CRASH BANDICOOT: THE THREAD

A big problem is, the gameplay style of the Crash games - at least that they went back to for N. Sane - is built on two very specific things: speedrunning, and collecting every box in the level. The gameplay is very rigidly focused on perfectionist runs, and every powerup has a pretty specific purpose for accomplishing of those two things.

IIRC, the only ones that are really superfluous are the Bazooka and the Death Spin, both of which are more just buffers. But if you, say, cut out the Belly Flop from Crash and give it to Coco, you would have to either give Crash a completely new ability that breaks Iron Boxes (which would defeat the purpose of splitting them up), remove Iron Boxes entirely (in which case, since the Flop has far less uses than the Ground Pounds in the Mario series do, you might as well just not have the upgrade at all), or expect the player to deal with the fact that they can no longer beat the game with either character.

So, like says, the only way for chopping up the upgrades to work is to change the way the gameplay works - which, admittedly, the series has certainly done before. I could see it working if they made future games more along the lines of how Twinsanity did it, for instance, with a bit more open world and far less focus on the objectives.

I wouldn't be surprised if that was the reason why the series went through such dramatic changes over time in the first place.

edited 9th Feb '18 9:38:06 PM by KnownUnknown

Good news for anyone who doesn't own a PS4! N. Sane Trilogy is headed to Xbox One, Nintendo Switch, and Steam July 10th!

edited 8th Mar '18 3:24:52 PM by SonicWind

Wait what.

I've got a Switch! And a PC! Yaay!

I have a PC... which probably won't run it very well tbh. This stupid thing can't even run Torch Browser that well since the window freezes and/or goes black semi-frequently. And my dad has an Xbox One... which he only uses for Netflix and movies on You Tube and only lets me use when I've persuaded him to watch a part of my Spyro 3 playthrough. IneedaPS4whyaretheysoexpensiiiiiiive T_T

edited 9th Mar '18 8:36:56 AM by ReikoKazama

8 GB!?

Yeah,no

Your dad bought a X Bone just for netflix and youtube...?

He might as well have because that's literally the only thing he uses it for nowadays. He played the few games he has for it (two Forza games and Mafia 3) about once each and then never touched them again. He keeps saying he'll get back to them but he never has and as far as I can tell he never will.

N. Sane Trilogy's multiplatform debut has been pushed forward to June 29th, almost a year to the day the original PS4 version was released!

edited 10th May '18 7:49:19 AM by SonicWind

That's not a coincidence.

Xbox One listing of the N. Sane Trilogy have Stormy Ascent already in alongside a new DLC level, Future Tense.

I hope that level eventually gets released for the PS 4 version as well tbh

An actual new level built for the N. Sane trilogy. Launches June 29th.

More info on the multiplatform release of the N. Sane trilogy:

• Physical Switch release will not need any downloads
• Xbox One X version will run at 4K.
• All DLC will be free going forward.
• More improvements including faster load times and bug fixes
• All improvements will be coming to all platforms; current PS 4 owners will get a patch.
• Old PS 4 retail disks will be pulled from stores and a new version will be launched together with the other multiplatform releases, and will have all DLC included with new boxart.

• PC version will be playable at 60fps.

So has anyone played the new Crash 3 level? I quite enjoyed it. If Vicarious Visions can keep up this kind of design mentality in a new Crash game, the franchise is in good hands.

One question, though: Is there any reward for shooting the saucer Lab Assistants flying around in the background? I managed to snipe a few, but it doesn't seem to do anything.

Unrelated to that, I've had the thought that for the next Crash game, they could remove the life system and put Wumpa Fruit as a currency to buy new upgrades (like Double Jump and the like), with five of them still being boss rewards. And perhaps it could be used to buy access to vehicles which would then show up in levels where they'd be useful.

Feel free to ignore this since Did just start a convo about the new level.

I just bought an awesome-looking new Crash action figure. Let me tell you, I am so glad the N. Sane trilogy has made Crash a merchandisable franchise again. I always wanted to own those old Resaurus action figures as a kid ever since I saw them on Naughty Dog's old website, but the only one I was ever able to get my hands on was the Coco one on an ebay auction. That figurine is cool, but it's not the one I really wanted. It came with some accessories that pose really well with the new Crash figurine, though. I do hope they make more of these action figures. The characters of Crash are so cool-looking and colourful that I'd love to have more of them as decorations.

Me, reading reviews of the N. Sane Trilogy: "Hard? Pfft. I'm an old hand at platforming. I'll breeze through these games in nothing flat!"

Me, ten minutes after starting the N. Sane Trilogy: "...uh-oh."

It's all the extra objectives that really get to you.

And fumbling and dying a few times is expected in old school platformers before you master a level, methinks?

You generally get used to the difficulty once you know what to do. Crash clearly benefits from the nostalgia of this kind of trial and error-type gameplay.

By the way, I noticed that the recent patch of the game added back in Dingodile's famous defeat quote. Not N. Gin's, sadly. Good on them, though I do wonder why they removed it in the first place. Did they just forget?

Well, I bit the bullet and bought Crash for the Switch. I remember watching my mother play it when I was a wee lad, and now the whole family plays it together.

...We did not get better.

Well ain't that precious. The whole family (probably cursing at the) game together.

Oh yeah, lots of swearing.

The only game we used to have was Warped, so boy are 1 and 2 very big surprises.

Ouch, yeah, 1 especailly is the the toughest, and sometimes not for the right reasons.

2 has a finer balance with difficulty and fun compared to 1 and 3 just feels the easiest, but somehow manages to be the most fun.

ironically, my go thru on remade trilogy, the first one was the easiest. I ended the game with 99 lives, and i didn't even try to grind. meanwhile, the 3rd game was the only one i got any Game overs on, though 2 got close near the end.

in general, I'd chalk it up to pacing of handing out lives. the first game is very much a feedback loop. you start out good and you just build up a surplus of lives. start out poor, and it'll be a tough ride. the 2nd and 3rd games balance their lives out more evenly, meaning unless you did grind, you'd likely never have more than 30 or so lives at any time, at most.

Could we see a new take on Crash Team Racing at The Game Awards?