Epic Mickey 2: The Power of Two Review

Thanks to the game’s cooperative focus, as reiterated by the title, Oswald plays a crucial role in the proceedings. It’s too bad, then, that he’s often rather incapable of performing his tasks. In a huge and glaring omission, there is no way to play as Oswald, unless you have a second person playing. There is no ability to switch to Oswald from Mickey, or even just play as him from the start. So instead, you’re stuck with a very simple and often dumb AI partner who can only be interacted with by calling him over. Because almost all of the game’s puzzles are designed to require two players to solve, you’ll be at Oswald’s mercy every step of the way. The AI is very random at following your orders and won’t often do as asked. For better or worse, the game’s combat and puzzles are very easy and simple to execute, so you’ll often be able to get by on your own while the AI is wandering around the level or attacking the same enemy endlessly.

That combat and exploration revolves around two key mechanics of Mickey’s Brush – paint and thinner. Painting objects brings them to reality, while thinning makes them disappear. Similarly, attacking enemies has two varying effects. The game attempts to present the use of these two streams of goo as a moral choice system, but nothing comes of it. Progressing through the game, you learn additional abilities like object levitation and slowing down time. Sometimes you’ll need to paint or thinner a particular part of the environment for Oswald then to interact with – puzzles such as these can be confusing because AI will stand there, doing nothing, as you try to understand what needs to happen next.

The game’s often muddy visuals are root cause of this. Needing to paint a small object in the environment (like a pipe) is often hard to see because it’s transparent to begin with. The technical visuals leave a lot to be desired in Epic Mickey 2, which often looks like an upscaled Wii game. Aside from the excellent and thematic 2D platforming sections and the characters themselves, the rest of the game world lacks any trademark charm or visual Disney design. Similarly, the pre-rendered cinematics have a great visual flair to them, treading the line between classic and modern drawn animation – while in-engine cutscenes pull you back into the low resolution disappointment.

So for most players interested in Epic Mickey 2, it’s a mixed bag at best. It’s nice to see these characters in a video game for the first time in a long while, but this isn’t exactly a return to greatness. The game’s core design is suitable enough, but shortcomings appear at almost every turn –inability to switch to Oswald when playing solo, poor controls, lack of direction, and overly easy puzzles. Cutscenes outside of the engine shine, only to be crushed by the sub-par presentation of the rest of the game. Quite simply put, most of the game feels outdated, and may have stood a chance if it released many years ago. Not even the amusing and well-crafted songs of Mad Doctor can save Epic Mickey 2: The Power of Two from feeling like a very average adventure.