Video Game / Maui Mallard and the Lost City of Dread

The Lighthouse of Thieves

Following the release of Donald in Maui Mallard in 1995, there were plans to create a sequel titled Maui Mallard and the Lost City of Dread for the PlayStation and the Sega Saturn. It involved Maui Mallard and a friendly Muddrake called Mucky on a quest to prevent a mysterious villain from bathing in the Pool of Power found in the titular city. Stages would require switching between Maui and Mucky for puzzle solving like in The Lost Vikings and its documents also mention vehicle stages that would have shaken things up.

Unfortunately, on top of the original game's success already being hampered by indecisive businessmen, marketers and the development of The Lion King games, the Maui developers had to convert much of the work for the sequel into the Hercules licensed game and could not gain support to return to the project afterwards.

And so the Sequel Hook at the end of the first game never came true, and much less the plans for a third and final game called Maui Mallard 3: The Quackening. The following information is gathered from interviews with the developers, design documents and a small prototype that were made available to the public over two decades after the original game's release.

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This game would have contained examples of:

• Arbitrary Skepticism: In the game's script, a Running Gag is Maui doubting any fantastical legends he hears about despite everything that's going on around him. Come on, wasn't Donald in Maui Mallard supposed to be chapter 35 of his career?
• Big Bad: The man who's after the Pool of Power remains anonymous throughout the story until he's revealed to be an evil incarnation of Maui himself. The script simply refers to him as "The Villain".
• Bookends: Evil Ninja Maui in the Temple of Truth was intended as the first properly challenging boss in the game, closing what is referred as either the prologue or stage 2 in the development files. It would be revealed as the Big Bad in the end and faced in a grand final battle within the Temple of Deceit.
• Chuck Cunningham Syndrome: Donald in Maui Mallard ended with Herneae saying she'd take Maui on a journey he'd never forget... but neither she or anyone else from that game are even mentioned in the sequel.
• Celibate Hero: Pirate Girl LeCruel is lovestruck with Maui after he defeats her in a duel, but the protagonist is only ever interested in his current assignment.
• Dance Battler: The design documents make several vague mentions of Mucky using dances for elemental attacks that would aid Maui during puzzles and boss battles. Even the final battle would have involved this somehow.
• Darkness Equals Death: The Lost City of Dread is illuminated by the mystical Lighthouse of Thieves. In this stage, characters oscillate between being harmless villagers in the light and hostile demons in the darkness.
• Dramatic Unmask:
  • The final boss' identity is unknown throughout the game. He starts out as a cloaked sorcerer and destroying his cloak finally reveals him to be the Evil Counterpart to Maui seen early in the game.
  • In the ending, it is revealed the the hooded Ninja Masters are children "played" by Huey, Dewey and Louie.
• Everything's Deader with Zombies: One stage is set in a graveyard of airplanes filled with undead World War II soldiers.
• Gimmick Level: The design documents mention vehicle stages, mechanics that made use of 3D space and even rotating level design. Incidentally, Donald Duck No Mahou No Boushi on the Super Famicom, which was released in 1995 like the first Maui Mallard, did feature a rotating stage.
• MacGuffin: The goal of the story is the Pool of Power located in the Lost City of Dread that grants god-like power to whoever bathes in it. The Lantern of Kahn Kuhn is stolen and soon destroyed by the Big Bad after he uses it to learn the location of the Lost City, but Maui is barely able to reconstruct the relic and project a map with an X mark over the Lighthouse of Thieves.
• Noodle Incident: It is said that Maui installed security systems in the Mojo Mansion after an "incident", not making clear if this is about the area's appearance in the first game or something else.
• Not the Fall That Kills You…: One gag early on involves Mucky deploying a parachute upon falling from a great height but not having a second one for Maui, who fails to hold on to him. Maui collapses into a lake small enough that Mucky still hears him hitting solid ground as it happens. Later, Maui attempts to chase the Villain into the portal to the Lost City but the man disables it just in time, leading to Maui running right off the side of the Lighthouse of Thieves and into hard rock far below. He once again survives with only comical injuries.
• Pirate: On the way to the Lighthouse of Thieves, Maui and Mucky attempt to sneak past a pirate village made up of many ships stacked on top of each other. They then get dragged into a bizarre and violent competition for leadership of the village. Yes, Ninja Maui was meant to be playable at this point.
• Schmuck Bait: The final stage would've ended with a set of two gates — one leading into light and the other into darkness. Choosing the first one leads Maui and Mucky into a luau where they are robbed of their memories and start merrily dancing around. A giant demon then casually eats the Earth, uses a comet like a toothpick and quips "Way to go, Maui". The stage would restart from the beginning after this.
• Sequel Hook: The game would end with the three Ninja Masters warping both Maui and Mucky away to inform them about "The Quackening". An interview reveals the final game in the trilogy was supposed to be a Whole-Plot Reference to Highlander II: The Quickening involving a war between alternate universe versions of Maui.
  MAUI MALLARD 3:
  THE QUACKENING
  Prepare to face it.
• Sequential Boss: The Final Boss would've featured the Villain as a robed sorcerer until he was revealed to be an Evil Maui spirit. He would then fight with ninja skills similar to Maui's until finally diving into the Pool of Power and rising as a super spirit described as having a morphing body akin to the T1000.
• Slippy-Slidey Ice World: The early stages involve Maui making his way across an ice maze filled with cavemen. His Ninja self would be more sure-footed on slippery surfaces, but also ineffective against the cavemen.
• Tag Along Kid: A major feature of the sequel was the new sidekick Mucky, a Muddrake who admires Maui and tagged along as a second playable character who could help Maui progress through stages.
• Teamwork Puzzle Game: Players could switch to Mucky in certain levels to help Maui get past obstacles in a variety of ways if his Ninja transformation was unavailable.
• Token Heroic Orc: In the first game, the Muddrakes were a crazy warrior tribe who players could splatter into green goo without a care in the world. The sequel would have introduced a kid Muddrake named Mucky who happened to idolize Maui and made him the deuteragonist of the story.
• You Are Too Late: The Villain sets up the portal to the Lost City right as Maui arrives at the Lighthouse of Thieves and disposes of the Dark Crystal artifact that powers the portal before the hero can follow him. After LeCruel tells Maui about a missing Light Crystal that can open an alternate path into the Lost City, the detective makes a detour into the stomach of Moby Duck to find the thing.
• Unexpected Gameplay Change: The game's design documents describe multiple 3D vehicle stages, such as a jeep chase scene on a mountain road where the player was required to perform stunts by cartoonishly bouncing off guardrails just right without breaking them.
• Willfully Weak: The Villain arrives on the Pool of Power ahead of Maui and Mucky, but first decides to fight them in his base form to prove his own abilities.
• Womb Level: One of the last stages was set in the innards of a giant whale called Moby Duck. The design documents mention rotating level design and a boss battle against a sea monkey Queen taking place around the brain of the beast.