Gremlin Gus, who’s a real character created by Roald Dahl and Walt Disney. He plays, I call it ‘Mickey’s spirit guide’ - he’s like Jiminy Cricket from Pinocchio or the mouse who befriends Dumbo. Gremlin Gus is the character who acts as your conscience, who understands the world really well and helps to guide you through the experience.

NoE: Collectibles are a big part of the Disney experience - is there any sort of bonus or collectible side to Disney Epic Mickey?

WS: Every platform or adventure game has collectibles and Disney Epic Mickey is no different: it starts with tickets.

Back in the olden days at Disneyland, they used to have A, B, C, D and E tickets. The E tickets were for the really cool rides and you had to give an A ticket up to go on the ‘kiddy rides’. I wanted a game economy - I wanted to be able to buy stuff, so during the game you can collect tickets! Frankly, while erasing stuff may make some characters upset with you, it’s a really good way to uncover tickets - so you have to balance wanting people to like you against wanting to find a bunch of tickets.

But, on top of that, Disney has these things called “Disney Pins” which are collectible and you’ll be able to collect pins for accomplishing different things in the game. You’ll be able to trade pins with some characters and buy some others - and there’s another kind of collectible I’m not quite ready to talk about, that I think will be really fun for Disney fans especially.

NoE: You’ve mentioned previously that there are a lot of Disney references in the game: some really obvious, but also hidden ones too. Can you tell us a little more about that?

WS: Well, we aren’t hiding them so much, there are hidden Mickey Mouses if you look around, just like there are in Disneyland! In fact I told the environment artists: “Any time you get the chance to, put a hidden Mickey somewhere! I don’t even want to know where - because I want to find them!”

There are plenty of hidden Mickey Mouses and there’ll be lots of other things that might not be quite as familiar, such as the Swiss Family Robinson Treehouse, or Enchanted Tiki Room, which we included the way it was years ago… Everything in the game, with very few exceptions, is inspired by something real.

Earlier on in the project, one of the artists showed me some concept art for a barrel, I asked him where the barrel came from - and he told me he’d made it up. So I made the artist go back and find barrels in Disney movies or from the park, so even little things like that are inspired by real things.

Some of them are pretty obscure - I’m hoping that Disney fans who may not even think about playing games will play the “Where did that come from?” game as they’re watching other people play.

NoE: Epic Mickey is quite a postmodern Disney story, a little like the movie “Enchanted”. Did that new take on the traditional fairy tale play a part in the development of Disney Epic Mickey?

WS: When I saw Enchanted I had been working on Disney Epic Mickey for a while. I went to see it with my wife and it was - I don’t want to say life changing, but - more a vindication of everything I was trying to do.

Looking around the movie theatre, there were all these different groups, ages and types of people - and we were all enjoying this movie. That was when I kind of got the “entertainment for families” idea. I mean, I’ve heard so many people at Disney say it: “We don’t make games, movies or entertainment for a specific person or group: we make entertainment for everybody.”

Enchanted was eye-opening for me, there’s something for everyone there and I hope that Disney Epic Mickey has the same kind of appeal. With Enchanted you could tell they were poking fun, but from a place of love; while we’re not trying to poke fun, I hope we come from a place of love. Even folks at my studio who weren’t hardcore Disney fans when they started, are now!

NoE: What kind of Mickey Mouse will the world be left with after Disney Epic Mickey?

WS: Well, the world will be left with a lot of Mickeys, all of whom share a core set of values and characteristics.

The Mickey Mouse at the theme park is not exactly the same as the one on Mickey Mouse Clubhouse, he’s not the same as the Mickey in comic books. None of those Mickey Mouses are exactly the same as the Mickey in Disney Epic Mickey. But what they all share is a core, the heart of the character stays the same.

The guy is smart, he’s resourceful, he’s a friend to everyone, he’s loyal and never gives up. He’s enthusiastic (sometimes to the point of getting himself in trouble because he gets overly enthusiastic) and he is a mischievous little mouse.

I think all of those characteristics are embodied in all of the Mickeys and that’s the important thing. It’s what has allowed Mickey Mouse to remain Mickey Mouse and to be the most successful and popular cartoon star in the world for 80 years.

Disney started it and everybody respected what it is that makes Mickey Mouse special - no one ever violated that. There’s never been a moment where I wanted to mess with Mickey - it’s like you’ve got to be respectful to the character and find the heart of it. If we’ve succeeded, the game will succeed and if we haven’t then we’ll try again. But I think we’re there.

NoE: Finally, what do you think about the Nintendo 3DS?

WS: At E3, as I was watching the Nintendo 3DS part of the press conference my jaw got progressively closer and closer to the ground - mid way through I just started standing up and cheering!

3D? Very cool. Glasses-free 3D? Thank you! And then it’s a 3D camera and you can watch 3D movies without glasses! I knew nothing about that stuff and at that point I was going, “I want the first one off the line, I want to own this now.” It’s amazing, I mean, how can such things be? It’s a little miracle.

Disney has a culture of innovation that goes back 80 years and Nintendo has a culture of innovation. The two companies need to be working together, because their corporate cultures are so similar - and that is instantly apparent in the Nintendo 3DS.

NoE: Warren Spector, thank you very much for your time!

Disney Epic Mickey will be in shops from the 26th of November, only for Wii.