aspro said:^Good reminders Raven, but those still don't translate to many people who buy games these days. Mickey had a good Game &Watch game, "Mickey and Donald" -- it was awesome. And the NES one where you are in a haunted house was actually pretty advanced as well -- and controlled well. But again, does anyone care/ know who Mickey is?
Big blindspot for me is Japan. I bet they gobble Mickey up over there. Right there they could sell millions (I bet).
In all fairness I think you may not be the targeted audience that Disney has been going after with Mickey over the last few years. They've really gone after a younger demographic with him over the past 10 years. As a parent of a 10 year old and a 3 year old I haven't gone a day without seeing him in a very very long time. This is why I think if Disney tries to market to parents of kids under the age of 12 they'll have a hit just with that.
That being said, they've done a good job of integrating him into a more adult audience as well. He's not a major pop icon because he doesn't have a mega budget movie out in theaters. It's not like Avatar crap that's everywhere. But trust me it's not hard to find anything with Mickey on it. Take 30 seconds and you'll find just about anything you want. Bottom line is Mickey is still the icon of the single most visited theme park in the world. That's always going to be a big deal.
And yes practically everything Disney is huge in Japan (Stitch might actually be their most popular character these days though). To single out another popular Disney franchise that's popular in Japan, the Nightmare Before Christmas is also huge over there. So now take Mickey and put him into a game with Tim Burtonesque visuals and I think you've got an instant hit over there.
One other thing to mention about Mickey is the way that Disney kind of promotes him. This is a character that's been around for over 80 years, and in that time Disney learned not to over saturate the public with him. So his popularity comes and goes in cycles of about 5 to 8 year periods, and then they pull back on him and push another character heavily. During the 90's Winnie the Pooh had a huge push and then that got pulled back. For a good part of the 2000's Stitch had a really big push which ended a couple years ago.
Right now Mickey is back in the early to middle stages of one of those cycles right now. They started to relaunch him again around 2007. He had a couple DVDs, has cartoons again on the Disney Channel, his merchandise at the theme parks is up, and now that's building up to Epic Mickey. As I think about it, the game could end up being bigger than I originally thought... going to need to watch carefully where they go with it over the next 10 months or so.
aspro said:gamingeek said:...
Force Unleashed, despite being the ugly stepsister of a 7/10 HD game still sold over 1.5 million on Wii.
Phantasia -- and when the fuck was that? Like, 1970 or something?
1940
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Tell me to get back to rewriting this site so it's not horrible on mobileYodariquo said:aspro said:gamingeek said:...
Force Unleashed, despite being the ugly stepsister of a 7/10 HD game still sold over 1.5 million on Wii.
Phantasia -- and when the fuck was that? Like, 1970 or something?
1940
It has been rereleased into theaters several times since then, and they did the whole Fantastia 2000 back in 2000, which did feature the original Sorceror's Apprentice segment with Mickey.
robio said:
It has been rereleased into theaters several times since then, and they did the whole Fantastia 2000 back in 2000, which did feature the original Sorceror's Apprentice segment with Mickey.
I own the DVD. 
Ravenprose said:robio said:
It has been rereleased into theaters several times since then, and they did the whole Fantastia 2000 back in 2000, which did feature the original Sorceror's Apprentice segment with Mickey.
I own the DVD.
Good for you. Wish I did. It got discontinued about 6 - 7 years ago.
robio said:One other thing to mention about Mickey is the way that Disney kind of promotes him. This is a character that's been around for over 80 years, and in that time Disney learned not to over saturate the public with him.
This is why I don't want to write it off - it's Disney. They have some promotional skills and ip's with mass market appeal. And when this game was announced, it was in lots of non-gaming media.
robio said:During the 90's Winnie the Pooh had a huge push and then that got pulled back. For a good part of the 2000's Stitch had a really big push which ended a couple years ago.
heh - we had an annual winnie the pooh festival for a few years around 2000 that Disney was putting cash towards. They can really push stuff if they want to.
Listen to Iced Earth and play Doom
robio said:aspro said:^Good reminders Raven, but those still don't translate to many people who buy games these days. Mickey had a good Game &Watch game, "Mickey and Donald" -- it was awesome. And the NES one where you are in a haunted house was actually pretty advanced as well -- and controlled well. But again, does anyone care/ know who Mickey is?
Big blindspot for me is Japan. I bet they gobble Mickey up over there. Right there they could sell millions (I bet).
In all fairness I think you may not be the targeted audience that Disney has been going after with Mickey over the last few years. They've really gone after a younger demographic with him over the past 10 years. As a parent of a 10 year old and a 3 year old I haven't gone a day without seeing him in a very very long time. This is why I think if Disney tries to market to parents of kids under the age of 12 they'll have a hit just with that.
That being said, they've done a good job of integrating him into a more adult audience as well. He's not a major pop icon because he doesn't have a mega budget movie out in theaters. It's not like Avatar crap that's everywhere. But trust me it's not hard to find anything with Mickey on it. Take 30 seconds and you'll find just about anything you want. Bottom line is Mickey is still the icon of the single most visited theme park in the world. That's always going to be a big deal.
And yes practically everything Disney is huge in Japan (Stitch might actually be their most popular character these days though). To single out another popular Disney franchise that's popular in Japan, the Nightmare Before Christmas is also huge over there. So now take Mickey and put him into a game with Tim Burtonesque visuals and I think you've got an instant hit over there.
Yeah, big in Japan for sure. And thanks for the info on the Disney marketing to kids -- I had no idea.
aspro said:And thanks for the info on the Disney marketing to kids -- I had no idea.
Hey you can be smarmy with me all you want, but you're the one that asked if a billion dollar a year icon is culturally relevant.
robio said:aspro said:And thanks for the info on the Disney marketing to kids -- I had no idea.Hey you can be smarmy with me all you want, but you're the one that asked if a billion dollar a year icon is culturally relevant.
I wasn't being smarmy, that was an authentic statement. I had no idea. I thought it was a dead franchise.
angrymonkey said:China Approves Disney Theme Park in ShanghaiDisney is still huge. And Mickey is their mascot. I wouldn't say he's dead - only sleeping.
That's awesome news and gives me some comfort. No matter how far in debt we get to China ultimately the US will still rule the world thanks to Disney, McDonalds, and Coca Cola.
robio said:angrymonkey said:China Approves Disney Theme Park in ShanghaiDisney is still huge. And Mickey is their mascot. I wouldn't say he's dead - only sleeping.That's awesome news and gives me some comfort. No matter how far in debt we get to China ultimately the US will still rule the world thanks to Disney, McDonalds, and Coca Cola.
angrymonkey said:Ah, what a legacy.Beats that boring old paper, printing, gunpowder, noodle, salt, silk crap they came up with.
angrymonkey said:Ah, what a legacy.Beats that boring old paper, printing, gunpowder, noodle, salt, silk crap they came up with.
How much of that do we still use. Come on. 
Dvader said:angrymonkey said:Ah, what a legacy.Beats that boring old paper, printing, gunpowder, noodle, salt, silk crap they came up with.How much of that do we still use. Come on.
shit, you're right.
^Good reminders Raven, but those still don't translate to many people who buy games these days. Mickey had a good Game &Watch game, "Mickey and Donald" -- it was awesome. And the NES one where you are in a haunted house was actually pretty advanced as well -- and controlled well. But again, does anyone care/ know who Mickey is?
Big blindspot for me is Japan. I bet they gobble Mickey up over there. Right there they could sell millions (I bet).