Original Epic Mickey Pitch Video Has Been Uncovered

Highlights

• Epic Mickey Rebrushed is an HD remake of the original game, featuring Mickey Mouse’s adventures in the wasteland.
• The recently uncovered pitch video shows a different take on the original game’s story and gameplay mechanics.
• Mickey’s ink powers in the pitch video differ from the final game, showcasing unique abilities like ink surfing and ink trampolines.

Ahead of Disney Epic Mickey: Rebrushed‘s impending release, the original pitch video for the game has been uncovered and posted online. Disney Epic Mickey: Rebrushed is an HD remake of the 2010 original Wii game, developed by Purple Lamp and published by THQ Nordic.

The story of the original Epic Mickey focuses on Mickey Mouse and his adventures in the wasteland, a land of forgotten Disney characters. Mickey enters the workshop of Yen Sid and messes around with his magic paintbrush, accidentally creating a giant monster in the process, the Blot. Mickey tries to clean up his own mess but accidentally makes things worse, later being abducted into the wasteland itself. From there, Mickey has to fight off the various monsters that have been created by the Blot, using the power of the magic paintbrush, which uses paint and paint thinner. While most of the concepts have been retained in the final game, the recently uncovered pitch video shows how things could have gone in a different direction.

The video was first posted by Thomas Heimann on DeviantArt earlier this past January, who helped create the concept and original cinematic pitch, and was archived online by fans like the Epic Mickey Wiki Twitter account. The video is very similar to Epic Mickey‘s opening cinematic, though there are a few differences, most notably the look of the characters. In this video, a voice (most likely the Mad Doctor) narrates how Mickey had fought the Phantom Blot as they fell into the wasteland, and that they need Mickey’s ink to survive.

How Mickey’s Ink Powers Differ in Epic Mickey’s Pitch Video

This video also showcased how Mickey utilized paint as a weapon in this original version, due to the Phantom Blot’s powers mingling with his physiology. Most notably, Mickey uses ink from his own body, rather than a paintbrush like in the final game. Some of these abilities include surfing atop ink, creating ink trampolines, gliding by turning his arms into ink parachutes, using ink to create weapons like a ray gun, and even creating a huge tidal wave of ink, though at the cost of expending his stamina. The video ends with Mickey freeing himself before spraying the screen with ink, the Mad Doctor warning Oswald to run.

While bits and pieces of Epic Mickey‘s original concept and pitch video have been shared before, this is the first time that the full video, including its voice acting, has been shared online. Heimann noted that he was responsible for directing and animating the shot of Mickey going down the hole, with fellow animators Jessie Slate and Mike Boyce contributing to the video as well. With Disney Epic Mickey: Rebrushed‘s release date on the horizon, this video is a fun look into what could have been.