I've been a fan of the Naughty Dog Crash games ever since the PS1 days (I guess that makes me an ancient), so while they're very familiar to me, going through the remakes for the first time made me realise the trajectory that these games took from 1 to 3. For better or worse (mostly better), ND really fished for that casual audience as the series went on! Playing 1, 2 and 3 in such close proximity makes it more readily apparent than ever how insanely easy 3 is compared to the first game.
So yes, Crash Bandicoot: Warped, aka 3, aka the one with much of the challenge removed. This is a pretty easy, breezy affair. Chill bait. The definition of comf. Even the platinum is a relatively stress-free time. This is also the entry where ND went a little too hard in on the gimmicky levels. There's a lot of vehicular stuff going on here, and most of it is passable, but it's not nearly as entertaining as the conventional platforming stuff, and it does make me miss that perfect balance achieved by 2. Still a jolly good time all in all though, and the faithfulness of this remake is testament to how well Warped holds up even all these years later. Just don't go into it expecting it to test your platforming mettle.
So yes, Crash Bandicoot: Warped, aka 3, aka the one with much of the challenge removed. This is a pretty easy, breezy affair. Chill bait. The definition of comf. Even the platinum is a relatively stress-free time. This is also the entry where ND went a little too hard in on the gimmicky levels. There's a lot of vehicular stuff going on here, and most of it is passable, but it's not nearly as entertaining as the conventional platforming stuff, and it does make me miss that perfect balance achieved by 2. Still a jolly good time all in all though, and the faithfulness of this remake is testament to how well Warped holds up even all these years later. Just don't go into it expecting it to test your platforming mettle.