Disclaimer: Crash Bandicoot 2 was one of the first games I ever touched in my life. It's a game that I've played to 100% completion at least six or seven times and, as such, it will be difficult for me to remain fully objective when talking about the game. I didn't own Crash 1 or Crash 3 for another few years but while I'm not as familiar with them, I have still played them both a lot.
To get started, I'm going to talk about some of the engine changes between the originals and this game. It's been well documented around the internet now that most jumps in are now harder. Nobody is 100% sure on why - most people think it's to do with a change in the collision detection - but it is very noticeable, especially in Crash 1. I do not think this was an intentional change. I obviously don't have insight into how the game was created but there are jumps now in the game that require you to push the direction the millisecond after you jump or bounce on something. This can lead to some pretty frustrating moments where previously mundane jumps have to be positioned perfectly. There's one level in Crash 1 in particular where you have to jump on some turtles to bounce across gaps on a bridge which has gone from somewhat challenging to something that costed me thirty of my lives. I also failed some bonuses right at the end just because my jumps weren't perfectly positioned. It's oddly demanding and I don't remember this much being asked of me back in the original games.
This is less of a problem in Crash 2 and Crash 3 due to slide jumps in the former and the double jump/glide power ups in the latter. Still, these games aren't without new odd glitches. The originals were generally very well polished with only a few minor hiccups here and there. I came across multiple minor graphical glitches throughout my playthrough of the N-Sane Trilogy as well as one gamebreaking glitch against N. Tropy that made him invincible even after death so I had to restart. I'm curious as to how more glitches are in the game now considering these are remakes but the glitches are definitely very minor. That said, I imagine that my N. Tropy glitch is extremely rare (I hit him on the same frame I died, I think) so I won't press the matter much further.
Aside from that, Vicarious Visions have added Relics from Crash 3 to Crash 1 and 2 which are extremely welcome. These time trials were always a really fun challenge that made you think about levels in an entirely different way so it's great to see the old levels get updated like that. Levels I've been familiar with for years in Crash 2 suddenly became a different beast as I was no longer waiting for enemies to move through their patterns.
They also added Coco Bandicoot as a playable character for all three games. She can't be used for Crash specific levels like riding Polar, diving or in boss fights. She basically just acts as an alternate skin for Crash but I will say that the team did a spectacular job on her animations. Her victory dance is impossibly cute and other neat touches like how she skates with her hands behind her back holding her laptop are the cherry on top. They did such a good job on Coco that her alone gives me confidence that this team making another Crash game would do well with it - all of her animations are so very Crash that she doesn't feel like an addition at all but rather something that should have always been part of the game.
With that out of the way, let's talk about the actual games.
Crash Bandicoot 1
I think the Crash trilogy is very comparable to the original Sonic games on the Mega Drive - Sonic 1 is an alright game that the sequels improved upon and fixed to make into classics. In my mind, the original Crash game simply isn't very good any more. If I was to recommend this series to someone, I'd tell them to skip the original entirely and move straight onto Crash 2.
In the original game, Crash has an extremely limited moveset of jumping, moving and spinning. He's unable to crouch or slide which makes the way you approach levels very linear. This isn't a terrible problem on its own - the original Mario game had only running, jumping and firing fireballs - but the level design doesn't really attempt to mix up the gameplay in any meaningful way. Pits are simply flat cuts in the ground and enemies are extremely simple for the most part. A large majority of the levels involve you holding up and pressing X at the right time to avoid obstacles. There are also plenty of side scrolling segments which basically fall under the same category. There are a lot of time based challenges in Crash 1 with platforms moving on a specific timer to make you have to make jumps as the game demands it. I don't think the platforming in Crash 1 is ever outright bad - there are good sections like the one in The Lab where you have to spin exclamation crates to open doors but it is for the most part very bland and without variety.
To be fair to Crash 1, it does have some different kinds of levels. There's a level where you ride on the back of a hog that automatically moves forward while you jump out of the way of obstacles that's fun enough to return in both the sequels. There's also a level where you run away from a boulder chasing you which forces some kind of urgency. I always disliked that you run towards the camera in these levels as it can make it a bit hard to know when obstacles are coming up but the levels generally goad you in the direction you're meant to go by leaving a trail of wumpa fruit or by having small lips at the edges of platforms you're meant to jump off.
I will say that Crash 1 actually has some pretty decent bosses after the first few. Well, it's probably fairer to say that the last three bosses are good while the first three are pretty dull/complete pushovers. Pinstripe has a neat cover mechanic that is some welcome variety, N. Brio has you avoiding explosive bottles and jumping on enemies to damage him and Cortex has a whole host of lasers to dodge and hit back at him. Cortex in particular is pretty challenging while also being fair - there's a lot of stuff to avoid but it's all very doable as he generally aims at you or, if not at you, his attacks come in slowly from off screen. Reflecting his attacks back is neat as well because you can't really get over to them fast enough to reflect if you're just running away so it makes you have to play somewhat dangerously at all times.
Crash 1 does a pretty good job of teaching the player about upcoming dangers well before they could pose a threat. Every new mechanic will give you a bit of time to see it before you have to deal with it. Enemies are often placed so an immediate jump would kill the player so they have to stop and wait, see the enemy's pattern and then tackle the challenge. Platforms are placed like this too - the first platforms that appear and disappear into the wall are placed above solid ground on a vertical climb so that failure isn't punishing.
You collect Gems in Crash games by collecting all the boxes in a level. In the original game, dying would reset your box count to zero so you had to collect all the boxes and not die to get a Gem. Considering how challenging some of these levels can be, that's a tall ask so the sequels got rid of the no death requirement with the exception of the special coloured Gems used to unlock alternate routes. I think this is a good compromise and is definitely welcome with the added difficult jumps to an already difficult game.
Crash Bandicoot 2: Cortex Strikes Back
A few seconds of playing Crash 2 and it becomes apparent that this is a much better game. The first thing that Crash 2 does is give you a tiny area to run through before you're taken to the warp room to get used to the controls. I think this is a really good idea as the player is taught very basic mechanics here while also giving the original developers Naughty Dog the freedom to make even the opening levels somewhat complex for experienced players which I'll get to later.
Crash/Coco have been given access to a slide move which allows you to move a little bit faster. Jumping during this slide makes you jump higher and further than normal as well. This small technique allows you to move with much more speed and freedom which makes all the platforming generally more exciting as you keep momentum up. In the original game, you would often just hold up and jump whereas in Crash 2, you're pressing more buttons at a time which makes everything just feel better. You're also able to take shortcuts over gaps that a regular jump wouldn't reach - this is pretty notable in the water levels where you can skip platforms entirely using a well timed slide jump. The developers also made it so that you can jump just after sliding off a ledge to give you the freedom to use a slide jump everywhere and also avoid frustrations where you just about slide off the edge of a platform and die.
Pits in Crash 2 have odd shapes to them which often encourage you to jump from one side to another at an angle - this isn't really any more challenging than just jumping over a pit but it gives the player more things to do as well. Arguably the best thing about all of Crash 2 is how it manages to make even its early levels very creative for experienced players. Crash 1 was a very hard game and Naughty Dog were aware of this - getting to the end of Crash 2 with its mandatory 25 Crystals is a much, much easier affair. I don't think getting all of Crash 2's 42 Gems is as hard as getting all of Crash 1's but it's still more challenging than the main game by a long shot. A general good design philosophy is that optional challenges should be harder than mandatory ones - inexperienced players aren't gated away from content whereas experienced ones are rewarded with more challenging, complex content.
Nearly every single level in Crash 2 has some kind of secret or element to make it more challenging to obtain their Gems. In addition to getting Gems for breaking all the boxes, fifteen of the twenty seven levels also have Gems for doing additional tasks such as completing an optional, more difficult route, beating a level quickly enough or even finding a hidden secret exit. On top of that, those Gems for breaking all the boxes are often complex enough on their own - some are only possible by finding hidden paths in other levels whereas others require you to do backtracking through multiple routes. The infamous example of this is Cold Hard Crash. In Crash 2, there are "Death Platforms" which are basically optional routes that are only unlocked if you reach a certain point in a level without dying. These all have Gems at the end. Cold Hard Crash takes it a step further by having boxes in its Death Route to make it mandatory for getting the All Boxes Gem. But then it goes a step further by making you backtrack through the entire Death Route again to go back to the main path to get the All Boxes Gem. The Death Route is laid out so that it's also challenging on the way back thanks to the icy floor and the obstacles reversing their order of threat (two pillars thumping down from above will take different timing in each direction). In this way, players of three different calibres are rewarded - a player who plays through just the basic level is rewarded with a Crystal, a semi-experienced player is rewarded with a Death Route Gem and an experienced player is rewarded with an All Boxes Gem.
Cold Hard Crash is probably the hardest level in the game and not all of them are as complicated as that. The All Boxes Gem in Road to Ruin requires you to find a hidden route in another level and then you're basically given the All Boxes Gem. I'm unsure exactly how to feel about these hidden routes - I know all of them because I played the game so much as a kid but I wonder if a newcomer to the game would get frustrated if they spent their time in a level getting what they thought was all the boxes only to be told "nope, go elsewhere first". Some of these hidden exits are also quite cryptic but Vicarious Visions have included loading screen hints for levels with these exits which do a good job to keep the secrets secret without making them too obvious. I still do think that somebody would struggle to get 100% on this game without a guide, though.
As I said, the opening levels are able to more complicated thanks to these Gems. In the opening warp room, three of the levels have additional Gems and the two without them have somewhat challenging All Boxes gems - The Pits forces you to backtrack through a separate route and Level 5 (I forget the name lol) has lots of missable boxes as it's a level where a boulder charges towards you. Noticeable, Vicarious Visions have changed Snow Go to make it so that you can't obtain the Red Gem early. Basically, the Red Gem is visible in the level but you have to go to a hidden route in another level to actually obtain it. In the original game, you could obtain it by doing a glitched high jump bouncing off the seal at a certain angle so Vicarious Visions have simply moved the gem further up so this is no longer possible. They also fixed this glitch in general (from what I can see, anyway) which makes it impossible to sequence break Road to Ruin in the same way. You can also no longer jump on areas of the background to skip the pits with the mole rats in Turtle Woods or skip the need for a Death Platform in Diggin' It. These are all welcome changes for the non-speedrunner and I'm glad they were fixed.
While I could endlessly praise Crash 2 all day (and believe me, I could), I will level some criticisms at it. The bosses are nearly all terrible. Tiny Tiger is the only one that's acceptable and even then, he's extremely basic. The final boss in particular is an absolute joke for forcing the player to use a jetpack and not the basic controls. On that note, the jetpack levels in general are very, very bad, breaking up the pace completely and forcing you to move slowly through a 3D space that just doesn't work well. I've also found that the depth perception in these levels is really wonky - I've often flown into things I didn't realise were so close. Depth perception in general is a problem in the Crash games as the camera is often more horizontal than most 3D platformers. This can make it hard to tell whether or not you're going to land on a platform. The water levels avoid this by moving the camera up so I kind of wish that all levels had gone for this fix. Side scrolling levels naturally aren't guilty of this.
The level design in Crash 2 is generally extremely solid throughout to the point that I'm struggling to think of a weak level. Mechanics are introduced, expanded upon and then resolved in a simplistic manner which demands enough of the player to be satisfying. The space levels in Warp Room 5 are a great example of this. They introduce an enemy that has lightning on either side so you have to jump on it. Then it introduces the same enemy with the lightning on its top so you have to slide or spin into it. Then they introduce one of these enemies that changes the lightning from the top to the side so that you have to adapt to its positioning. It then starts to puts these enemies in patterns so they're vulnerable from the top as you would jump over an obstacle before making the next one vulnerable from the side instead, forcing the player to jump into a small space with this enemy. I hope I described that well enough but you can see here that the challenge increases very slowly but in a way that you are taught the mechanics fairly in advance.
The only examples of bad level design are in the cryptic stuff occasionally. There's one notable part where you have to literally jump down a pit on purpose to find a Gem and I really don't know how seven year old Skarfelt worked that out. In this part and when you find the Purple Gem, Naughty Dog decided to put the Gems right at the start of the optional routes. Unfortunately, this was stupid because if you die, you keep the Gem in your inventory and you respawn back on the main route so there's no reason to complete the Purple Gem route at all.
There are also levels where you ride a polar bear creatively named Polar. His levels function the same as the Hog level in Crash 1 but with more variety in enemies and challenges. These are a pretty fun diversion as they're still platforming and you're moving pretty quickly throughout them. There's only three of these in the game counting the secret Totally Bear and the only other time Polar is used is in a brief segment in Unbearable so they're not frequent enough to take away from the main game at all if you don't like them for whatever reason.
Once you beat the final boss, you are given the Sprint powerup, something was previously only in Crash 3. This makes Relic challenges much easier but I do find it kind of odd that it's possible to do Relics long before you obtain this power. If I had started doing Relics before I got the power, I would be pretty annoyed that I'd been effectively wasting my time without the Sprint powerup. It doesn't really add much besides allowing you to make extremely long jumps that wouldn't otherwise be possible but it's a welcome addition nonetheless.
Finally, I think the soundtrack in Crash 2 is much stronger than the first game in my opinion. The snow levels' Death Route song, the sewer levels and the water levels in particular all have really good tracks behind them. They've all been remixed from the original game to varying levels of effectiveness. I feel the sewer song has had a bit of its energy removed due to a lack of "hard-ness" in its intro whereas the snow level Death Route song is now much more intense, making Cold Hard Crash even better than it already was.
Crash Bandicoot 3: WARPED
A lot of the stuff that makes Crash 2 really damn good is still present in Crash 3 though there are still a few differences. Crash 3's levels don't get as complex as quickly - Crash 2's first level had a hidden Blue Gem whereas Crash 3's first level is just a straight forward slog to the finish. The first route that demands a special Gem crops up before you can physically obtain it which forces some eventual backtracking. Crash 2 put most of its coloured Gems in its first three warp rooms so there aren't really many cases of this happening - the worst example is probably how you get the Red Gem in Level 7 and you need it in Level 6 but at least these levels are in the same warp room. The way that Crash 3 approaches secrets is subtly changed and your mileage may vary on whether or not it's a good change.
In Crash 3, a lot of the optional hidden routes end with the player being transported back to the warp room rather than being moved back into the level. I feel this misses some potential to make the All Boxes Gems more complex like in Crash 2 while also forcing the player to sit through some more loading screens and play levels multiple times. That said, there were two or three of these in Crash 2 and, like in that game, these sections offer extremely focused challenges that are very well thought out. I don't think every difficult section should be built to be backtracked through like in Cold Hard Crash in Crash 2 so having these challenges exist on their own in a vacuum to be developed as much as possible is also a good thing. There are still complex All Boxes Gems as well that require backtracking or hidden routes so, like I said, it's only a subtle change that's neither for the better or for the worse.
The level design in Crash 3 is largely very good. The levels this time are themed off of different time periods and while this doesn't really effectively change anything on a mechanical level (future levels operate very similarly to Crash 2's space levels), enemy types are radically different between levels which makes things feel very fresh. Returning mechanics from Crash 2 are given a new spin in a different environment to mix things up - the ice has turned into oil that's used in the pyramid levels, the things you hang from in the sewer levels are now in the Arabian ones and so on. These mechanics are used in novel ways thanks to the new environments. For example, in the pyramids, an enemy will pull a lever to drop huge weights onto an oil slick that slowly moves towards you. You have to jump over these weights while managing the harsher controls on the oil while making sure to not be underneath the weights when they drop. I think it's impressive that Naughty Dog managed to reuse basic mechanics in different ways just by changing the environments so much.
From what I've said so far, you'd probably believe that Crash 3 is the best game of the series. If every level in the game was solid platforming, I'd probably agree with that sentiment - the pyramid levels in particular are stronger than any of the themes present in Crash 2. Unfortunately, though, "variety" was the "in" thing at the time of development. I don't really have the sources to back me up here but I remember reading interviews with the developers of Insomniac Games as well saying that they wanted as many different types of gameplay as possible, hence Spyro 3's multiple characters and skateboarding segments.
Well, in Crash 3, there are also levels which dramatically change up the gameplay. Whereas the platforming in Crash 3 has had three games to be refined to control extremely well, these "gimmick levels" are basically extremely dull in comparison. Their controls don't really feel fleshed out, leading to some accidental deaths because the player is not used to the sudden movements.
In addition to platforming, Crash 3 has underwater scuba diving levels, jet ski levels, motorbike racing levels, plane levels and levels where you ride Pura which are mechanically very similar to Crash 2's Polar levels. Pura's levels are basically just Polar's but better - the All Boxes Gem is more challenging as you can choose different routes at sections and it's mechanically superior. If you press R1, you start to charge for as long as you hold the button whereas Polar just got a burst of speed for a fixed amount of time. Going for Platinum Relics (the highest tier) in these Pura levels is actually ridiculously fun as you charge through them max speed, bypassing enemies before they've even had a chance to move.
The other four level types aren't so successful. The diving levels are probably the best of the lot - you control Crash moving slowly underwater as enemies fill the screen more and more as you progress. While there's no platforming here, the levels still feel like levels with incremental difficulty spikes so I think these are for the most part a fine change of pace. I much prefer them over the jet pack levels of Crash 2, anyway. I probably wouldn't mind these as much if the other three level types didn't exist.
The jet ski levels sound like they could be pretty fun with constant momentum but, in reality, you're forced to slow down to avoid obstacles because the thing controls so poorly that it's impossible to avoid enemies when moving at any kind of speed. You can still go fast in these levels, don't get me wrong, but you have no chance of obtaining the All Boxes Gems from these levels if you do. These levels don't really introduce much more complex mechanics after the first one and there are FOUR (!) of them in the game if you count the secret one which I do.
The motorbike racing levels are also pretty dull. There's not really much depth to be had here - you just hold accelerate and turn as required. You can avoid some obstacles on the inside of a corner if you cut it very close to the edge of the track and there are boost pads to mix things up a bit but that's basically all. The only real difference between these levels is that the first has no police cars, the second has parked police cars, the third has moving police cars and the fourth has police cars driving towards you. Yes, again, there are FOUR of these levels if you count the secret one.
Finally, there are plane levels. In these ones, you seek out some blimps, shoot them down and then move on with your life. That's basically all there is to it. The planes control perfectly fine but there's no real "level design" here - just an open space with stuff to shoot down. The hidden race level is a bit better as it forces you to line up your vehicle in a particular way to make it through all the rings while going as fast as possible but they're still not too great.
All in all, these levels make up a whopping thirteen of the game's thirty levels. If I count the two Pura levels as well, half the game's levels aren't even the core gameplay. I can speculate as to why this is - chances are that it's much easier to design a level for a plain road with no variation for the motorbike levels compared to making an entirely new level type for Crash to jump through. All of the main level types have at least three levels (outside of future which only shows up towards the end of the game so this makes sense) so at least all of the ideas get explored properly. There are only five different environments for the platforming levels in Crash 3 whereas Crash 2 had seven if I'm generous and don't count the night time levels. I probably wouldn't mind as much if all the alternate game types were as fun as Pura's levels but they're unfortunately not.
I've given this game a lot of criticism so far which is pretty unfair as the game is still very good so I'll talk about its good sides now. It has by far the best boss battles of the series. In the original, you could beat the second boss, Dingodile, in just a few seconds by slide jumping over his barrier. This has thankfully been fixed and so now we have the proper boss we always should have had. The only boss I would call weak is probably N. Gin due to the game randomly becoming StarFox for the duration of the fight but it's actually one of the better alternate gameplay modes so I won't criticise too much. The final boss is pretty good all in all - Cortex uses the same gun and hoverboard he did in Crash 1 which I think is pretty cool and there's a lot of stuff to avoid. I kind of wish that all of the bosses were a little bit harder but I don't really mind too much.
Oh, and Dingodile's boss theme is an absolute whopper of a tune.
Conclusion
I'm thankful that the PS4 doesn't track my playtime on these games because I'm sure my time spent getting platinum trophies on both Crash 2 and Crash 3 in just a few days would be extremely alarming. I've come away from the trilogy extremely satisfied - Crash 2 and 3 both have very good platforming that I would love to see expanded upon in a new game of some sort. I actually think that it's a shame that the first game people will touch in the trilogy is Crash 1 - it totally pales in comparison to Crash 2 and 3 which may turn people off touching 2 and 3 at all. I understand that Vicarious Visions were in an awkward spot here - if they realised that Crash 1 was much weaker, they still had to remake it because ignoring it would upset fans of the first game and I do recognise that such fans exist. As I said before, I'd still probably recommend that a newcomer to the series start with Crash 2. Even though it's the best game, I think that playing Crash 2 first would make somebody more willing to put up with Crash 3's bad levels.
I didn't really touch on the graphics which is like the whole point of the remakes but I will say that I'm extremely impressed with what Vicarious Visions have done. I was a little bit sceptical after I saw the first footage but these games just look so perfect in motion that I have to applaud the team. I watched a bit of footage from the originals when I was writing this and I couldn't believe how much things had changed. It really didn't feel like that much was different which is a credit to the team. It's particularly impressive because the original Crash trilogy used extremely exaggerated animations that only really worked because of the low polygon count like the way Crash's mouth opens so wide after he collects a Gem or the way his eyes go wide during certain death animations.
All in all, I think I would feel comfortable recommending the trilogy to newcomers, especially if you like platformers. It's hard to put my nostalgia aside but I hope with this article I've been able to state why I feel these are genuinely good games. I'd still suggest skipping Crash 1, though. I'm excited for the future of Crash platformers which is something I never thought I'd say.
Now just give me a remake of Crash Team Racing with online and I'll never touch another game again.
In Crash 3, a lot of the optional hidden routes end with the player being transported back to the warp room rather than being moved back into the level. I feel this misses some potential to make the All Boxes Gems more complex like in Crash 2 while also forcing the player to sit through some more loading screens and play levels multiple times. That said, there were two or three of these in Crash 2 and, like in that game, these sections offer extremely focused challenges that are very well thought out. I don't think every difficult section should be built to be backtracked through like in Cold Hard Crash in Crash 2 so having these challenges exist on their own in a vacuum to be developed as much as possible is also a good thing. There are still complex All Boxes Gems as well that require backtracking or hidden routes so, like I said, it's only a subtle change that's neither for the better or for the worse.
The level design in Crash 3 is largely very good. The levels this time are themed off of different time periods and while this doesn't really effectively change anything on a mechanical level (future levels operate very similarly to Crash 2's space levels), enemy types are radically different between levels which makes things feel very fresh. Returning mechanics from Crash 2 are given a new spin in a different environment to mix things up - the ice has turned into oil that's used in the pyramid levels, the things you hang from in the sewer levels are now in the Arabian ones and so on. These mechanics are used in novel ways thanks to the new environments. For example, in the pyramids, an enemy will pull a lever to drop huge weights onto an oil slick that slowly moves towards you. You have to jump over these weights while managing the harsher controls on the oil while making sure to not be underneath the weights when they drop. I think it's impressive that Naughty Dog managed to reuse basic mechanics in different ways just by changing the environments so much.
From what I've said so far, you'd probably believe that Crash 3 is the best game of the series. If every level in the game was solid platforming, I'd probably agree with that sentiment - the pyramid levels in particular are stronger than any of the themes present in Crash 2. Unfortunately, though, "variety" was the "in" thing at the time of development. I don't really have the sources to back me up here but I remember reading interviews with the developers of Insomniac Games as well saying that they wanted as many different types of gameplay as possible, hence Spyro 3's multiple characters and skateboarding segments.
Well, in Crash 3, there are also levels which dramatically change up the gameplay. Whereas the platforming in Crash 3 has had three games to be refined to control extremely well, these "gimmick levels" are basically extremely dull in comparison. Their controls don't really feel fleshed out, leading to some accidental deaths because the player is not used to the sudden movements.
In addition to platforming, Crash 3 has underwater scuba diving levels, jet ski levels, motorbike racing levels, plane levels and levels where you ride Pura which are mechanically very similar to Crash 2's Polar levels. Pura's levels are basically just Polar's but better - the All Boxes Gem is more challenging as you can choose different routes at sections and it's mechanically superior. If you press R1, you start to charge for as long as you hold the button whereas Polar just got a burst of speed for a fixed amount of time. Going for Platinum Relics (the highest tier) in these Pura levels is actually ridiculously fun as you charge through them max speed, bypassing enemies before they've even had a chance to move.
The other four level types aren't so successful. The diving levels are probably the best of the lot - you control Crash moving slowly underwater as enemies fill the screen more and more as you progress. While there's no platforming here, the levels still feel like levels with incremental difficulty spikes so I think these are for the most part a fine change of pace. I much prefer them over the jet pack levels of Crash 2, anyway. I probably wouldn't mind these as much if the other three level types didn't exist.
The jet ski levels sound like they could be pretty fun with constant momentum but, in reality, you're forced to slow down to avoid obstacles because the thing controls so poorly that it's impossible to avoid enemies when moving at any kind of speed. You can still go fast in these levels, don't get me wrong, but you have no chance of obtaining the All Boxes Gems from these levels if you do. These levels don't really introduce much more complex mechanics after the first one and there are FOUR (!) of them in the game if you count the secret one which I do.
The motorbike racing levels are also pretty dull. There's not really much depth to be had here - you just hold accelerate and turn as required. You can avoid some obstacles on the inside of a corner if you cut it very close to the edge of the track and there are boost pads to mix things up a bit but that's basically all. The only real difference between these levels is that the first has no police cars, the second has parked police cars, the third has moving police cars and the fourth has police cars driving towards you. Yes, again, there are FOUR of these levels if you count the secret one.
Finally, there are plane levels. In these ones, you seek out some blimps, shoot them down and then move on with your life. That's basically all there is to it. The planes control perfectly fine but there's no real "level design" here - just an open space with stuff to shoot down. The hidden race level is a bit better as it forces you to line up your vehicle in a particular way to make it through all the rings while going as fast as possible but they're still not too great.
All in all, these levels make up a whopping thirteen of the game's thirty levels. If I count the two Pura levels as well, half the game's levels aren't even the core gameplay. I can speculate as to why this is - chances are that it's much easier to design a level for a plain road with no variation for the motorbike levels compared to making an entirely new level type for Crash to jump through. All of the main level types have at least three levels (outside of future which only shows up towards the end of the game so this makes sense) so at least all of the ideas get explored properly. There are only five different environments for the platforming levels in Crash 3 whereas Crash 2 had seven if I'm generous and don't count the night time levels. I probably wouldn't mind as much if all the alternate game types were as fun as Pura's levels but they're unfortunately not.
I've given this game a lot of criticism so far which is pretty unfair as the game is still very good so I'll talk about its good sides now. It has by far the best boss battles of the series. In the original, you could beat the second boss, Dingodile, in just a few seconds by slide jumping over his barrier. This has thankfully been fixed and so now we have the proper boss we always should have had. The only boss I would call weak is probably N. Gin due to the game randomly becoming StarFox for the duration of the fight but it's actually one of the better alternate gameplay modes so I won't criticise too much. The final boss is pretty good all in all - Cortex uses the same gun and hoverboard he did in Crash 1 which I think is pretty cool and there's a lot of stuff to avoid. I kind of wish that all of the bosses were a little bit harder but I don't really mind too much.
Oh, and Dingodile's boss theme is an absolute whopper of a tune.
Conclusion
I'm thankful that the PS4 doesn't track my playtime on these games because I'm sure my time spent getting platinum trophies on both Crash 2 and Crash 3 in just a few days would be extremely alarming. I've come away from the trilogy extremely satisfied - Crash 2 and 3 both have very good platforming that I would love to see expanded upon in a new game of some sort. I actually think that it's a shame that the first game people will touch in the trilogy is Crash 1 - it totally pales in comparison to Crash 2 and 3 which may turn people off touching 2 and 3 at all. I understand that Vicarious Visions were in an awkward spot here - if they realised that Crash 1 was much weaker, they still had to remake it because ignoring it would upset fans of the first game and I do recognise that such fans exist. As I said before, I'd still probably recommend that a newcomer to the series start with Crash 2. Even though it's the best game, I think that playing Crash 2 first would make somebody more willing to put up with Crash 3's bad levels.
I didn't really touch on the graphics which is like the whole point of the remakes but I will say that I'm extremely impressed with what Vicarious Visions have done. I was a little bit sceptical after I saw the first footage but these games just look so perfect in motion that I have to applaud the team. I watched a bit of footage from the originals when I was writing this and I couldn't believe how much things had changed. It really didn't feel like that much was different which is a credit to the team. It's particularly impressive because the original Crash trilogy used extremely exaggerated animations that only really worked because of the low polygon count like the way Crash's mouth opens so wide after he collects a Gem or the way his eyes go wide during certain death animations.
All in all, I think I would feel comfortable recommending the trilogy to newcomers, especially if you like platformers. It's hard to put my nostalgia aside but I hope with this article I've been able to state why I feel these are genuinely good games. I'd still suggest skipping Crash 1, though. I'm excited for the future of Crash platformers which is something I never thought I'd say.
Now just give me a remake of Crash Team Racing with online and I'll never touch another game again.
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