Welcome to another edition of Playing With Power. The review article that looks at all things Nintendo. I said before in a previous edition of Playing With Power that Disney and Capcom were perhaps one of the greatest pairings back in the age of the great gray box. This powerhouse alliance led to some of the best video games ever made. Not just for the NES, but of all time. But was this a pairing that was strong from the start? Or was the first game under the Disney/Capcom banner a bomb? And would it really be Capcom to blame? Well, that’s what we’re here to find out.
YEAR OF RELEASE: 1988
PUBLISHER: Capcom/Hudson Soft
GENRE: Platformer
In the early years of the NES, Disney had yet to find a company to stick with when it came to publishing video games for them. Among the many companies like Kemko and LJN, one of the companies they would align with was Hudson Soft. Hudson is perhaps best known in that era for the Adventure Island and Bomberman games. Disney would align with them to make a video game game starring Mickey and Minnie Mouse. And in 1987, Mickey Mouse: Fushigi no Daiboken, or Mickey’s Adventure in Wonderland was released for the Famicom. However, before the game would be released for the NES, Disney would align with another company for the rest of the NES era. That company was of course Capcom.
So, what did that mean for Hudson’s Mickey game? Well, Capcom would acquire the rights to publish the North American version. However, with those rights came plenty of changes and edits to the NES version. Some of which would make the game seem a lot more nonsensical than it already was. And so, in 1988 the game, now dubbed Mickey Mousecapade, would be released worldwide for the NES, and sold fairly well, despite some heavy criticism. But was this criticism justified?
COVER STORY
I do like the cover art for the game depicting Mickey and Minnie facing off with Pete on his pirate ship in that classic Disney art style that we all know and love. The cover is filled with enough excitement and action to catch anyone’s eye and draw anyone in. I do have one issue with the footprints on the side of the ship, and why they’re there. Did the two try running up the side? and why are their shoes that dirty that it would make a mess on the side of the boat? Very mild gripe, but still very nice box art.
STORY
According to the manual, Mickey and Minnie decide to go see their “mystery friend”. But to do that would require that the two traverse through fun houses, evil forests, and even a pirate ship to eventually meet up with this friend of mystery.
While that makes little sense in the US version, the Famicom version makes a little more sense, bust still not much. Mickey and Minnie venture through Wonderland in order to save Alice from the evil Queen of Hearts and her minions. why Mickey and Minnie are in Wonderland, how they know Alice, or even why the Queen hasn’t just “offed with her head” (that sounds a bit too dirty) is beyond me. But then again, this is the NES age, and rarely did the story matter.
GAMEPLAY
Mickey Mousecapade is your average platformer game on the NES starring Mickey and Minnie Mouse. you control both Mickey and Minnie simultaneously as you head through five levels defeating enemies and bosses as you head off to save your “mystery friend”. You move both mice with the D-Pad, pressing A to jump, and B to fire your star weapon if you have it. You get the star weapon through treasure chests in the first level of the game. Although one downside is that sometimes the chests will contain enemies that will damage you. That means that you have to keep going in and out of the room, trying the chest until you get your weapon. Trust me, this is only one of the many annoying things about this game. You can get two in the first level. One for Mickey, and the other for Minnie. Both are a must have to have any hopes in advancing through the game.
You will play through five levels. Each of which try to add something new and different, although not too well. The first level is the Fun House, which has you try and traverse through diffrent rooms looking for keys and stars to make the exit. The Ocean is a fairly quick side scrolling level. The forest is a very annoying tree maze. Then there’s the pirate ship which is, and I am not joking here, a mere four screens long. And finally there’s the castle where you’ll face the Queen of.., of wait, never mind. The NES version has the final boss as Maleficent. Why did Maleficent kidnap Alice? Hell if I know.
You do have a heath bar, but the damage you can take feels very random. Sometimes enemies will do perhaps two hits of damage with one attack, and sometimes they can take half your health away. Also, I find that the health bar’s size seems to vary in each level from smaller to larger. Same situation with the enemies. Sometimes they can only take a couple hits to kit, and then there are occasions where they’re practically impervious to your attacks. So, in a nutshell, damage balancing is absolutely broken in this game.
There are items you can find in the game that are hidden in either windows or just thin air. And again, just like the enemies sometimes it can take a couple hits to open the items, sometimes practically forever. Doesn’t help that you have to jump to hit them, and the jumping in this game is broken beyond compare. The items within vary from cakes that will restore a random amount of health, blue diamonds that can restore either destroy all enemies on screen or give you extra points, purple diamonds that can give you full health, and even extra lives. There’s also the fairy from Adventure Island (not Tinkerbell like some believe), that will give you invincibility for a short period of time. However, there is one item you have to be cautious about getting. That being a bird that will snatch Minnie away. This means that even if you beat the boss of the stage, you can’t finish the level without her. So you’ll have to search until you find a hidden key that will take you to a bonus area where you have to find Minnie hidden inside one of several statues.
Speaking of Minnie, it’s now time to talk about the game’s ultimate flaw. That of course being Minnie as your partner. She moves alongside you at all times, can’t take any damage, and can fire with you if you have the star. But other than that she’s broken completely. Sometimes she’ll get caught in areas, or either end up too high above or below you, and trying to get her back in place can be a pain. This can be an especially major hassle in the Castle level which has plenty of platforms that need jumping over. You have to make sure that when you jump with her that both of you land perfectly, otherwise she can end up falling to the ground, lagging her too far behind to get the jump right, so you have to start all over again. Then of course another issue is in levels with open pits (The Ocean and Forest levels), sometimes Minnie will lag too far behind you, and should she fall in the pit (which can be quite common), Mickey will die as well, even if he successfully touched land. But considering how broken the jumping is, this just adds to what is already a major problem.
This is my ultimate killing issue with Mickey Mousecapade. There is absolutely no need for Minnie. Or at least any reason for the game to make both characters simultaneously controlled. Better decisions would have been to either choose one of the characters from the beginning of the game (with the possibility of being able to switch characters on the fly), or have two player co-op.
The game’s bosses are annoying too. They aren’t difficult, but most will fire never ending streams of attacks that can be almost impossible to time. Especially Peg Leg Pete, who fires dozens of knives at a time in random areas, making it near impossible to get through without taking some serious damage. And again, like the other enemies, the amount of hits required to defeat them feels very random.
POWER TIP
While Minnie is a massive detriment to the game, she can come in handy with two of the game’s bosses. In both the fun house and pirate ship levels, time your jump so that when only Minnie is touching the ladder, hold up. Minnie will be the only one on the top level to face either Witchy Poo, or Pete. Since Minnie can’t take damage, you can get up close and fire as much as possible to beat the bosses with far less hassle. Provided of course that you picked up both stars from the Fun House level that is. If not, get ready for pain.
GRAPHICS
The graphics are average at best. Nothing looks too terrible, but there really isn’t anything that will leave you in awe. All the Disney characters look like who they should, and are well designed., but the rest of the enemies are very bland and average looking, and most don’t fit the Disney feel of the game. It’s also interesting to note that a lot of the characters were changed from the original game. The original boss of the Fun House was the Cheshire Cat, and of course, the Queen of hearts was replaced by Maleficent.
MUSIC
The game does have a decent soundtrack. Even a few themes like the Fun House and Forest levels that will be caught in your head for quite a long time. There really isn’t too much to really mention on this end.
OVERALL THOUGHTS
Mickey Mousecapade is just an all around terrible game. While decent in the graphics and sound department, everything else is just broken beyond saving. Awful control and jumping, terrible damage balance, and one of the most annoying gimmicks in any game ever. This is definitely not how one would hope Capcom’s Disney debut would turn out. But to be honest, this one I don’t blame Capcom for (well maybe for the character changes), but most of the gameplay problems are more on Hudson Soft’s end.
Similar to Snoopy’s Silly Sports Spectacular, this is another game I played a lot as a kid, and back then I didn’t hate it. But just like Snoopy, once you let the nostalgia wear off, you really see just what’s wrong with the game. If you’re a game collector, or a Disney fan, I’d say pick it up. But if you aren’t, I would suggest that it’s best to just avoid this mouse turd. It’s once escapade that you don’t want to embark on.
RATING: Thumbs Down