The first issue featuring the upcoming game arrives, with plenty of new details about the story, gameplay, music and more.

We’ve had all sorts of little bits of information over the course of this month about Epic Mickey for Wii from Game Informer, but now the first issue of their magazine focusing on the upcoming title has hit stores, and understandably they’ve kept much of the information for it.

One very interesting part is that Warren Spector—the guy now leading development—was opposed to the idea of making a Mickey game when Disney first approached him. He told them that he doesn’t do kids games, which can be easily seen from his history of Wing Commander, System Shock, Deus Ex and Thief games. He got swayed when they told him that they needed someone to ’reinvigorate’ Mickey, something he’d definitely liked to do with his games in general.

"I want him to be a hero... and I want to remind him that it’s okay to behave badly," is what Spector had to say about Mickey, and this time he is back with a very retro styling and quite a dark plot compared to normal. The story goes that the sorcerer Yen Sid (try reading it backwards) made a pen-and-paper world, alike to Walt Disney World, for all his long-forgotten creations. The rights for Oswald the Lucky Rabbit, one of his residents, had to actually be re-secured for the game.

One day, Mickey found a magic mirror which transported him to this world, but spilt some paint and thinner on it by mistake! He managed to escape before Yen Sid discovered what had happened, but his accident was certainly costly: the pen-and-paper world mutated into dark twisted version of the original. To make matters worse, the ever-evil Phantom Blot managed to take over the place. "The Phantom Blot has been a consistent villain since 1939," said Warren Spector on the character. "He’s just been lame." The Blot ends up causing poor Oswald to go into hiding and exile. "All he really wants is to be loved by Walt Disney," says Spector.

Much later, long after Mickey becomes successful in the normal world, he again travels through the mirror to see what has become of the other world; however, the Phantom Blot finds Mickey and takes him right into the evil world.

This is where the game begins; players will need to progress through gameplay with elements of platforming, exploration, and role-playing genres. With Wii Remote in hand, you’ll be to painting structures and destroying enemies with paint thinner. You can also find sketches throughout the game to use as powers by drawing them with your brush. You’re essentially creating and destroying the world as you progress; however, how you handle the situation is up to you. Mickey’s appearance and stance will apparently be altered as you go through the game depending on how you play it.

Great care has been taken throughout the design process, like Junction Point Studios taking hundreds of pictures at Disney World to get the general feeling of the park right and for ideas. The result is an art direction like "the bastard child of Tim Burton and Disney" according to Spector.

As you traverse the various messed up versions of Disney World rides, you’ll actually be going down into the inner-parts that power them; the ’It’s a Small World’ ride is an example of this. You’ll need to find E-Tickets to go on the rides, however, which are also used as a money supply for buying power-ups.

One intriguing element is that there are animatronic pieces of Donald Duck spread throughout one part of the game that Mickey can find to put him back together. Warren Spector explains, "Oswald is trying to recreate Mickey’s life, so he has the Mad Doctor build these animatronic versions of his buddies."

Even the hub system for travelling between worlds has some thought put into it to keep with the Disney theme. You go through movie screens that place you into a 2D world containing some of the mouse’s old cartoons. This world allows transitions between the different islands the game takes place on.

Lastly, composing the score for the game is Jim Dooley, who has worked with Hans Zimmer on many movie soundtracks in the past.

Source: GoNintendo