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Video Game / Mickey Mousecapade

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Mickey Mousecapade, or Mickey Mouse: Adventures in Wonderland as it was titled in Japanese, is the earliest known Disney-based video game to be released on the Nintendo Entertainment System, and one of the few not developed by Capcom (although they did publish its American release, it was developed by Hudson Soft). The game follows Mickey and Minnie Mouse as they venture through Wonderland to find their mystery friend, who is being held captive by the evil Queen of Hearts Maleficent. Along the way, though, a lot of the creatures they encounter have decided for no apparent reason that the mice need to be exterminated, so Mickey and Minnie have to fight these creatures off as they look for their friend.

In gameplay terms, the game is a fairly standard side-scrolling platformer, with Mickey and Minnie navigating jumping puzzles, collecting keys to unlock doors and shooting nondescript "stars" at enemies. This might have been a surprise to any parents who were hoping for something less violence-intensive than, say, Super Mario Bros. Minnie lagged slightly behind Mickey, much like the second Ice Climber in the Super Smash Bros. series, and could occasionally be kidnapped by a random bird, forcing Mickey to get her back.


Tropes:

  • Adaptational Villainy: In the North American version, both Witch Hazel and the Crocodile from Peter Pan are bosses.
  • Bears Are Bad News: The bear enemies in the Woods level (the Fall and Winter sections), in the American release only. They take away a large chunk of your health bar and can easily and instantly kill you if your health is low enough.
  • Big Bad: Maleficent in the North American version, Queen of Hearts in the Japanese version.
  • Bizarrchitecture: The Palace in the fifth and final level.
  • The Cameo: In the Japanese version there are hidden items shaped like Donald Duck's head that restore all of Mickey's health.
  • Climax Boss: Pete (North American version) and Captain Hook (Japanese version), being the fourth out of five bosses and appearing in the shortest level in the game. The former even appears on the North American box art.
  • Co-Op Multiplayer: Predating Sonic the Hedgehog 2 by over five years, plugging a controller into player 2 will allow another player to play Minnie, selective invulnerability and all.
  • Cultural Translation: Capcom changed most of the items and enemies in the North American version.
  • Degraded Boss: You'll fight the Stage 4 boss again in Stage 5 as the level's mid-boss.
  • Dolled-Up Installment: A variation: The game itself was already a Mickey game, but many changes were made for the localization, most notably in the enemies. Both versions make use of Disney villains for bosses but not one of them is present in both versions. For example, the Cheshire Cat from Alice in Wonderland is the first boss in the Japanese version, but in the North American version he was replaced by Witch Hazel. Many Disney characters who appear as regular foes in the Japanese version were also replaced in the North American version by other Disney baddies. The Japanese version was based, first and foremost, on Alice in Wonderland and most references about Disney on this version derive from the same movie, although some references to Peter Pan are also made, such as having Captain Hook as the fourth boss in the game, in which the level is themed to a pirate ship. The North American localization used a more varied formula, with enemies coming from such Disney films as The Jungle Book (1967) (the boss of the third level is Kaa) and Sleeping Beauty (the final boss is Maleficent). Also, in the North American version, the boss of the pirate ship level is a pirate version of Pete.
  • Four-Seasons Level: The maze-like Woods level has seasonal variations, where walking through a doorway in a tree would change from spring to summer, fall, and winter, or backwards.
  • Gameplay Ally Immortality: Minnie can't get hurt by the normal enemies or the bosses' projectiles, so if you gather her stars at the beginning, she becomes very useful against the Cheshire Cat Witch Hazel and Captain Hook Pete. This said, if she falls down a pitfall and Mickey doesn't, it's still a loss of a life.
  • Gangplank Galleon: The fourth level, themed to a pirate ship.
  • Giant Wall of Watery Doom: The ocean waves in the Ocean level can be hard to dodge in parts of the level where many waves occur in a short time, and they will take a huge chunk of your health if they hit you.
  • Guide Dang It!: The Winter section of the Woods. The hidden door to the final section is in the tree right at the start, but won't open until you go all the way through and loop back to the start, so many players would think there is no door there at all and eventually admit defeat and consult the helpline after shooting every other tree to no avail.
  • Invincibility Power-Up: In most stages you may be lucky enough to find a golden fairy that will provide you with invincibility and you'll be able to kill any enemy on contact. However, if you reach the location where the boss is while the fairy is still with you, she will automatically fly away, so you can't perform a one-hit kill on the level's boss.
  • Luck-Based Mission: If Minnie gets kidnapped in the first or in the fifth level, you need to look for the pink key that will lead to the location where you can free her. For you to do so, you have to choose between four golden Minnie statues, and if you choose the wrong one, you'll have to find another pink key and try again. And there's no way to tell which golden Minnie statue you have to touch to free her.
  • Making a Splash: The second boss will attack you with bubbles.
  • Never Smile at a Crocodile: Tick Tock is a boss.
  • Nintendo Hard: For a game that is aimed for children, it is extremely difficult. There's a lot of precise platforming in the second level that if you miss a jump, you're dead. That's not even accounting for the maze-like final level where you can end up with an unwinnable situation if you forget the key.
  • No Fair Cheating: There's a level start code that allows the player to skip to any level that they like. You won't see the ending if you do, or be able to have Minnie fight against enemies.
  • No One Gets Left Behind: Enforced. If Minnie gets kidnapped in the first level, you won't be able to leave the house until you rescue her.
  • One-Hit Kill: All the bosses do this to you. There's also an enemy in Stage 5 who will kill you in one hit if you run into him that guards the door to the final boss.
  • Respawning Enemies: This gets especially cruel on levels where you have to backtrack. Even the instant-death-on-contact minibosses respawned, which meant that you could get stuck in an Unwinnable situation if you missed the key in the castle.
  • Super Drowning Skills: If either Mickey or Minnie fall into the water in the second level, they instantly drown.
  • Waltz on Water: The theme for the second level, "The Ocean," is a sweeping 8-bit waltz tune. Slightly unusually for this trope, the level involves jumping across islands above the water rather than swimming in it.
  • A Winner Is You: The ending is just Mickey, Minnie and Alice together and then the word "End" is featured. It then resets to the title screen.

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