Disney's Villains' Revenge originally began development as an early version of the browser MMO Virtual Magic Kingdom. The latter game was first pitched by Disney Imagineering art director Terry Dobson as a CD-ROM game set in an unknown Disney park, with different areas like Fantasyland and Adventureland being taken over by villains during an after-hours event. Despite being well into development, this version of the game would be cancelled in 1998, and the Fantasyland portion of the original game was repurposed as part of Disney's Villains' Revenge. Virtual Magic Kingdom would eventually be resurrected as an MMO web game by 2005, which was released just in time to celebrate Disneyland's 50th anniversary.