What the game would have been under Mark Cerny's direction.
Examples
- As this early test animation
, this concept art, and this GDD (game design document) demonstrate, The Wrath of Cortex was meant to be more revolutionary under Mark Cerny's direction, taking on a more wide-open level design. After a fall out with Cerny, however, VU handed the project over to Traveller's Tales, asking for a more conventional Crash platformer in a twelve-month deadline. - The story would have had Crash traveling from planet to planet saving them from Cortex's experiments to make battle drones to take over the galaxy.
- The game would have had a new villain named Elli-mental with fire hair, rock skin, and swirling eyes, who wears a water dress. She would have been a replacement for Uka Uka as the Big Bad, employing Cortex to make battle drones to take over the galaxy. She was later replaced by the Elemental masks in the final.
- Originally, there would have been a twin sister to Coco named Quoco who would have looked like Coco but with blue eyes instead of green and wears her hair down. She was most likely replaced by Crunch.
- Originally, the final boss would have been a direct fight between Crash and Crunch, with Crash fighting Crunch in a mechanical robot suit. Cortex would have controlled Crunch via remote control, which he would stamp on and destroy in frustration after Crunch was knocked out by Crash. This explains why the fight starts off with Crunch standing in front of you and the Orphaned Reference at the end of the fight.
- "Crash and Burn", a level clearly based on the early pitch, was originally nearly twice as long and had more story involvement. Storyboards were made for a cutscene where Coco entered the level only to be kidnapped by a gorilla, who intended to sacrifice her to the erupting volcano. Crash would rescue Coco and then face the gorilla miniboss at the top of the volcano. Early footage and beta assets show they got some way into programming the original level.
- The original "Ice Station Bandicoot" would have had the players venturing in the wide-open platforming area below, with the polar bear serving as an enemy.
- "Banzai Bonzai" similarly had a much different more wide-open structure in early builds, paying more homage to the "Upstream" levels from the first game.
- The boss fight Crashes to Ashes was originally going to have Crash driving around in a jeep to run away from Crunch and then later chase him with green balls of goop to attack him. This was changed to Crash with out a vehicle to run from him and then using a mechanical Firetruck suit to attach him because the previous version would have made the fight too easy.
- Two other Dummied Out levels involved a dogfight against Cortex's airship (likely the vehicle section for "Weathering Heights") and a race track level in a volcano.
- The game was also set to be released on the Sega Dreamcast before its production ceased. This would have been the first and only time a Crash game was released on a SEGA console had this occurred.
- In early prototypes and betas, the game would have Crash flying in a realistic airplane in the flying stages, but the idea was scrapped possibly due to the 9/11 attacks.
- The original PS2 release's atrocious loading times were the remnant of a mini-game where the player could control Crash as he fell and collected wumpa fruit (that would be retained in the next level). When the game was ready to be shipped, disputes were made by the game's Japanese publishers, Konami, that Namco had at the time patented playable loading transitions and didn't want to risk a lawsuit, forcing the team to quickly delete it with no time left to optimise the loading screens (something they utilised the Greatest Hits rerelease to rectify).
- Other features such as a multiplayer mode and in-level minibosses were also considered but quickly dropped.
