If you’re in a particular age group in the United States, you might remember Marsupilami as a Disney cartoon from the early 1990s. Marsupilami, the titular long-tailed creature, was the creation of Belgian cartoonist André Franquin. The character made his television debut on a segment show called Raw Toonage, but he was so popular he got his own spinoff show in 1993. Unfortunately, it only ran for a season.
Inevitably, there was a video game adaptation for the Sega Mega Drive/Genesis in 1996.
The character didn’t exactly disappear after that. A new TV series (this time not connected to Disney) was launched in 2000 for French/Belgian viewers, and it would get five seasons over the course of the next dozen years or so.
Now, we live in an age where we’re obsessed with digging up the past (just look at the success of Ready Player One as an example). We see old franchises being revived left and right, it seems, as well as collected bundles of classic games that preserve the more retro feel. And hey, I’m all about it. I love retro games so much that I bought a retro gaming site back in 2014 (which is still around today, and it’s awesome). So the more attention that gets brought to these old classics, the better.
But never in my wildest dreams would I have expected Marsupilami, of all things, to get a video-game revival. The Genesis game seems to be mostly forgotten these days, and I don’t know that it even did that well back in the 1990s. In fact, I was just talking to someone the other day about Marsupilami, and they had no idea what I was talking about (they thought I was speaking gibberish).
But this November, Marsupilami is getting another video-game adaptation. It’s called Marsupilami: Hoobadventure, and it’s due out for PS4, Xbox One, Nintendo Switch, and PC on November 16, 2021. This is a 2.5D platformer, and it’s said to be designed for younger players (which was true of the Genesis game as well).
Add this to the growing list of “things I never expected to see in 2021.”
I uploaded episodes of the old Disney series on Youtube. What really obsessed me hard was Marsupilami can actually talk. And he a gorilla sidekick named Maurice. I wish the show was on Disney Plus right now.