Disney Epic Mickey: The Power of Illusion (3DS) Review

When Epic Mickey: Power of Illusion was announced, it was surprising to find it was a unique, separate game that would pay homage to some of the greatest Mickey games; the Illusion series. It was even more surprising to find that it featured full sprite work, and appeared to play exactly like older games in the franchise. My childhood was eager to give it a try. Then trailers came out, and it looked not only slow, but incredibly boring. Was this really a game coming out in 2012? I wasn’t sure. However, having played through the whole journey from beginning to end, I can safely say that I have walked away from Power of Illusion feeling happy and somewhat satisfied, but there is a lot to be desired from Mickey’s latest outing. Hopefully, after this review, it will be clear why.

Power of Illusion is, for the most part, a spiritual successor to the Illusion series that graced the SEGA home consoles all those years ago. It follows Mickey and his arch nemesis from this series, the evil witch Mizrabel, who has to be one of the most poorly named villains I’ve come across in a video game. Mizrabel was banished to “the wasteland” from the Epic Mickey series, and obviously wants to find a way out. Using the powers of her Castle of Illusion, Mizrabel drains the paint of all the popular Disney characters in the cartoon world, enslaves the minds of some of Disney’s worst villains and attempts to return to her castle and be evil, doing evil things….or something. Of course, Mizrabel has also kidnapped Minnie, so Mickey just has to get involved too, in the process banishing the witch back to where she came from and saving his lifelong love.

The greatest standout, in Power of Illusion is the presentation. Every single Disney character you know and love has been digitised into sprite form and animate beautifully, including some rather larger than life boss characters too. The environments are colourful and vibrant, lifting key assets from the films that they are based on while updating the Castle of Illusion’s generic looking locales with a fresh lick of (colourful) paint. There are moments when these two areas are blended together (they are only illusions, after all) and these moments look absolutely fantastic. Thankfully, the 3D functionality of the 3DS is used to full effect here, with many areas having depth in their background not only on two planes, but multiple ones. You’ll notice that care has been taken to separate several items in the background to give it a really layered look. Yes, it’s purely cosmetic, but it looks fantastic and is potentially one of the greatest looking games to grace the system.

The soundtrack is unfortunately, a little bit hit and miss. There were more times than not where I would turn down the volume just to make the game a little bit more bearable. Don’t get me wrong, the almost symphonic tunes that the game plays throughout your adventure give an epic feeling to the whole adventure, but they just get a little bit too repetitive at times. Additionally, every time Mickey jumps, he makes a noise that is quite possibly one of the most annoying sounds I’ve ever heard in a video game. I understand they can’t change Mickey’s voice now, but they could’ve maybe recorded different samples to use or at least make him grunt every now and then, rather than every time. Speaking of voice acting, it’s barely here, with most scenes being relegated to scrolling text boxes. This feels like a significant step back from its console cousin, Power of Two, and is more in line with the original game. The opening cutscene in particular is just overlong, boring and almost put me off the entire game. Thankfully what followed cooled my nerves.

At its crux, Epic Mickey: Power of Illusion is a basic platformer that takes subtle cues from the Metroid franchise and of course, the Illusion series from which it gains its name. You control Mickey, who is armed with the magical paintbrush, and must traverse through worlds to save characters who are captured by Mizrabel’s magic. Saved allies are stored in “the fortress”; a top down map area consisting of connected rooms where each of the allies “live” during Mickey’s journey. Once saved, allies may ask Mickey to do certain tasks or retrieve certain items from areas and doing so provides the player with upgrades and powers to use. These are entirely optional, and upgrades (though not the same ones as those retrieved through side quests) can also be purchased from certain characters as the player saves them.

Like the Illusion games that came before it, Mickey can jump on enemies and damage them (but only when pressing the jump button a second time while in the air – again, like the old games). Pressing the jump button as you hit the enemy triggers a greater jump that allows Mickey to reach greater heights, providing some rather inventive and cool platforming moments. While he can also spin attack enemies, Mickey can also use his trusty paintbrush for a variety of functions. He can shoot projectiles to take down enemies. The magic comes from the painting and stripping functions – on the bottom touchscreen items will appear as Mickey progresses through levels. Painting them by drawing over an outline allows Mickey to use these items. For example, players can strip a cannon to remove it, or paint it to ensure that it fires on enemies. The care you take while drawing your outlines on the touch screen is important, as the better you do the better quality item you craft. One example of this is that painting a poor platform mid-air will result in half of its surface being covered in spikes. Special powers can also be used, which allows Mickey to build a platform anywhere randomly, paint a rock to drop on top of enemies and fly (among others), however they are non-essential; the game is easily completed without them.

The general progression of the game is rather formulaic. Players travel through levels, defeat a boss character, and move on to the next world. One of the biggest concerns with players is the speed of the game – it looks incredibly slow in the trailers. While I was one of these people, I am happy to say that actually playing the game, it becomes a little bit harder to notice the speed of the game. It can only be assumed this is because you are pre-occupied with playing the game rather than passively watching a trailer. Mickey does get speed boosts following completion of paintings (and this happens quite often), however this reviewer is happy to report that it became a non-issue as gameplay began. The other big issue with the game is the pacing; namely the annoying need to continually pause the game, find an object, and paint it. To be fair, some of these moments are remedied by level design which essentially makes them skippable, but it still happens far too often and does break the pacing of the game much too often.

While Power of Illusion looks fantastic, plays satisfactorily and provides a whole lot of fan service to Disney fans, it’s definitely not without its problems. First of all, the game requires players to backtrack should they wish to complete quests for their allies. This is not only annoying, since you have to complete the level after securing an item, but because these items might not appear until after the quest is given. Worst of all is that there’s no proper way to track what you’re looking for (besides a vague icon on the level) or what quest you’re fulfilling. It just feels like pointless busy work to secure upgrades to what is already a rather manageable game without them, and artificially lengthen the game. They add little depth to the game’s story and the characters all blurt out the “OH I LEFT MY BRUSH BEHIND IN THAT FOREST BACK THERE” lines before saying “THANK YOU MICKEY YOU’RE MY HERO” and giving the player an upgrade to health or something similar. It feels shallow and it feels tacked on.

Easily the biggest disappointment with Power of Illusion is its longevity. The main storyline will take most players around four to six hours to complete, although 100% completion could easily stretch out to ten. Mind you, that ten would include copious amounts of backtracking through the same levels and shifting through mountains of inane dialog. The most disappointing thing with this game however, is the fact that it has been clearly rushed either by the publisher or the developer. There are four villains on the front of the box; each of which clearly correspond to a world within the game. There are however, only three worlds featured in the actual game. One of those worlds doesn’t even have a boss, and abruptly shifts the player to the game’s endgame. A quick bout of research reveals that the developer probably had to cut content, which is disappointing. Still what’s here is beautifully realised and works well, but it annoys that this could’ve been a fuller more substantial package.

Epic Mickey: Power of Illusion is a largely competent follow up to the classic Illusion series of old, but offers a few things that might annoy long-time fans of the franchise. Linear levels and an obvious removal of content, be it due to time constraints or budget, really bring this one down. Copious amounts of backtracking and pacing issues with the paintbrush do bring the game down, but for some reason I still love it. The risk-reward associated with the timed button pressing of jumps is oddly rewarding for me, and the colourful detail and effort gone into the game’s art is just too stunning to ignore. This is a bit of a bittersweet offering. It’s hard to decide whether you’ll like it or not, but any Disney fan or platformer fan should definitely give it a try. Just be warned; it ends rather abruptly. I can’t fault the developer, as they’ve clearly put heaps of effort into this title. It’s just a shame that a deadline might’ve prevented it from reaching its full potential.