There are few characters as iconic as Walt Disney's Mickey Mouse; but if you're not the most hardcore of Disney fans, you may be surprised to learn that Mickey wasn't actually Walt's first creation. Hands up if you remember a cartoon rabbit called Oscar. Anyone? Chances are you won't have heard of the poor chap - unless you've played the first Epic Mickey game on the Wii, where, as one of the main characters, he presided over the land of Wasteland, a desolate place filled with all manner of Disney's creations that have been lost in time. It was a land full of abandoned theme park attractions, rejected characters and broken down buildings for you to explore - and alter how you see fit with strategic use of your paint brush and thinner. Your paint could be used to fill in the missing bits around town, make enemies friendlier and generally do good deeds, whereas the paint thinner could be put to work to erase parts of the environment completely, destroy enemies or other nefarious uses.
Painting in the house like a good little mouse.
And now, with some two years having passed since the first game landed on our shelves, Disney have announced that it's time for Epic Mickey to get a sequel. Latter this year, you'll be able to step into the iconic shoes of Mickey Mouse, with his now-partner Oswald in tow, and return to Wasteland in Disney's Epic Mickey 2: The Power Of Two - with, you guessed it - co-op! One player gets to be Mickey, with his staple paint brush and thinner, while the second player gets to be Oswald, who, for some reason can control electricity...
However, rather than being a straight platforming adventure like the first game, Epic Mickey 2 comes with something of an, er, unique twist. Even stranger than a rabbit with an electric personality, the game will apparently play out much like a musical. This means that at certain points in the adventure, the cast will burst out into specially written songs, and, depending on your actions in the rest of the game, the soundtrack will subtly change - probably going into minor keys if you're a bit of a baddie or something... Hopefully we're not required to sing along to the songs, seeing as our auditory assault would adversely affect our standing in Wasteland... And we wouldn't want that...
While the first Epic Mickey game was a Nintendo Wii exclusive, the sequel, Epic Mickey 2: The Power Of Two is set to appear on both the Xbox 360 and Playstation 3 (with Playstation Move support) too, as well as a special not-much-is-known-about-it 3DS version too. As before, we're imagining there'll be a load of quests to complete, Disney pins to collect and plenty of platforming - check out the trailer below, and don't forget to check back in the coming months for a release date and more info!
