Concerning platformers? Sure.
But don't worry about your console war, PS1 had it better on every other genre. (Well okay, not FPS)
-
If you have been following the news, you should be aware that the people of Lebanon have been under a violent bombardment that has recently escalated. Please consider donating to help them if you can or trying to spread word of the fundraiser.
-
Asheville and Western North Carolina at large are in crisis after Helene, please consider contributing to these local organizations and helping the people whose lives have been destroyed.
Crash Bandicoot is a bad platformer
- Thread starter Infinity Times Two
- Start date
Concerning platformers? Sure.
But don't worry about your console war, PS1 had it better on every other genre. (Well okay, not FPS)
I had a N64 back in the day but I played Crash too because a friend of mine had the PlayStation, and even though I had played Mario 64 and Banjo-Kazooie A LOT, I thought Crash was great and had a great time, and still do. Maybe I don't have good taste, I dunno.
It's a controversial statement, but I agree. I was so excited about the Insane Triology, rushed out to buy it at launch in order to re-live my young PS1 days... But it didn't really work like that, playing the game now felt like repeatably punching myself in the face, the contols are awkward/janky, the hit detection seems off, the game is stupidly punishing at points and the gameplay for me is just very basic and one dimensional - but most of all, I didn't find the games fun at all.
I fully understand this is my opinion and I fully respect other gamer's opinions but Crash really isn't for me anymore. It still feels like an early PS1 platformer to me.
It's made me wary of the Spyro Trilogy now as well, I LOVED Spyro when I was younger but I'm not sure I want to buy it now after my thoughts on Crash.
I fully understand this is my opinion and I fully respect other gamer's opinions but Crash really isn't for me anymore. It still feels like an early PS1 platformer to me.
It's made me wary of the Spyro Trilogy now as well, I LOVED Spyro when I was younger but I'm not sure I want to buy it now after my thoughts on Crash.
That's a ridiculous comparison. Those fighters weren't considered to be some of the best received and best selling games on the system.
Crash 3 has a 91 metacritic score. The series sold consoles, and they're consistently the best selling PS Classics on PS3 for 10 years now, and they were all in the biggest sellers on PS1.
Waited the whole time for that response. ERA you never disappoint me
Don't let the avatar fool you; I missed the console wars of the 90s. I didn't even get my first console until the 00's were more than half done.
I'd have said that both consoles had loads of fun platformers, but that's just me.
Your taste is fine. It isn't a zero-sum game, despite what some people will tell you. The Crash games do different things to what wide-open games like Mario 64 or Banjo do, and both approaches are totally valid and fun in their own ways.
The PS1 has Tombi, Klonoa, Spyro...Let's not forget Rayman too
The N64 has a massively under appreciated platformer in the name of Mischief Makers, meanwhile I do think that Spyro was a much better platformer than BK ever was. Wasn't there that Bugs Bunny platformer that was surprisingly good too ? The two systems weren't lacking in quality platformers, anyone arguing that they didn't know better on both sides is disingenuous.
The N64 has a massively under appreciated platformer in the name of Mischief Makers, meanwhile I do think that Spyro was a much better platformer than BK ever was. Wasn't there that Bugs Bunny platformer that was surprisingly good too ? The two systems weren't lacking in quality platformers, anyone arguing that they didn't know better on both sides is disingenuous.
Crash Bandicoot is great.
Super Mario 64 is one of my all-time favourite games.
Cortex Strikes Back fixes up a lot of the first games awkward quirks and brings forward what works. Warped is a Victory Lap with a few new ideas.
I'd say that if one is bothering you, stick to two and three and have a better time.
Comparing it to something like 64 or Banjo-Kazooie isn't entirely fair as they're sandboxes with objectives, not obstacle courses like the old 2D Marios. In BK's case Jumping and Platforming isn't even the main focus.
The fact that you have complete Camera Control in those games should designate it from something like Crash when the Boulder Levels wouldn't work with those controls.
D-Pad is perfect for that kind of movement too IMO. 64DS and 3D World even proves it's fine for Mario.
Meanwhile something like Super Mario 3D Land (my favourite Crash-alike game) is more appropriate. A great bridge between 2D and 3D that benefits from tailored camera placement and staging like the best Crash Levels.
Bugs Bunny: Lost in Time is aces. Holds up really well too because of its cel-shading.
Super Mario 64 is one of my all-time favourite games.
Cortex Strikes Back fixes up a lot of the first games awkward quirks and brings forward what works. Warped is a Victory Lap with a few new ideas.
I'd say that if one is bothering you, stick to two and three and have a better time.
Comparing it to something like 64 or Banjo-Kazooie isn't entirely fair as they're sandboxes with objectives, not obstacle courses like the old 2D Marios. In BK's case Jumping and Platforming isn't even the main focus.
The fact that you have complete Camera Control in those games should designate it from something like Crash when the Boulder Levels wouldn't work with those controls.
D-Pad is perfect for that kind of movement too IMO. 64DS and 3D World even proves it's fine for Mario.
Meanwhile something like Super Mario 3D Land (my favourite Crash-alike game) is more appropriate. A great bridge between 2D and 3D that benefits from tailored camera placement and staging like the best Crash Levels.
Bugs Bunny: Lost in Time is aces. Holds up really well too because of its cel-shading.
Last edited:
That crash 3 score was during the era when nothing scored lower than a 6-7 and there were multiple console specific magazines who would throw 10s at any half decent exclusive. There are some really odd scores from that period. The remasters are between 76 and 80 on metacritic across all 4 platforms and imo that's still a tad high.
My point is that this genre doesn't have any truly great games on ps1 in the same way that fighters (and I'd add RPG's) were under represented on n64. Someone mentioned a couple of really fun games in tomba and Rayman and I'd say they were the pick of the ps1s platformers.
PS1 Crash > Any 3D Mario
I enjoy the way the games are linear the same way i enjoy 3D Land/World over open stuff like 64/Sunshine. I would love more "3D corridor platformers" existing and it's sad that 3 games on the PS1 are pretty much the only stuff like that.
I enjoy the way the games are linear the same way i enjoy 3D Land/World over open stuff like 64/Sunshine. I would love more "3D corridor platformers" existing and it's sad that 3 games on the PS1 are pretty much the only stuff like that.
It really is. It's a bad, bad game. The Jump is floaty and imprecise, you can clip and kinda "slide" down many edges and paltforms, the enemies' hitboxes are often abritrary and not at all obvious, the visual code on which enemies you can jump on is unclear, many levels make it impossible to see further than one jump ahead, killing any possibility of momentum (let alone mentioning the fucking "run towards the camera" levels) and the "2D"-sections still have 3D movement, making it possible to jump in "front" or sometimes even "behind" the platform instead of onto it.
The reversed camera/chase sequences make jumping to platforms difficult and can make things cheap. Some levels are also absurdly cheap.
Yeah I've never rated them at all... Not a fan of Crash as character in general, though I grew up with an N64 so I'm pretty biased in that regard! Having recently played the remakes, I have to wonder what the appeal ever was... They're such stiff and narrow games, with some of the lousiest controls I've seen in a platformer. But is that difficulty curve part of why people like them? I really don't get it.
That first paragraph could apply entirely to Mario 64/any other game that got good reviews then. I know reviews are opinion based, but you can't just say the games that got high scores didn't deserve them unless you liked the game in which case the score is correct.
Even if the PS1 didn't have any truly great platformers, that's not the point. The point here is that people are saying it is a bad game, which it absolutely clearly isn't. I don't like FFVII: I still think it's a great game.
'Twas for the best. Crash and Spyro's games were way too samey. Game 1 was charming but rough, Game 2 perfected the formula so much that Game 3 would've been boring data discs for both series if not for the alternative levels and mini-games.
In both series I played the third game before the second, and vastly prefer the third in both.
Time trials in Crash 3 were my jam back then, too. Spent so much time on those.
I had both PS1 and N64 and only Mario 64 was a better platform than Crash Bandicoot games.
Agreed. I'm no big Crash lover but Croc was absolutely wank back in the day. Never mind in 2018.
But the crash games did get reviewed again in a different era and the scores were 78 on average for all 3 in a remaster. We could look at the only remaster of Mario 64 which was a really odd version on the ds as a comparison? That went down from a 94 to an 85 although that was an inferior port on a system without analogue controls. Regardless of the remaster issues these aren't downgraded ports to fit a different type of system.
People saying that crash is bad is an opinion. The metacritic scores for the games as a whole probably sit in the 60s/70s which imo I think is fair. But there are some in this thread making out that they're superior to 3D Mario games which if were using metacritic as a benchmark is patently false.
The fact there is a thread with this many saying that they think crash isn't a very good platformer shows this isn't a rare opinion either.
As you've got Oro as your avatar I'll use fighters as an analogy. I think of crash bandicoot games as the world heroes of platformers. They aren't art of fighting crap but they're certainly not super turbo or
Kof98.
The metascores are obviously just a sign that the reviewers didnt know better when it came to platformers.
/s just in case
I don't think this is especially controversial, especially regarding the first one. It's a weird perspective with a lot of teething problems back in the day but it has its charms.
I went from Mario 64 to playing this game at a friends house and I could tell the design and quality were night and day. Still I see everyone praise it over the years as I disliked it and never went back I have thought about giving the remasters a go just because. Though what I really want is Spyro and then some Ape Escape remakes, the first one was a masterpiece that I even played for ages on the PSP with the worse controls (I always thought a remaster for Vita would have been perfect to show off the dual sticks on a handheld but I guess Sony never did).
I think all the people who keep buying the good Crash games (be it back then or right now) disagree with you, as do I. It's a great platformer, and it's a good thing that it doesn't play like most platformers. That you think it's somehow unfair sucks to you, because you seem to be blaming the game for your shortcomings.
I thought it was a crappy game when it came out and I didn't know anyone who had it or even cared to play it. Years later I found that there were people out there on the internet who not only played it but even liked it. I thought that was pretty weird, and then there was a re-release that people were genuinely excited about.
It's like my personal Berenstain/Berenstein Bears situation.
It's like my personal Berenstain/Berenstein Bears situation.
When Crash first came out, the PS1 didn't have analog sticks. I think that's why the controls don't quite transfer into the remake. It really was designed to be played with a digital d-pad.
If you replaced every DS1 boss with Bed of Chaos it would indeed probably be equally frustrating.
Crash got big because back then it had no better competitior on the platform it released.
Nowadays its popular because of nostalgic. To be honest the first Crash is just a bad game.
Whoever bought the triology on Switch, PS4, XOne should skip the first game. Otherwise the disappointment will probably prevent people to play the better successors.
Nowadays its popular because of nostalgic. To be honest the first Crash is just a bad game.
Whoever bought the triology on Switch, PS4, XOne should skip the first game. Otherwise the disappointment will probably prevent people to play the better successors.
Couldn't agree more OP, it's a bucket of fetid pish IMO. Every time I tried to played it (on more occasions than I'd like to admit) I found it so inconsistent with deaths, and those running into the camera sections can GTFO, nowhere as good as other games that have done it. More power to those who love it, I just couldn't.
I never got the love around these games, I thought they sucked back then and cannot imagine they have improved at all since. The cart racing game is good though.
Crash games are fantastic. Despite being a solid experience, the remaster was done on the cheap and it shows, but that doesn't take away from the timeless quality of the originals.
Do people actually have trouble with the run toward the camera levels, or is it trolling? They're usually some of the easiest levels in their respective games.
Do people actually have trouble with the run toward the camera levels, or is it trolling? They're usually some of the easiest levels in their respective games.
Nah, even 20 years later the games have proved to stand the test of time by doing great numbers with the remaster, plus topping the PS one classics charts in Europe. If the gameplay hadn't aged well I don't think it'd still be selling like this. With that said, everyone's entitled to their opinion, however wrong it may be.
I was able to not reply to all the shit takes saying Crash is a bad platformer but fucking Croc?? Tank controls Croc?? Jesus Christ.Having played the remaster, I agree. They're mediocre games, failing at the core gameplay (trash jumping).
Now this was a good game.
That's awful if true.
The Jak trilogy is ripe for a remake, one of the goat 3D platformers, they can finally fix the problems in Jak II and 3.
This is like someone saying they hate the Classic Sonic titles but instead love the Bubsy games.
Croc is literally bottom of the barrel shit-tier.