Grab the updated version at the project entry.

Anyhow, it looks like former Ultima developer Warren Spector‘s upcoming game for the Nintendo Wii, Disney‘s Epic Mickey, is getting the ol’ Collector’s Edition treatment.

Actually, this does look pretty cool.

The $69.99 bundle includes everything seen in the image above: A copy of the game, a pair of skins for the Wii, a faceplate for your Wiimote, a DVD containing behind-the-scenes videos and other marketing materials, some special packaging and a five-inch vinyl figurine modeled after the game’s falsetto protagonist.

I bought my wife a Wii for Christmas last year, and I honestly keep forgetting we have the darn thing (she’s the console gamer, not me). Still, I might just have to check this game out…and I have to admit that I am just a little bit tempted by this package. The Wii is aesthetically pleasant in its design, but its white shell is rather plainspoken, whereas this skin for it has all the right kinds of randomness and contrast.

What was arguably the first browser-based Ultima spinoff (take that, Lord of Ultima!) is once again available for download here at Aiera, and I have also updated the project entry with some notes and considerations for getting the game running on modern systems. Downloads to compatible Internet browsers (The Dark Core’s requirements are, sadly, very specific) have also been added.

…one of his main problems with games’ stories is their tendency to be dude-centric — he warned the Gamescom crowd “if we don’t break out of big buff guys with swords and guys in tights and space marines in armor, we’re going to get marginalized in the way comics have been in the United States.” He also warned about attempting to ape blockbuster films by filling games with obscenely expensive visuals, as “we still fall far, far short of what people expect from a movie.”

Ultimately, the only form of storytelling Spector thinks games should attempt to emulate is oral conversation, as the person interacting with the game is equally responsible for shaping its story. “Player experience comes first,” Spector explained, “we have to allow them to show their creativity. No other medium has allowed them to do this. We are unique in the history of humankind. Every player becomes an author when they play a game.”

I, for one, don’t necessarily agree…or, rather, I take somewhat more of a both/and stance rather than an either/or stance on the issue. I’m in total agreement in regard to the importance of good, interactive conversation in a game — an Ultima hallmark, to be sure.

At the same time, I don’t see what’s so bad about some of the conventions* (the epic hero, space marines, whatever) that Spector seems down on. Yes, they are conventions, and yes, Spector has a reputation for attempting to defy convention…but the beauty of many conventions is that they resonate with people. We crave the stories of the epic hero, because we find meaning in them, and we connect with them. Not because space marines or epic heroes actually exist, but because they represent ideals of form and philosophy toward which our minds and imaginations are naturally, as if by design, drawn. (If you haven’t read John C. Wright‘s various essays on this topic, you’ve been missing out.)

Nor do I see what’s so bad about developers who have the solid foundation of a compelling, conversation-driven story adding in the cinematics and other visuals. Granted, if all a game has to offer are good visuals, there’s a problem there, sure, and I’ll grant Spector his point in that regard. But the visuals/plot dichotomy is not an absolute, and there are lots of great games out there that offer both. Granted, the visuals don’t quite aspire to the quality of Hollywood movies…but is that such a bad thing? I can’t be the only one who’s noticed that the overall quality of Hollywood’s productions has been in steep decline over the last decade**, whereas the quality of games has been on the rise, overall, over the same period of time. These days, I’d much rather play a game like Mass Effect than watch the latest piece of sci-fi drivel to appear on the big screen, or the television.

And what about games like Starcraft — a great game, by any metric — which use visuals and cinematics to great effect in order to drive the plot of the game forward? Starcraft‘s mechanics really don’t allow for a lot of conversation in the first place, yet the game is both fun to play and tells a good story (again, thanks to its expensive, but well-made, visuals).

As to the “still making cartoons” bit…this is the man who is helming Epic Mickey. As in this Mickey. There’s nothing wrong with that, of course — Epic Mickey is actually a very interesting concept. However…

* To be fair, some conventions (heroines with DD cups and combat uniforms that fail to rise even to the level of undergarments) could probably be done away with.

** Much the same can be said for the quality of Marvel and DC comics, and then over the same time frame, and then precisely because they abandoned the conventions that really resonated with their fanbase in some misguided effort to become more gritty, edgy, and politically relevant. Captain America getting bagged by that sniper was Stan Lee‘s shark-jumping moment, if ever he had one.

So…check thou it out!

Feel like rescuing a princess again? Or maybe taking a space shuttle mission to a distant world? Has it been too long since you journeyed into the Abyss?

Ultimoid appears to be a browser-based parody of the Ultima games, constructed with the GameBuilder service. As such, it’s not a particularly lengthy adventure, and its control set is pretty simple.

Its appearance draws heavily on the tiled graphics of Ultima 1 through Ultima 5. Timeline-wise, it claims to be set in a post-Ultima 9 Britannia.

In a new interview with Industry Gamers, he now says that, “A day does not go by where I don’t tell somebody at Disney: ‘Uncle Scrooge, come on! Donald! Huey, Dewey, and Louie! Come on, let me do a duck game!’ So yeah, I would love to do a duck game.”

Of course, being the animation geek that he is, Spector prefers the Carl Barks version of Uncle Scrooge and the nephews, so we probably won’t get any Fenton Crackshell cameos (even though that would be awesome). If Epic Mickey does take off, you never know what franchise Disney may let Spector put his own spin on next.

It would seem that if he is able to have his way — which is, I suppose, to say “if Epic Mickey doesn’t bomb” — Warren Spector will be sticking with Disney for a goodly while, and bringing his unique brand of warped awesomeness to whatever other franchises Disney is willing to hand over to his care.

Personally, I think a Darkwing Duck game headed by Spector might be interesting. Or something set in the darker Gargoyles universe.

So if there’s any of you Ultima fans out the Philly (or Paulsboro) way who’d care to meet for a beer or suggest a favourite cheesesteak joint…let me know, eh?