Meet Mickey,the action hero,virtually!

More than 80 years after he first appeared in Steamboat Willie,Disney's Mickey Mouse is poised to make his debut as the lead character in a computer game.A year-long makeover has transformed him into a three-dimensional 'action hero'.Disney hopes to establish Mickey as one of the world's best-known action heroes alongside Super Mario and Sonic the Hedgehog,and then build on his new wave of fame with a games franchise and merchandise.And he is a modern mouse for modern times.
  "We've pulled Mickey out of the world of cartoons which is where he belongs and feels comfortable and safe and we pull him into a world we call the Cartoon Wasteland," says game designer Warren Spector.He developed the Disney Epic Mickey Game,set for launch on Nintendo's Wii console  next year.
  Disney Interactive Studios general manager Graham Hopper said:"This started from a belief I had when I came into this business a few years back,that we were not treating Mickey properly in the videogames space and that he had a lot more potential than we had unlocked.When Disney came up with new-look 'cartoon character thrown into turmoil', game guru Spector built on the idea of Cartoon Wasteland where Mickey has big problems to solve and a world that needs saving.A guilt-ridden Mickey roams the wasteland he faces up to friends he cast aside and eclipsed with his own fame.The storyline allows the Magic Kingdom to revive Walt Disney's first cartoon star created in 1927,Oswald the Lucky Rabbit.In the Epic Mickey game,Oswald becomes the earliest inhabitant of Cartoon Wasteland after Mickey is created.