Original Artwork for Epic Mickey Will Not Be Used

How far can one go when reinventing something so ubiquitous as Disney cartoon characters? That's just one of the problems faced by Warren Spector, of Deus Ex fame, and his Junction Team development outfit as they work on Epic Mickey, the Nintendo Wii game set to star a host of characters from the back catalog of the company. And often the desire for reinvention will hit hard on the corporate need to keep things recognizable for the general public.

In an interview with 1UP, Spector has said that there is a need to reconcile his view with that of the videogame that comes down from Disney.

Spector stated that “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.”

It's an interesting choice to attempt to always push the line, offering a design that crosses certain lines only to see whether the publisher is willing to actually accept it or whether a negotiation process on the final version is set to follow.

And some of the initial art, which can be seen attached to this article, really seems too disturbing for Epic Mickey, a Disney Nintendo Wii title that will presumably be bought by parents for their children as Christmas 2010 approaches. Still, the creepy mouse-like mecha walker seen earlier in the year is something that Epic Mickey should keep.