Mickey Mouse tries to save the day in an innovative and sprawling platforming adventure.

Story

One evening as Mickey Mouse is reading a story book, he feels tired and falls asleep. When he later wakes up, he’s realizes that he’s been magically teleported to another place. He finds himself in a creepy village where a stranger tells him that a phantom has stolen the crystal that protected the village from evil magic. The stranger then asks Mickey to retrieve the stolen crystal from the phantom, and he agrees to help for the greater good.

The Game

Land of Illusion starring Mickey Mouse is a sequel to the Sega Mega Drive game “Castle of Illusion starring Mickey Mouse”. This one builds on a similar formula – that is to say the very basics of a typical side scrolling platform game where you run and jump your way through a wide variety of environments. You play as Mickey Mouse, and he can defeat enemies by crushing them with his buttocks (weird, I know) or throwing various objects at them. On top of that, the game does have some interesting features added to it to keep things fresh and innovative. For example, there’s an exploration aspect where sometimes the screen can scroll vertically to reveal new areas, and there are numerous doors that can take you to hidden rooms. The game also has many puzzles like moving blocks from one location to another to be able to reach your goal.

The game starts you off with just two “power stars” which means that you can take two hits before you die. Throughout the levels you’ll find cakes of various sizes that will replenish your health. Also, extra power stars can be collected to increase the amount of damage you can withstand. With that being said, make no mistake about the difficulty level of this game. It’s very punishing as it forces you to replay much of the level when you happen to die – and the various traps you need to navigate through are sometimes plain evil.

Content

This Disney themed platforming adventure consists of 16 large stages, making it a pretty substantial undertaking, especially for casual play. Between levels you’ll get to see the world map with the various locations you need to go through to reach the phantom’s castle, that is said to be somewhere in the clouds. You’re free to replay any levels you have previously completed, and that means that you can backtrack to collect missed bonuses. Many times you’ll encounter bonus areas that you can’t reach for the time being. But in a later level you may find something that would allow you to reach it, and that’s when backtracking makes sense.

Even more innovative is the fact that levels can change their layout as the story unravels. This means that it can be a good idea to explore an already completed level in its new state after you’ve triggered an event that would alter the state of that stage.

There’s a wide range of different enemies you’ll encounter. Watch out for snakes hiding in the bushes, dragons, and angry fish. But if you get into the game your biggest problem will probably be the sometimes illogical puzzles.

Other innovative aspects of this game involves triggers that make the level scroll in another direction, and running back through the same stage once you’ve retrieved an important key at the other end. Simple things like these can really uplift a simple concept like the standard platform game, and this is living proof of it.

Controls

For the most part, Mickey Mouse is a sheer joy to control with the gamepad. He generally plays along with your intended movements, but it will take some time to get used to the controls at first. The game is also very well animated as Mickey Mouse skids along the scenery, and if standing too close to an edge, he’ll show it by making a cartoonish-almost-falling animation.

Picking up objects is the move that causes the most problems, as it does not always seem to register as it should in the game. You’ll also need to train an eye for how far Mickey can throw various objects; there’s a difference between how far he can throw a standard block of rock and a vase that can be used to stand on, for example.

The game also has some environmental effects to take into consideration. There are whirlwinds that can capture Mickey and when standing on a slope, you need to be careful not to slide down. When swimming under water you need to keep an eye on the air-gauge to avoid drowning.

As if the game wasn’t hard as it is with the precision needed to make some of the jumps, cruel traps, puzzles and secrets there’s also some dubious respawning of the enemies. More often than not, they’ll reappear right back at their original positions when you’ve left the screen where they originally appeared. If you forget about this for even a second, chances are that you’ll rush into something nasty – and death comes swiftly!

The game has a strange quirk regarding the invincibility shield after taking a hit – it’s extremely brief, lasting less than a second, and you often end up taking multiple hits in succession because of it.

Graphics

The graphics in Land of Illusion is very much satisfactory. It’s colorful, and features a great level of detail overall. The animations, as mentioned are also well done and joyful to behold. It very much is in line with Disney’s famous cartoons, but translated into glorious 8-bit graphics. It all contributes to making the game a very smooth experience, and it all just works well. As you explore the various environments, you’re also guaranteed great variation in the backgrounds and scenery.

Sound

The various stages feature different music, but sadly there aren’t many (if any) memorable songs here. A cherry jingle is played when you complete a stage, and the end-of-stage bosses have typical boss music. The sound effects are very standard for the Sega Master System. It works even though it’s quite dull in the long run.

Summary

Land of Illusion starring Mickey Mouse is certainly not a bad game by any means. It has plenty of charm, especially if you’re a fan of Disney’s classic cartoons. The game looks like it’s made for kids, but it does have a wicked difficulty level and some punishing game mechanics. You won’t be able to save your progress in the game, but you are allowed an unlimited amount of continues. This can feel a little discouraging because you’ll be forced to replay the game from the very beginning each time you start it up. All in all, as a platform game it has many positive sides – but in my opinion, it’s not enough to be considered as one of the great classics.

Developed By: Sega
Published By: Sega
Version Reviewed: SEGA Master System
Genre: Platforming
Players: 1
Also Available On: SEGA Game Gear
Released: 1992