"Wow, they are going to remaster the greatest platforming series of the 90's and made the Playstation an awesome console to have! I can't wait to play those great games! Wow!" said every gamer who never played Crash Bandicoot. Trust me, I love Crash, he was my childhood as a kid as well as some gems out there like Ty The Tasmanian Tiger. It's just the Bandicoot series had some bad or boring level design that kind of hurt looking back on. Hello and welcome to this soon to be hated thought blog!
Okay, raise of hands of how many people actually played the Crash Bandicoot games before the third entry. I bet half of those people actually remember the game while the other half was too young to remember the game entirely. Know that I am apart of those who don't remember, but recently I got to play those games with a cousin who had those three games in his collection. I played all of them and had some bad thoughts on only two of those games. The first one was a platforming mess, having player go back to the splitting path, risking everything to do so, and go down a different path to destroy the rest of the boxes. To those of you that don't know, Boxes are like red coins from every 3D Mario, if you destroy them all, you get a reward from them. Most of you might think that this is what makes the game challenging, but know that you don't have camera control in the game nor can tell what you're going to run into, whether it be a respawned enemy or a long pit. If you are a completionist or have any sense of OCD, not destroying all those boxes just to get a box gem out of it to both move on with the game and a decoration is going to drive you mad.
And if you want to be a super completionist, you had the bonus stages where you had to break boxes to get your girlfriend's head three times to get to. Don't ask, just play the game. Those were easy, but easier to die in and never get back to unless you replay the entire level again. That, if you ask me, is just punishing. "Well, that's part of the challenge." I will hurt you if you think this is a fair challenge, because they are not. There are even some levels that just don't even give you chance, having no rhythm to the obstacles, poor perspective or clunky hit boxes. Again, if you say that is part part of the challenge, I will hurt you.
For them to make the game bearable to play without having this awful level design and challenge, they would have to redo almost the entire game. Not changing everything, just the level design to have the game be fun with a little bit of challenge. I don't think they are going to do this, unless they are going to the best people who ever handled the game since Naughty Dog sold the property, but who knows if that will ever happen. That would take a lot of work since the other games hold similar level design.
As for the second game, Cortex Strikes Back, it's pretty perfect. I love this game better than the rest, every level is designed to your abilities in the game and doesn't unfairly challenge the player with stupid backtracking or having to replay a level. Unless you count the Light Levels, the game has a smooth level design that is perfect for anyone who plays, so for whoever owns this at the moment doesn't have to redesign anything with the levels. I mean, the game introduced the slide jump that completely changed the game by making backtracking or taking a leap of faith fair and less of a challenge to accomplish. I know this is unexpected, but I think this is the game that made most of my childhood at the time and was the only game of the series that could rightfully challenge Nintendo's power... Unless you remember the Coco level...
Back to hating the game, Crash Bandicoot 3: Warped is one of the most annoying of the games and I believe to be the crashing point of the game's series. No pun intended. The game had some bad level design, having only a few of the levels being fun and what brought back the Coco levels. I don't know why she had to be apart of this, I mean, they could have just left her in the game's background and not let her in the game again, but they had to bring her back for the girls. "You cis white racist male! You hating on a girl in a video game?!! That is absurd! I believe she is a powerful character in the game and is better than the stupid, male dominant Crash. I should report you." Look, I don't what gender she is, I just hate her levels, and I am ashamed that these levels were for the girls. They were just boring and hard to control in the game, nothing was fun about them except maybe her death animations. I love the one where she gets destroyed by a pirates paddle, just made me laugh so hard. Anyways, she also has some levels that are racist as all hell. In the China levels, the dragons and every other enemy in that level or wearing glasses to show they are asian. Whoever is remastering this game, better change that.... I don't care personally, but I know that people are going to hate it now.
And it's not her that has the boring levels! There are some pretty bad ones with Crash in it that are just so boring or just too clunky to play! The fighter plane doesn't seem right and is harder than anything the game to complete and the racing levels feel out of place! Know that the game wants to break all the boxes in the game, so you have to break each box in each level if you want to feel complete. And what makes the challenge even harder is how the game doesn't let you go back to get them or at least safely. And what almost destroyed the Cortex Strikes Back was also put into Warped: Light Levels. I mean, the water levels are pretty stupid in the game, but at least they are beatable with just a simple restart, not risking any lives. In the light levels, you can't see anything in front of you unless you have light. If you get hit, you lose the light and have to either die, restart or be bold and traverse the nightmare that is the platforming in the game.
I know that this game would not be changed at all since this game needs a lot of work done on it. Completely redesigning Coco's levels and Crashes out-of-game levels, work on the models that look to offensive... You know what, drop the game completely, make a newer and better Crash 3! The game was a stain in the Crash Bandicoot quilt, why not clean it up by making a better Crash 3?
I mean, this game was taunting at Nintendo as they advertised the Playstation console and game itself, saying that Mario can't compete with the Bandicoot, the guy in a mess of a game that Mario could have easily beaten. Please tell me if you remember any bugs in Mario games that were game breaking...
Okay... You got me on that one... Not many would agree with that, actually it's a controversial statement to say the least, but you are right... Anyways, still Crash Bandicoot has been a broken game (except Crash 2), but seeing that they are going to remaster it is crazy to me. I believe this is a risky idea to begin with and can destroy a company if they don't do it correctly. I mean... Does anyone remember the other games past Crash 3? I rather not remember the bad games that had to come...
My point is that they would have to do a lot of work to fix all the problems in the game, both glitches and level design, but seeing that the game has been known to be a milked cow after Naughty Dog sold the rights to the game, I don't see that happening. "What if they actually do it, StarterPack?" I would be mildly surprised to see that they did such a thing instead of doing the typical and try to milk this almost dead cow. I didn't pre-order it nor do I feel the need to, but I want to see what the game will do after release, see what people will discover in the game. I mean, every other remaster always has a new glitch that was never in the first game. What do you guys think? I know there are some fans left out there on this site that love the series, what are your thoughts on the new N-Sane Trilogy coming? Did you pre-order it? Are you a parent that is going to show your kid the wonders of the 90's reborn? Please, I would love to know if people have an interest in this game still and 'til next time...
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