Crash Bandicoot, lançado em 9 de setembro de 1996 pela Universal Interactive Studios e Naughty Dog, é um verdadeiro clássico dos videogames que deixou uma marca indelével na indústria. Como o primeiro jogo da série Crash Bandicoot, ele não apenas estabeleceu o personagem icônico de Crash, mas também solidificou a reputação da Naughty Dog como uma das principais desenvolvedoras de jogos.

A história de Crash Bandicoot nos leva a uma jornada emocionante através de várias paisagens e ambientes exóticos, enquanto tentamos frustrar os planos malignos do vilão Doctor Neo Cortex. A criação do protagonista, Crash, e sua batalha contra as forças do mal são envolventes e nos mantêm cativados do início ao fim.

A jogabilidade de Crash Bandicoot é onde o jogo realmente brilha. Com sua mistura única de plataformas desafiadoras, combate divertido e momentos de ação intensa, o jogo oferece uma experiência verdadeiramente satisfatória para os jogadores de todas as idades. Os controles são simples e responsivos, tornando a jogabilidade acessível para jogadores de todos os níveis de habilidade.

Os níveis em Crash Bandicoot são projetados com maestria, oferecendo uma combinação de desafios de plataforma, quebra-cabeças inteligentes e batalhas emocionantes contra chefes. A variedade de perspectivas, incluindo visões laterais e de deslocamento para frente, mantém a jogabilidade fresca e empolgante a cada novo nível.

Além disso, os visuais vibrantes e coloridos de Crash Bandicoot ajudam a trazer o mundo do jogo à vida de maneira impressionante. Cada ambiente é ricamente detalhado, com gráficos impressionantes que aproveitam ao máximo o hardware da época.

Em resumo, Crash Bandicoot é um tesouro dos videogames que merece seu lugar no panteão dos clássicos. Por sua jogabilidade envolvente, sua história cativante e seu legado duradouro, eu daria a Crash Bandicoot uma nota digna de 8/10. É um jogo que continua a encantar e desafiar os jogadores até hoje, e sua influência na indústria dos videogames é inegável.

I often think of Crash Bandicoot (both the character and the game) as being an important part of my formative years, I received its disc, together with the console, as a sort of inheritance from a cousin of mine after he bought himself a PS2. It is with such rose tinted glasses that I looked towards playing this game again, and that the text that follows was shaped by:

It's pretty good.
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I'm not the biggest platformhead around(at time of writing), so I can't throw comparisons that were shaped by a better execution of its core concepts, nor do I have a deep understanding of what "better" would really entail, but I think that given a similar ignorance of the medium or a possible understanding of its flaws that Crash Bandicoot is indeed "pretty good", it was (for me) often challenging but never frustratingly so and I liked the stage selection map being an overview of the islands, unfortunately I found the bosses (one of my favourite parts of gaming) to be very lacking, but I enjoyed the normal levels more so I had fun , just like in the good ol days before a fully developed frontal cor- huh.

Anyway, uh, I'd love to say Crash Bandicoot is my favourite game ever but after two levels I realised that my cousin had actually gifted me Crash Bandicoot 2: Cortex Strikes Back, which I have yet to replay, and I only played the first one for a bit when I got confused which disc was the second's. Also, Idk why I wrote this thing this way, what's up with that?

I’ve recently gained a platformer addiction over the past month, to be more specific, with PS1 platformers. I’ve played the Spyro & Crash remakes multiple times but I thought it might be worth playing through the originals, seeing how much they got right and what changes were made in the future re-releases. And beginning with the one that started it all, Crash Bandicoot is a fun time, but not a well polished one in terms of its collecting, difficulty & movement.

At its core, Crash is a very simple game. You go through the course, hit as many boxes as you can, finish the level, rinse & repeat until you get to the end. To mention the goods, I think the original has a lot more charm which you don’t really see in the remake; the limitations of the hardware works in its favour and environments have beautiful colours and vibrancy alongside a catchy soundtrack and crunchy sound effects (that live in my head rent free). I also enjoy how it tries to create some sort of journey between each level, rather than what the series became known for afterwards, the hub worlds, which feels more disjointed. I think the Jungle/Tech/Castle themes all fit really well and the designs of each of the characters are just as goofy as Crash!

Crash himself feels okay to control, though maybe having the option to play with joysticks on later controllers would’ve been a nice touch as sometimes on the harder courses the d-pad only movement makes it all the much worse. To coincide this, the lack of movement options does make him feel very rigid. Compared to 2 & 3, there's no slide kick, ground pound or unlockable powerups, just a simple walk, jump, hit & Aku-Aku for extra defence. This setup paired with some of the awkward depth perception issues results in stressful gameplay, especially if you’re trying to get all the boxes on say the bridge levels. I’d say the level design and environments themselves are great! But It’s that camera and movement that turns it into a nightmare for completionists.

Speaking of a nightmare, the difficulty spikes. The base game wasn’t too bad to get through, even with the problems with the perspective, but OH LORD trying to 100% this is an entirely new beast. So, not only do you have to hit all the boxes without dying (which is a big ask considering how long the harder levels are), but then some require a coloured gem to unlock secret paths which you get through specific bonus stages in levels. There's also extra levels you need to unlock by getting keys… and none of this is ever properly explained to you, you’re just meant to figure out where they are. It’s a fun challenge to add for replayability, but some levels can be downright grating to finish, and once you finally collect everything the secret ending doesn’t add much value, so it's not really worth it. I also found the boss stages to be easier than any of the platforming levels, even Cortex, so the balancing is really mismatched, you’ll never know when the next hardest challenge is.

This does start to show a general lack of polish throughout the game. It’s like how you can only save when you’ve completed a level for the first time or doing a bonus area in a level, but once you’ve used that bonus it doesn’t return so you have to find another to go to??... or how lives reset every time you boot the game back up… or how enemies can sometimes be hidden until the last second, ruining the principles of planning where you want to go (this was extremely noticeable in the ‘Fumbling In The Dark’ level). There's just a certain threshold it passes when it's more annoying than difficult.

I’d say that if you were to check out this game yourself, then probably just play the remake version as it does add more QoL improvements that make 100%ing the game much more enjoyable and the definitive way to play. The controls feel better, you can die in a stage and still get standard gems (just not coloured ones), you can save at any point & there's even a box counter so you can see how many you have left to get instead of having to guess and hope that you’ve gotten everything. There's also the addition of time relics too that weren't in the base game however, so take that how you will as me personally, im terrible at them.

I think the only things I’ve ended up preferring in the original is the style & music. Crash Bandicoot is still a good platformer, but it hasn’t aged as well as say Spyro. It shines best with its design, story & general silliness and less-so its controls and progression. Anyone CAN pick up and play it, but depending on how your experience goes with platformers you might just end up pulling your hair out trying to fully complete it if you don’t get along with it well.

Ah, Crash Bandicoot. One of the earliest pioneers in 3D Platforming Action, coming out the same year as the revolutionary Super Mario 64.

Unlike Super Mario 64, Crash Bandicoot decides to opt for a more traditional approach when it comes to level design.
While Super Mario 64 was very open and sandbox-like in its level design, Crash Bandicoot is like the 2D Platformers of old, where you go from point A to B, while trying your best not to lose all your lives.
It may be simple, but Crash Bandicoot succeeds in providing fun level design... but it can get quite challenging, even early on in the game.

Some levels are long, others are challenging, and then there are some that are both. Crash Bandicoot will challenge you, and it will challenge you even more if you're trying to go for 100%!

Probably one of the most well known things about the Crash series is the fact that you can jump and spin boxes you find throughout the levels.
That's all well and good, especially because the act of breaking boxes, and hearing that ricochet sound while you're spinning them, is ultra satisfying, but you'll need to break all of them if you want to get that stage's gem, which all of them will be required to 100% the game, and get the best (?) ending.

The problem with this original game is that, it doesn't matter if you broke a checkpoint box or not, if you die once, you will not be able to get that stage's gem, which means you have to get every box without losing a life.
And with how hard these levels can get... yeah, fuck doing that.

I personally didn't 100% the game during my most recent run, simply because it just turns from something that can be fun but challenging, to something very frustrating. And that's not even accounting the colored gems that you'll get later on in the game, that you'll need to use in previous levels to get just those few missing boxes that you couldn't get to before.
I salute those who have 100% this game!

But when you're not going for 100%, even with its difficulty, I'd say Crash Bandicoot is a good game. Crash himself is a bit heavy on his jumps, but you'll get used to it, and overall, I just had a good time going through the levels and beating the bosses.

Speaking of the bosses... they're ok. They have their own obstacles to avoid, and most of them have a sort-of gimmick, like with Ripper Roo where you defeat him with Big TNT crates, or in Pinstripe Potoroo's fight where you hide behind some objects to avoid his gunfire.
They're fine, but nothing too special.

Outside of that, this game looks great for an early PlayStation game! Crash's model is not as detailed as future games, but I think it looks fine for a 1st game, and the environments that Crash goes through are really nice looking!
I remember when I was a kid, and when I saw this game for the 1st time, even though I already had much more modern games to play, I still liked looking at Crash 1, in spite of being older.
It was probably the sunsets.

The music is fine. I think they decided to go for an atmospheric sound for a lot of the stages, and it works in the moment, but not a whole lot of it I find catchy. But the main theme is classic!

In conclusion, while it gets hard quite early in the game, and going for 100% is not worth your time, Crash Bandicoot can be a pretty fun 3D Platformer!