Disney Epic Mickey: Rebrushed review for PC, Nintendo Switch, Xbox, PlayStation

It’s been a long time since I played Epic Mickey. I think I enjoyed it on the Wii way back when it first came out in 2010. I vaguely remember enjoying the concept of that first game but being less-than-enamored by its waggle controls, but really, by that point in the Wii’s lifespan, I probably felt that way about a lot of games. I know I felt lukewarm towards its sequel when that came out more than a decade ago, but I was still happy to see that the original game would be getting new life as a remake.

I’m even more happy now that I’ve played it. I don’t know exactly how faithful Epic Mickey: Rebrushed is to the original version, but I know that it shows that beneath the waggle controls, it turns out there was a pretty enjoyable 3D platformer waiting to be found.

This shouldn’t be totally shocking, of course. Even if Epic Mickey starred one of the most iconic characters ever created, it was still given a wide latitude in how it used Mickey Mouse, using him as a springboard to talk about Disney’s forgotten characters. On top of that, the original was created by the legendary Warren Spector, and even if he didn’t exactly make his name in platformers, he still clearly had great ideas for this game.

You can see those ideas much better here than you could on the Wii. Some of that, of course, is literal: being able to play the game on modern systems gives you a much better appreciation for the visuals than you could get on the Wii in 2010. Given that the game’s core mechanic is all about using paint and paint thinner to either build up or destroy the world, having crisp, clean graphics rather than the Wii and its 480p resolution is a huge step up.

Similarly, you’re not fighting with the camera here the way you had to on the original. Again, it’s not surprising if playing the game on a proper controller is a much smoother experience than playing the game with a Wiimote and a Nunchuk, but having the game remade and built around a controller was clearly for the better.

Still other things are easier to appreciate now than they may have been back in 2010. For starters, we’re a little more removed from the early- to mid-’00s 3D platforming golden age now than we were back then. Where back then Epic Mickey may have seemed like the last gasp of a genre that was no longer nearly as popular, having more distance from that era (not to mention a semi-revival of the genre) makes it much easier to appreciate Epic Mickey: Rebrushed on its own terms.

And, of course, there’s the world of Epic Mickey: Rebrushed itself that makes the game so worthwhile. The game is obviously full of collectibles that allow you to uncover more of its storied history, but you can also see the way classic Disney cartoons and worlds play into the game. Even when the game requires you to jump from 3D to 2D platforming, it does that in a way that recalls some of the earliest Disney cartoons.

Honestly, it’s kind of a relief that Epic Mickey: Rebrushed turned out so well. It’s not uncommon to have fond memories of an older game that turned out to wildly inaccurate in terms of remembering how good that older game actually was, so playing a remake like this, that shows Epic Mickey was just as fun as I remember it (even if it has an obvious new coat of paint), brings some a welcome feeling. Will Epic Mickey: Rebrushed garner the same kind of cult following that the Wii game got? Probably not – but hopefully that’s because being on more platforms allows more people to play this delightful game.

THQ Nordic provided us with a Disney Epic Mickey: Rebrushed PC code for review purposes.