Day 40: Crash Bandicoot N. Sane Trilogy

For my last game before the Top 10, I want to talk about a game from the Crash Bandicoot series. But which game I hear you ask? Oh that's an easy one. I want to talk about the awesomeness, the shear genius, the utter masterpiece…that is…CRASH BOOM BANG!

No, April Fools, it's Crash Bandicoot the N. Sane Trilogy.

It seemed like only yesterday that this series went on what seemed like an infinite hiatus, only showing up in the form of cancelled games and mobile games. But come E3 2016, we were given the ultimate surprise in the form of the N. Sane Trilogy, brilliant remasters of the original PS1 trilogy.

The stories for these three are the same as they were. Crash Bandicoot 1 has Crash escape from Cortex's lab and then venture through the island, its ruins, and some castle and industrial areas to save Tawna from being experimented on. Crash Bandicoot 2 Cortex Strikes Back involves Crash collecting Power Crystals for Cortex, believing that Cortex wants to use them for the great good when meanwhile he wants them to power his Cortex Vortex so he can take over the world. And then Crash Warped involves the release of Dr. Cortex's master, Uka-Uka, and with the help of Dr. N. Tropy's Time Twister Machine, seeks to collect the Power Crystals and Gems from their original places in time, and now it's up to Crash to stop them.

Going into the presentation for a bit, the graphics are just as cartoony and vibrant as ever, made all the more better in HD and given more detail and polish, and the soundtrack in all three games are all given a new coat of paint, making this awesome soundtrack even more awesome.

Now let's talk about that gameplay, because wow there are some changes.

Starting with Crash Bandicoot 1, getting the obvious out of the way, we can actually save the game properly! No more of that, "getting to the end of a bonus area," bullshit from the first game. On top of that, you can actually see how many boxes you've collected, dying a bonus stage gives you a chance to play it again and it doesn't cost a single life, and if you're going after the box gem…it's okay to die! You don't lose your chance on getting it! I don't know how Vicarious Visions did it, but they made the first Crash game…for lack of better words…good!

Crash Bandicoot's 2 and 3 don't really do much different in terms of gameplay. You can still hang from monkey bars in these games, and Crash 3 brings back Crash's improved body slam, death tornado spin, fruit bazooka, double jump, and crash dash for speed runs. So, the first Crash game really got it good with gameplay improvements.

All three games boil down to a collect-a-thon where you need to break boxes to get gems, collect each level's power crystal, get colored gems, keys, or find secret areas to unlock alternate pathways or open up new levels respectively, and when you beat a level, go back into it to tackle a time trial challenge for a relic. On the subject of time trials, they actually give these challenges to the levels in Crash 1 and 2! Granted, unlike Crash 3, the levels in those games weren't built with speed running in mind, but it's still a nice touch which adds a good sum of replay value.

This game also adds more mechanics beyond your usual platforming. There's animal riding stages (pig for Crash 1, Polar bear for Crash 2, and tiger for Crash 3), plane flying stages, jet pack stages, jet ski stages, underwater stages that don't suck, and motorcycle races.

I also really adore the level design. Crash 1 might have been limited since it boils down to jungles, jungle ruins, factory, and castle levels, but Crash 2 adds more variety beyond that like polar regions, mountain regions, sewer stages, and space stages. And then we get to Crash 3 which takes us to numerous points in time like the Medieval Era, the Prehistoric Age, Ancient China, Ancient Arabia, Ancient Egypt, the freaking Future! All of these levels are well designed with loads of obstacles and enemies to overcome.

The Crash Bandicoot N. Sane Trilogy is one of the best examples outside of Pokémon I can think of when it comes to remaking a game for the current generation. Hopefully this means more attention will be paid to our favorite orange marsupial, and if the remake to Crash Team Racing is anything to go by, I'd say Crash won't be leaving us anytime soon.