CRASH BANDICOOT: THE THREAD

From what I understand, the jump physics of the first two games have been changed to match the third game's. On one hand, this makes it easier to swap between the three games without getting your wires crossed. On the other hand, it's been responsible for like 99% of my bottomless pit-related deaths in the first two games.

For some of the jumps (most infamously The High Road), you've gotta get right up to the edge of a platform, almost running off it, with a good running start to get some momentium going, then hold down X all the way until you reach the other side, which you'll just barely reach.

...Except, of course, for when the game wants you to do a short, quick jump by tapping X instead. And the bridge levels in Crash 1 love to alternate those types of jumps. Oh, and don't even think about hesitating while you bounce across the bridge on those turtles, because you need the forward momentum from your previous bounce to land your next bounce.

I spent hours trying to get a handful of measly sapphire relics.

Also the camera angle is slightly different to accommodate the widescreen, which has led to me running headfirst into bottomless pits a couple times. I bet people who haven't played the original games a billion times don't have these problems...

You hit the nail right on the head.

So i guess the first game is as hard as it was in the past given the weird momentum they designed?

I hear many people complain about Native Fortress now. I don't recall it being that difficult outside of the gem challenge.

I think there's possible/rumored factors that make these remasters harder than people can remember:

• People got older, their reflexes got worse, their Crash skills dwindled. (But probably can be re-trained with more time with the game.)
• According to vg247, possibly a difference in Crash's hitbox. Some think the hitboxes are now ellipsoids rather than boxes (rectangular prisms), so jumps that players could barely make before now cause Crash to slip off and die.

Can any of you guys comment on the second one? Is that even possible to verify?

A main problem is that the first game's precision platforming is far more rigid than the latter two. Like, while the later games want you to land jumps on small platforms or moving things and the like, the first game wants you to land jumps on areas the size of individual crates (or, in some cases, actual individual crates) quickly and and precisely. It's a good example of how different level design was back then, pretty faithfully remastered.

That said, I think the backlash against Native Fortress in particular (and the chase levels, for that matter) is a bit overblown... though even so, that level does have an extremely dickish gauntlet at the end.

On a completely different track, playing through Warped and looking at the stuff from the original, I'm definitely getting the impression that N. Tropy was originally conceived a much bigger deal than he ended up being in the actual game. He gets an ominous entrance in the opening, the ending has him fighting with Cortex over Uka Uka, and he's important to be backstory... but in the game itself, he's just the third boss and the main story unambiguously has Cortex and Uka Uka as Big Bad Duumvirate. I can't help thinking that the original plan might have been for him to be more present in the latter half of the game.

I played through the original versions of the three games beforehand and physics and hitboxes are definitely slightly different for the first two games and more like Warped. That being said, they are super easy to get used to and in no way make the game super difficult (well, more than it was) like some are complaining. Native Fortress, Sunset Vista, the Roads, Slippery Climb, etc. were all about as difficult as they've always been for me.

edited 5th Jul '17 8:28:55 PM by LordVatek

I remember beating someone elses copy of Crash 1 back in the day, and I do remember the odd physics.

But I never noticed a difference between Crash 2 and 3 in terms of physics. The most notable physics WTF from Crash 2 is being stopped by a box on ice... And somehow retaining your full momentum the moment you jump.

And each game is easier than the one before it, which confuses me on some people thinking that Warped is hard at all.

Crash 1 is kicking my ass. Man, that game is still hard.

Good thing No Death Run only applies to coloured gems.

Still, that includes Slippery Climb...ugh

And apparently the boulders can break boxes for you. You can take that with a grain of salt though.

I think the hitboxes are now more precise. Like, to jump on a turtle, you have to touch the shell. Not the head, not the tail. The shell.

Also I never thought Slippery Climb was that hard, but I guess that's just me...

For those of you who have played the game (;-;), what's your favourite part about the N. Sane Trilogy?

The cutscenes and animations.

I mean, I love the levels, but I was always going to love the levels. But man, those fully rendered time twisters, that super expressiveness every character seems to have, it's great. I sometimes wish they outright went a step beyond and added a few scenes that weren't in the original just so I could see more of it.

Yeah, ditto.

One thing to ponder: I'm still on Crash 1 (I'm playing the games in order). I've been getting a lot of game over screens, and I find it noticeable that Uka Uka is only sometimes shown in shadow. Sometimes he's in clear view. I'd been told that he's only supposed to be in clear view when playing the third game, so what gives? Is this a glitch?

Incidentally, Uka Uka's shadowy game over screen is really terrifying. I imagine that it'd be even more so to a kid playing this for the first time and having never heard of Uka Uka before, seeing this unknown shadowy figure laughing at your failure. It's also a cool way to build up Uka Uka before officiall introducing him in Warped.

edited 8th Jul '17 6:26:15 PM by DrDougsh

On a different note, the N. Sane Trilogy is apparently selling like hot cakes. In the store where I bought it, the clerks noted between themselves that they could probably sell it at half price to make an even heftier profit given how fast it was going out. That bodes well for Crash's future and means there's almost certainly going to be some new games. Here's hoping VV will be able to do something exciting and fresh while still remaining loyal to Crash's spirit.

I wouldn't mind a reimagination of Crash Bandicoot: N. Tranced.

Sure it was a hanheld game but it had interesting ideas.

What characters introduced post-Naughty Dog would you want to return?

You know, they really should remaster Crash Team Racing.

Crash from the sound of it is very much back, and Honest Trailers can suck it.

The only characters post-Naughty Dog who ever found any lasting success in the series were Crunch and Nina, so I guess they should probably bring them back. And maybe N. Trance who never really as iconic, but he was Vicarious Visions' most notable addition to the series so I can imagine them wanting to bring him back.

If they do bring Crunch back I hope they actually do something interesting with him and not turn him into the one-joke character Radical made him.

edited 9th Jul '17 7:23:12 PM by DrDougsh

Yeah, Crunch could have been more, if Radical made him more than a one note joke.

In fairness to Radical, though, the problem with Crunch really started right after The Wrath of Cortex. No developer was able to figure out what to do with him. Presumably, having a strong guy on the good guys' side meant in theory that he should be playable, but it'd be difficult to reconcile a big guy like Crunch with the gameplay style of Crash. Hence, almost every game had Crunch either brainwashed (N-Tranced, Mind Over Mutant), incapactiated in some way (Titans) or just absent or quietly shoved aside. The only games where he was an active participant were racing and party games, where it was easier to reconcile his physique with gameplay without radically altering it.

Come to think of it, this is probably why Radical made Crunch into such a buffoon: Because it'd be unbelievable for the no-nonsense badass he started out ass getting shoved aside constantly like that.

Umm, in N-Tranced Crunch was playable in the Atlasphere levels. To be honest, what good would come out of making him only playable in those?

Case in point: That game only made Crunch playable while putting him inside a hamster ball that made him control exactly like Crash in the same situation.

And in addition, Crash was used for the first Atlasphere level in the very same game, so Crunch's playability was completely redundant in that game.

You could still make Crunch play like Crash, sort of?

Dunno, make him able to lift and throw stuff, but not able to do slides or something. There, now just design levels like a Crash game, but with the altered abilities in mind.