Crash Bandicoot PS1 trilogy

[Anonymous No.9788003]

Going through these atm, 100%-ing this one was pretty tough for me. How are the others in that regard?

[Anonymous No.9788008]

The difficulty in 2 isn't so much executing the stuff but finding the secrets and figuring out how they works.

100% in CB3 is easier but tons of fun, 105% or whatever the max was though was challenging (time trial on all levels)

[Anonymous No.9788021]

Crash 1 is the only one that's super hard to 100% because some of those levels are fucking marathons.

2 and 3 are easier because they drop the no death requirement for the most part, but even when they still make you no death levels it's not for as long. 2 has a pair of levels that are ripe bastards to break every box in though. The time trials in 3 are a pretty good challenge, they only really get ball busting if you go for plats but you only need golds for completion.

[Anonymous No.9788073]

>>9788008
>>9788021
Thanks anons, sounds interesting. I hear the Warped novelty gameplay levels are kind of a pain too though

[Anonymous No.9788103]

>>9788003
Why did Crash 1 have 6 boss battles but 2 & 3 only 5?

[Anonymous No.9788112]

>>9788103
Never really noticed this, does it matter in a significant way? Anyway, the first game has a weird structure in general, the way you can save midway through a stage in the Tawna bonus levels, or how a boss battle may be placed kind of at random in the middle of an island

[Anonymous No.9788187]

>>9788073
Yeah there's far too many crap airplane / bike levels

Good game overall though

[Anonymous No.9788282]

>>9788003
1 is the best one, it's also the big filter. I assume that's the reason normies always say 2 is the best one, after getting btfo'd in 1.

[Anonymous No.9788294]

>>9788103
i think the whole thing was them just trying to make a 3D platformer that didnt suck. no one had really done that yet, so they were kinda freeballin it
some crazy voodoo and overwriting half the PSX BIOs later and they had a game
good one too
tough though

then i guess they realized "oh yea were making this shit for small children" and so they made the next two games way easier in all aspects

[Anonymous No.9788314]

>>9788103
Because 1 didn't really have any set pacing or formula figured out. Aren't Brio and Cortex like one level apart?

[Anonymous No.9788329]

>>9788282
1 has this unique dark aesthetic that sets it apart from the the sequels which just go for a more cartoony, slapstick look. 2 and 3 feel better to control and are much less frustrating, but the environments are not nearly as captivating.

[Anonymous No.9788339]

>>9788329
agreed
2 + 3 were the games i could beat when i was younger, but 1 was the one that i kept going back to for whatever reason

[Anonymous No.9788343]

>>9788329
also idk i like all the OSTs but imo 1 had the most DEVO feel to it
and DEVO is based

[Ellen Rowe No.9788362]

It's strange, CTR 100% is exhausting at times - especially when going for platinums but I don't think back to the difficulty as frustrating, I think that one is incredibly satisfying to 100%.

the only annoying thing in 3 is the two secret levels are dumb<div class="xa23b"><span class="xa23t"></span><span class="xa23i"></span></div>

[Anonymous No.9788363]

>>9788073
I honestly kinda hate Warped solely because the motorcycle levels are so fucking aids
it's like they intentionally designed it to have absolutely horrible controls and if you make one mistake you're fucked and have to restart the whole level

[Anonymous No.9788371]

The bike levels are fun. Only the airplane sucks.

[Anonymous No.9788383]

frankly id rather just have the hog/bear autoscrollers from the old games back rather than the vehicle levels
i guess they thought theyd switch it up after making 2 games with almost the same level designs
just kinda half-baked

[Anonymous No.9788386]

also lets not forget the WORST gimmick levels: the jetpack levels in 2

[Anonymous No.9788391]

>>9788003
Crash 2 is really easy to 100%
I'm absolutely terrible at vidya, I'm talking like "couldn't beat a single robot master in Mega Man X" levels of bad. And yet even I've managed to do Crash 2 100% multiple times, takes me around 3 hours for a single run.

[Anonymous No.9788398]

>>9788386
those levels wouldn't be half as bad as they are if the controls weren't retarded. Even as a baby in 1998 I didn't understand why jumping didn't make you go up and crouching didn't make you go down, instead of the retarded scheme they set up.

[Anonymous No.9788401]

>>9788391
theres a lot less backtracking thats for sure
nvm the not having to 1cc each level with all boxes to get gems. that got pretty vicious on the later levels of 1

[Anonymous No.9788405]

>>9788371
Complete opposite for me, fucking HATED the bike levels in Warped.

[Anonymous No.9788407]

I never liked Crash 1's backtracking. It felt like you had to go out of your way for a lot of the boxes and to get half way through the stage and sometimes the end in some cases and just have the game be like
>lol, you need a colored gem to get the last few boxes
Just felt like a big kick in the teeth. I love pretty well every other aspect of the game though.

[Anonymous No.9788409]

>>9788398
yea its like i said in regards to the vehicle levels
half baked
it just feels like some director poked his head in and said "BRO!!!! but wat if jetpack?", then left, leaving the codemonkeys to figure out how or why to do such a thing

[Anonymous No.9788538]

I made a custom wallpaper based on the original launch poster ad from '96 if anyone is interested: >>7977647

>>9788003
1st game is hard to 100% because of the death penalty vis-à-vis getting the box gems. 2nd game removes this feature & is easier to 100%. 3rd game is as hard to 100% as the 1st due to getting the time relics, especially on the gimmicky special stages like the flying ones.

>>9788103
It was the first game in the series & the devs had no former bosses to reuse.

>>9788329
Both the visuals & the music had a dark ambiance to it. It was sort of haunting & memorable.

>>9788363
>>9788383
With the bazooka, the motorcycle, the airplanes, and all that stuff, I think they were trying too hard to make Crash cool & deviated too far from the formula that made the series great to begin with. There were too many gimmicky special stages in 3 & they weren't fun like they were in the previous two games. I'd take jetpacking through the Cortex space ship over the airplane levels any day of the week.

[Anonymous No.9788540]

I made a custom wallpaper based on the original launch poster ad from '96 if anyone is interested.

>>9788003 (OP)
1st game is hard to 100% because of the death penalty vis-à-vis getting the box gems. 2nd game removes this feature & is easier to 100%. 3rd game is as hard to 100% as the 1st due to getting the time relics, especially on the gimmicky special stages like the flying ones.

>>9788103
It was the first game in the series & the devs had no former bosses to reuse.

>>9788329
Both the visuals & the music had a dark ambiance to it. It was sort of haunting & memorable.

>>9788363
>>9788383
With the bazooka, the motorcycle, the airplanes, and all that stuff, I think they were trying too hard to make Crash cool & deviated too far from the formula that made the series great to begin with. There were too many gimmicky special stages in 3 & they weren't fun like they were in the previous two games. I'd take jetpacking through the Cortex space ship over the airplane levels any day of the week.

[Anonymous No.9788551]

I think the plane race level in 3 was actually pretty fun, the plane levels should have been races instead of the terrible dogfights

[Lena Pugh No.9788646]

>>9788540
I always hated time trials more than the crash 1 gems. although painful, I liked the tension of it and it felt a lot more rewarding than just running through the level, smashing some arbitrarily chosen boxes, and then dying over and over on the same pit because the game keeps eating one your inputs when using the crash dash. just mind numbing repetition with little pay off.<div class="xa23b"><span class="xa23t"></span><span class="xa23i"></span></div>

[Anonymous No.9788667]

>>9788646
I don't like the time trials largely because it turns each level into a speedrun & kills the replayability of the game by inducing an over-familiarity - you end up mastering each level with its repetitive & tedious trial & error process. If they had restricted the time relics to just a few special stages that are optimized for time trials, it may have been alright.

[Anonymous No.9788670]

>>9788540
>>9788405
>>9788386
>>9788187
not sure why the airplane levels get so much hate in 3. getting a platinum on mad bombers is pretty fucked, but they seemed fine otherwise. I even really liked rings of power.

Fore me the worst vehicle was the jetski (motorcycle is a close second), just because of how annoying it is track down the all of the boxes in those levels, especially the last two.

[Anonymous No.9788687]

>>9788670
True. The Hot Coco time trial managed to be even more aggravating than the flying levels & is probably the biggest reason I don't want to 100% that game ever again.

[Anonymous No.9789016]

>>9788103
>>9788540
>Why did Crash 1 have 6 boss battles but 2 & 3 only 5?
>It was the first game in the series & the devs had no former bosses to reuse.

Sorry, my reply was based off of a misreading of the post. The reason is probably because:

a.) The bosses of 2 & 3 follow the 5 warp room format while 1 did not.

b.) The devs probably had a little more creative energy & ambition the first time around. They wanted to go all out & make their mark. I think there was more level variety in the first game too. If I remember correctly, much of the second game is said to have been developed for the first game but was shelved. Crash 2 was said to be effectively a second volume of the first game - like Crash 1 & 2 are two volumes of the same book.

[Anonymous No.9789192]

Plane > Animal riding > Motorcycle > Jet-Ski > Jetpack

[Anonymous No.9789468]

All the Crash games are good, but 1 just feels the most soulful and endearing.

[Pablo Rivas No.9789586]

Crash 2 and 3 are much more lenient when it comes to getting gems thanks to allowing you to die during a stage and still getting it/them.<div class="xa23b"><span class="xa23t"></span><span class="xa23i"></span></div>

[Anonymous No.9789602]

>>9788329
I like how you can see the Cortex Castle in the background in a wide variety in the levels.

[Anonymous No.9789649]

>>9788003
i remember seeing this game playing on a pc in a homewares shop pre-2000. at the time i was amazed, but only just realised it was probably bleem!

[Anonymous No.9790368]

>>9788687
Hot Coco's time trial is busted on NTSC-U and uses the time requirement from the level it's hidden it, which is like 5x more time than you need to get even a platinum.

I pity anyone in the regions where that bug is fixed because doing it in NST made me want to fucking kill myself.

[Anonymous No.9791274]

>>9788540
>>9788646
>>9788667
I'm glad to see that I'm not the only one that hated the introduction of time trials in Crash 3, and sadly to me every single Crash after that had them once again... even 1 and 2 in the N. Sane Trilogy.

[Anonymous No.9791380]

>>9791274
>even 1 and 2 in the N. Sane Trilogy.
Just one more reason why people should stick with the originals.

[Anonymous No.9791445]

>>9791380
For CalTech retards they did a decent job remaking them. The trilogy is no where near as bad as something like Twin Snakes, New N' Tasty or Tomb Raider Anniversary.

[Anonymous No.9791458]

>>9791445
Agreed. It could've been a lot worse. And if it introduced Crash to a younger audience then I'm glad they remade them. But if someone with patrician taste asks me what's the best way to get into Crash, I'm laying the truth on them.

[Anonymous No.9791461]

>>9788343
>but imo 1 had the most DEVO feel to it
>and DEVO is based
Mark Mothersbaugh helped with the music in the Naughty Dog Crash games. Keyword is "helped".
Unfortunately, Josh Mancell often gets little credit in the public eye for his compositions in these games because he's not in a big name band like Mark is.

[Anonymous No.9791557]

>>9788103
Papu Papu barely counts as a boss.

[Anonymous No.9791783]

>>9791380
The time trials in 1 are actually pretty fun because there's no run button and it just comes down to playing the game well as is.

I get they were too afraid to balance the time trials around slides but the run really just ruins the time trials by trivializing them with a mechanic irrelevant to 99% of the rest of the game.

[Anonymous No.9791805]

>>9788003
I'm going through 2 and the running-toward-the-screen levels are kicking my ass, I feel the reaction time for the landmines specially is way too short to pull off 100%s without general memorization

[Anonymous No.9791824]

>>9788003
1 is harder than the others

[Anonymous No.9791910]

>>9791824
That fucking High Road level, and one of those temple levels.. so much screaming back in '97

[Anonymous No.9791919]

>>9791910
Replaying it recently I was surprised it wasn't as difficult as I remembered. I think the single-direction layout puts you on a mental groove that makes things easier.

[Anonymous No.9792320]

>>9791805
The boulder level(s?) in 1 were definitely easier. I think it's because in 2 they used a narrower focal length for the "camera" that stretches the visible space in front of you way too much. In contrast, the animal riding levels are easier imo.

[Anonymous No.9792469]

So is the new crash good?

[Anonymous No.9792482]

>>9792469
Yes. Tawna's redesign is pandering slop, and the game has probably the worst 100% requirements I've seen in a game, but if you're playing just to beat it it's pretty good.

[Anonymous No.9793241]

>>9792469
this >>9792482
It has the basic ingredients of a good crash game, but they badly fucked up with the 100%. It's so disappointing that I ended up having more fun with TWoC and Twinsanity's 100% replays.

The level design is good, mechanics are decent, and platforming feels great when just trying to finish a level, so it's even more baffling how they botched it. Here's a small list of what's wrong:

1. Remember that stupid "lel you missed a single box meme"? It happens a few times in 1-3, while in 4 they intentionally do it in EVERY level. They put boxes off-screen which you can only find by using the right stick to slightly tilt the camera at every new frame you reach. The addition of this tiny gimmick alone makes completion 10x more tedious.

2. Crash 1 no death + all boxes requirement is back, but now the levels are much longer. They might as well have brought back its busted save system too.

3. You have to 100% every level in inverted mode as well. You know those gimmicky filters that games have as unlockables? The ones that you flip on a for a second just to see what it is and never turn on again? You have to now play the entire game with them. Exactly one of them is kind of neat and the rest are downright nauseating to look at for more than 5 seconds.

4. Developer times now have their own relic. This one isn't a requirement for 100%, but just another thing that bothered me. Platinums are basically the gold relics of this game now, since they ARE required for max percent.

5. For some reason the game doesn't tell you which levels contain color gems. Accidentally spoiled myself the location when watching another playthrough being under the impression that I had fully completed the level. Sounds minor, but it's another log in the shit pile.

6. And the bonuses really suck. Each one is essentially the bonus from Stormy Ascent.

slog of a game

[Anonymous No.9793445]

Is it just me or do people always say cr4sh is good and then proceed to describe at length how it's a horrible game made by idiots

[Anonymous No.9793507]

>>9788003
>How are the others in that regard?
Checkpoints save your crate count so it's more toelrable, but 2 still manages to throw some diabolical levels to 100%. 3 is full of out of touch/place crap.

[Anonymous No.9793602]

Crash 2 is kino, I had it in one of those black demo discs back in the day, and immediately went to find the full game. Jesus man when did I get 32 years old, it’s so fucking sad.

[Anonymous No.9793737]

>>9793445
that's the thing about it. it's sort of both. there's a very stark difference in the enjoyment between just finishing it and fully completing it. for the people that don't want to bother with 100%, it's not bad at all.

[Anonymous No.9793785]

What do people think of the N sane trilogy?

I absolutely love it. Haven't gone back to the originals in a while. 100% crash 1 isn't a pain anymore since you can now die in sunset vista

[Anonymous No.9793813]

>>9793785
I mostly liked it with a few complaints
>Crash 1
better controls, replayable bonus rounds!
but it lost its original dark aesthetic in a misguided attempt to unify the style between all three games. music was badly handled in more than a few places too.
>Crash 2
something just felt off with how the graphics looked in some of these levels. the warp room looked worse, lighting was badly off. otherwise controlled well. time trials were a bitch though, especially because they put in the crash dash for god knows what reason. i would say this one was the worst conversion.
>Crash 3
levels looked better here than in 2, but the vehicle levels are worse than ever, especially the bike. just flat out broken really. the plane levels control better, but it's a small consolation. water looks terrible in the jetski levels and controls are also worse there too.

the worst thing for me was that they put time trials in 1 and 2 when the games were never designed for them. people make the argument that it increases replayability, but for me it's the complete opposite. after getting all the platinum relics, i just never want to back to it at all, whereas the original ill feel like replaying after enough time.

[Anonymous No.9793814]

>>9793785
Don't you still have to no death Sunset Vista? they kept that requirement on levels that give color gems.

[Anonymous No.9793818]

>>9793814
sunset vista is a clear gem, so no.
easy to gem now.

[Anonymous No.9793820]

>>9793814
>>9793818
and you can replay the cortex bonus to top it off

[Anonymous No.9793823]

>>9793818
Maybe the other big temple level then? I remember at least one of those big motherfucker levels still had to be done without dying and I loved it as much as I hated it.

[Anonymous No.9793828]

>>9793823
yeah, that one you still do. it's easier than vista, but only slightly.

[Anonymous No.9793934]

>>9788282
Absolutely based

[Anonymous No.9793965]

>>9788329
another thing 1 had was this really sharp, raw look. like I remember the bats looking strikingly real the first time I played Temple Ruins. also when you die from an enemy in 1 you don't become an angel. the screen goes black and the camera zooms in on your corpse. rather disturbing for kids.

[Anonymous No.9794307]

>>9793785
>1 isn't a pain anymore since you can now die in sunset vista
Sunset Vista is less of an issue than those road to nowhere and lights out levels.

[Anonymous No.9794331]

>>9788282
Crash 1 filtered the casuals but the first two games were equally great & enduring classics imo, and I can recommend them with the same air of confidence I could recommend the first two games of Spyro, DKC, & Sonic. Warped was a mixed bag however.

>>9793965
Everything from the dark cartoonish visuals to the haunting ambient music score to the difficulty level of the game made for a jarring experience. But its a really nice & memorable game if you didn't get filtered by it.

[Anonymous No.9794352]

so is 2 the best PS1 crash game? I've never played any of them

[Anonymous No.9794360]

>>9794352
I'd say it's tied with 1 but 2 is more beginner-friendly & perhaps the best starting point for newcomers (if you're playing the originals on the PS1).

[Anonymous No.9794362]

>>9788407
You have to be a turboautist to 100% crash games for sure

Unlike for example Spyro game which are easy to 100% even without guides

[Anonymous No.9794567]

>>9794352
1 is a better platformer, 2 is overall a better action game, 3 is just nonsense.

[Anonymous No.9794586]

>>9794352
is the most "good" one

[Anonymous No.9794604]

>>9794362
This is what bad players tell themselves

[Anonymous No.9794653]

2 and 3 are really easy. 1 it takes time to get used to it.

[Anonymous No.9794963]

>>9793241
>Exactly one of them is kind of neat and the rest are downright nauseating to look at for more than 5 seconds.
which one are you referring to? I didn't mess with any of that stuff

[Anonymous No.9795005]

>>9794963
the one where the level doesn't have any color at first and spinning makes crash splash paint over it to restore the original color. there's even a nice artist skin to go with the idea. the level where you first use it is also just well-designed in general.
https://youtu.be/4CosE1vUGzo?t=10

here's what the rest are like
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5i4YlWtPEWs

[Anonymous No.9795014]

>>9795005

[Anonymous No.9795072]

100% crash 2 on the n sane trilogy last night in one sitting. First time I've ever done such a thing. Death abuse for gems is the best feeling

[Anonymous No.9795181]

>>9795072
I could never bring myself to do death abuses in most games for some autistic reason. Brain just goes
>Nope, don't do it! Dying is wrong. Don't even do it if it saves 10 minutes. Just play the level again from the start like you're supposed to. You like the level anyway.
Only exception is for miss-able boxes.

[Anonymous No.9795419]

>>9793785
I thoroughly enjoyed 1 and 3 but I think they really ruin 2.

Like 3 is more or less a perfectly good straight remake that doesn't fuck with anything, and the DLC level is really fun. When I played it it really felt like the real motherfucker level that was always missing from 3, like its own version of Sunset Vista or Cold Hard Crash (to be clear I'm saying this as a good thing)

1 tones down the difficulty to reasonable levels but still preserves a little of the original challenge by keeping the death requirement on color gems. Since 1 has some more precision platforming going on it's really where you'll notice the slight physics and collision changes which I don't think is really a big deal but you'll definitely miss one or two jumps in a level like the High Road that you would have made with the proper physics.
I personally really liked the addition of time trials in 1 and I think they do a good job at adding extra challenge. Since there's no extra abilities you can just do them whenever you want which is nice, instead of having to save them all for the end of the game if you want good times. If you're not an achievement whore they're totally optional which is good.

2 was where they hide all the suck though. Aesthetically it's really unpolished and a lot of the levels and areas just kind of look like shit and there's a lot of lighting problems. They basically redid the warp rooms to make them worse. Gameplay wise I think they tried to maintain that slide jump trick from the originals but they did a shitty job at it and made it even easier to do and more broken, like if you wanted to you can just fucking fly over damn near every obstacle in the game with it and it just comes across sloppy. Unlike 1, 2's implementation of the time trials is garbage because they add in the dash for beating Cortex so you basically can't do the time trials in 2 until you have a mechanic lifted from 3 making them feel pointless.

[Anonymous No.9795490]

>>9795181
Eh, outside of really specific speedrun autism the only time it's useful to death abuse is to just get all the gems in one go in certain levels like the nobox gem or those timer gems.

The purple gem death route is definitely a cheat but that death route is a motherfucker if you actually bother trying to do it. Like every time I replay 2 I say to myself "this time I'm NOT going to skip the purple gem route" but I bitch out every time lol.