Now, I have to point out right now that I know nothing about the Crash Bandicoot franchise as a whole, except that it was created as Sony's answer to Mario's popularity. And we already have a talking mammal trying to unseat Mario as the face of gaming, and it's not like Sonic did that good of a job in that regard! (Flame shield ready: I prefer Sonic to Mario, but I know that Mario is usually the better performer.) But I digress.
On a holiday a while ago, a friend of a friend who I was staying with gave me this game to help while away the hours (I still have a classic Nintendo DS, by the way.) I never really gave it much thought, until the flight home from a holiday I had just this week. Since it was there, I decided to play through it properly, and I got through the first two worlds before I went off to play more Pokemon. And here's my opinion: It would have worked a lot better if it had been on a platform with better system specs.
The gameplay is pretty much what I know of Crash, done from a 2D perspective (mostly). You run, you jump, you spin-kick, you ground-pound, and sometimes there's levels that are underwater, involve jetpack flying (from behind Crash) or have you running away from a yeti (from in front, and the camera being in front isn't great when Sonic does it, either.) The graphics do their job, but they don't *wow* me like some games do, even games that aren't called Fallout 3, and the soundtrack is pretty good but once again, not exactly memorable.
Like I said above, I reckon this really could have been something great, but the Game Boy Advance just doesn't do it justice. And while I've seen some impressive technical achievements on the console (say what you like about the port of NFS Most Wanted, the full-3D thing was pretty cool), this game was made back before people were trying to push it. So, it's only average at best.
Graphics: 6/10
Like I've already said, they do the job, but they're far from excellent.
Sound: 8/10
I'd probably enjoy it more if I knew whether that was music used in the other games.
Gameplay: 6.5/10
Could have been good, but the 3D sections kinda let it down, and there's some annoying difficulty spikes (especially if you want the white gem for breaking all the boxes, or an ankh for beating a time trial.) Also, you can't skip over levels that have mechanics you hate.
Controls: 8.5/10
They're fluid, but since Crash has only ever heard of inertia when he's standing on ice, it's a little bit awkward at times.
Longevity: 7/10
There's a whole lot of side objectives, but most of them are just too hard!!
Overall: 7.1/10
It's okay, but unless you're a fan of Crash, either rent it or pass it up entirely.
On a holiday a while ago, a friend of a friend who I was staying with gave me this game to help while away the hours (I still have a classic Nintendo DS, by the way.) I never really gave it much thought, until the flight home from a holiday I had just this week. Since it was there, I decided to play through it properly, and I got through the first two worlds before I went off to play more Pokemon. And here's my opinion: It would have worked a lot better if it had been on a platform with better system specs.
The gameplay is pretty much what I know of Crash, done from a 2D perspective (mostly). You run, you jump, you spin-kick, you ground-pound, and sometimes there's levels that are underwater, involve jetpack flying (from behind Crash) or have you running away from a yeti (from in front, and the camera being in front isn't great when Sonic does it, either.) The graphics do their job, but they don't *wow* me like some games do, even games that aren't called Fallout 3, and the soundtrack is pretty good but once again, not exactly memorable.
Like I said above, I reckon this really could have been something great, but the Game Boy Advance just doesn't do it justice. And while I've seen some impressive technical achievements on the console (say what you like about the port of NFS Most Wanted, the full-3D thing was pretty cool), this game was made back before people were trying to push it. So, it's only average at best.
Graphics: 6/10
Like I've already said, they do the job, but they're far from excellent.
Sound: 8/10
I'd probably enjoy it more if I knew whether that was music used in the other games.
Gameplay: 6.5/10
Could have been good, but the 3D sections kinda let it down, and there's some annoying difficulty spikes (especially if you want the white gem for breaking all the boxes, or an ankh for beating a time trial.) Also, you can't skip over levels that have mechanics you hate.
Controls: 8.5/10
They're fluid, but since Crash has only ever heard of inertia when he's standing on ice, it's a little bit awkward at times.
Longevity: 7/10
There's a whole lot of side objectives, but most of them are just too hard!!
Overall: 7.1/10
It's okay, but unless you're a fan of Crash, either rent it or pass it up entirely.