And so my journey through the Crash PS1 games via streaming them on Twitch comes to a close. I had been looking forward to this one since last week, and it didn't disappoint~. I didn't even try for 100% after the slog that was doing that with Crash 2 last week, so it only took me about 2 and a half hours to get through the Japanese version of the game.
Crash 3 picks up just around where Crash 2 left off, with the blown up Cortex Vortex crashing down to Earth after blowing it up at the end of the previous game. It happens to crash into an ancient ruin where Aku Aku (Crash's friendly mask friend) sealed his evil rival Uka Uka eons ago, freeing him to run rampant once more. He teams up with Cortex to try and N. Tropy to build a time machine to collect power stones from across history and the future to try and rule the world, and it's up to Crash to stop him. Once again it's all fully voice acted, and it's good quality silliness interspersed throughout your adventure, usually Cortex & Uka Uka or also sometimes that world's boss taunting you. They're all very extra and make the romp through the game that much more silly and fun.
Gameplay-wise, it's both a refinement and an augmentation to how Crash 2 handled things in many ways. Crash himself controls similarly, but has has his movement tightened up that much more compared to Crash 2 and it feels just that little bit better. There are also returning alternate stage types, such as the animal riding segments, but there are also new ones like bike racing, jet skiing, and biplane flying. The bike racing is a bit too difficult compared to the rest of it all, but other than that, they're fun diversions from the good platforming stuff, and the fact that you often get to play as Crash's sister Coco during a lot of the vehicle sections is also fun.
There are 25 base stages across five worlds, and each world has its own boss. There are also several hidden stages, like in Crash 2, that are accessed through similarly arcane and otherwise nigh-completely hidden means, like in Crash 2. Although unlike in Crash 2, I don't believe any of those hidden levels dump you back into previous stages. Also like in Crash 2, there is a power stone to collect in each level, but they're barely hidden like they were in the last game occasionally. They feel almost pointless with how easy they are to find, and just finishing the stages would be an equivalent difficulty. Also like the other Crash games, there are diamonds to collect in each stage, either hidden behind breaking every box in the level or by discovering an alternate path. It's the same platformer-meets-collectathon thing that the other two games have, and it's refined that much more to be a little more forgiving and more fun.
Something a good deal less forgiving and more difficult, however, are the time trials that are now in every stage. Like it would later be in Crash Team Racing, it's going through a stage but all the boxes normally there are now numbered, and each one you break freezes the clock for that many seconds. Crash 2 had a couple secrets hidden behind time trials, but these are the genuine article, and the whole game is designed around them. This also means that every level was designed with the intention of being easily sped through, which means the levels as a whole feel like they have a much better rhythm to them than the previous games, and you can get a really good flow going far more often than the other games allowed you to do. The time trials themselves aren't really my thing, but I think their inclusion makes Crash 3's level design easily the best out of the 3 games because of how it influenced the stage design.
However, there is also a little bit of a unique weakness to Crash 3 in how it uses those time trials. After beating every boss (including Cortex & Uka Uka at the end), you get a new power to expand Crash's move set. This includes a bigger area on your belly slam, a double jump, a run button on L2, and even a bazooka with unlimited ammo. With the exception of the bazooka, these serve to underline the design of following stages, with the run button especially intended for time trials. However, the bazooka sorta messes up the intended flow of the last world and of box 100%-ing. You need to stop to aim the bazooka, so you'd never use it for the time trials (more or less) despite how efficient and safe a way it is of defeating enemies and breaking boxes. But this trivializes a lot of the difficulty in the later stages, as do your expanded platforming abilities somewhat trivialize a lot of the difficulty of early stages upon your return to them. It's not a bad thing, per se, but the emphasis on time trials may have helped the level design, but I think it also hinders the game design to a certain extent too.
In terms of presentation, Crash 3 continues Crash 2's trend of looking dramatically better than its predecessor. It's not quite the jump from 1 to 2, but it's still significant, especially on the character models. The music is also once again quite good, as is the Japan-exclusive theme song (even if it is highly derivative of the theme from the 2nd game). That theme song, the usual Aku Aku tutorial messages, and a few new incidental voice clip reactions and sprite designs are really the only things changed for the Japanese release of Crash 3. Out of the 3 Crash PS1 games, Crash 3 is easily the least changed, but it was already quite good, so it clearly didn't need those changes.
Verdict: Recommended. Crash 3 has its weak points, particularly in how hit or miss the vehicle stages can be (once again), but it's easily the strongest out of the 3 PS1 Crash games. Those weak points don't ruin the experience, but they do add up for some particularly frustrating difficulty spikes from time to time (especially if you're going for 100%). I wouldn't call it a must-play or an all-time favorite of mine, but it's a fun time that's totally worth going through in an afternoon if you can pick it up for cheap.
Crash 3 picks up just around where Crash 2 left off, with the blown up Cortex Vortex crashing down to Earth after blowing it up at the end of the previous game. It happens to crash into an ancient ruin where Aku Aku (Crash's friendly mask friend) sealed his evil rival Uka Uka eons ago, freeing him to run rampant once more. He teams up with Cortex to try and N. Tropy to build a time machine to collect power stones from across history and the future to try and rule the world, and it's up to Crash to stop him. Once again it's all fully voice acted, and it's good quality silliness interspersed throughout your adventure, usually Cortex & Uka Uka or also sometimes that world's boss taunting you. They're all very extra and make the romp through the game that much more silly and fun.
Gameplay-wise, it's both a refinement and an augmentation to how Crash 2 handled things in many ways. Crash himself controls similarly, but has has his movement tightened up that much more compared to Crash 2 and it feels just that little bit better. There are also returning alternate stage types, such as the animal riding segments, but there are also new ones like bike racing, jet skiing, and biplane flying. The bike racing is a bit too difficult compared to the rest of it all, but other than that, they're fun diversions from the good platforming stuff, and the fact that you often get to play as Crash's sister Coco during a lot of the vehicle sections is also fun.
There are 25 base stages across five worlds, and each world has its own boss. There are also several hidden stages, like in Crash 2, that are accessed through similarly arcane and otherwise nigh-completely hidden means, like in Crash 2. Although unlike in Crash 2, I don't believe any of those hidden levels dump you back into previous stages. Also like in Crash 2, there is a power stone to collect in each level, but they're barely hidden like they were in the last game occasionally. They feel almost pointless with how easy they are to find, and just finishing the stages would be an equivalent difficulty. Also like the other Crash games, there are diamonds to collect in each stage, either hidden behind breaking every box in the level or by discovering an alternate path. It's the same platformer-meets-collectathon thing that the other two games have, and it's refined that much more to be a little more forgiving and more fun.
Something a good deal less forgiving and more difficult, however, are the time trials that are now in every stage. Like it would later be in Crash Team Racing, it's going through a stage but all the boxes normally there are now numbered, and each one you break freezes the clock for that many seconds. Crash 2 had a couple secrets hidden behind time trials, but these are the genuine article, and the whole game is designed around them. This also means that every level was designed with the intention of being easily sped through, which means the levels as a whole feel like they have a much better rhythm to them than the previous games, and you can get a really good flow going far more often than the other games allowed you to do. The time trials themselves aren't really my thing, but I think their inclusion makes Crash 3's level design easily the best out of the 3 games because of how it influenced the stage design.
However, there is also a little bit of a unique weakness to Crash 3 in how it uses those time trials. After beating every boss (including Cortex & Uka Uka at the end), you get a new power to expand Crash's move set. This includes a bigger area on your belly slam, a double jump, a run button on L2, and even a bazooka with unlimited ammo. With the exception of the bazooka, these serve to underline the design of following stages, with the run button especially intended for time trials. However, the bazooka sorta messes up the intended flow of the last world and of box 100%-ing. You need to stop to aim the bazooka, so you'd never use it for the time trials (more or less) despite how efficient and safe a way it is of defeating enemies and breaking boxes. But this trivializes a lot of the difficulty in the later stages, as do your expanded platforming abilities somewhat trivialize a lot of the difficulty of early stages upon your return to them. It's not a bad thing, per se, but the emphasis on time trials may have helped the level design, but I think it also hinders the game design to a certain extent too.
In terms of presentation, Crash 3 continues Crash 2's trend of looking dramatically better than its predecessor. It's not quite the jump from 1 to 2, but it's still significant, especially on the character models. The music is also once again quite good, as is the Japan-exclusive theme song (even if it is highly derivative of the theme from the 2nd game). That theme song, the usual Aku Aku tutorial messages, and a few new incidental voice clip reactions and sprite designs are really the only things changed for the Japanese release of Crash 3. Out of the 3 Crash PS1 games, Crash 3 is easily the least changed, but it was already quite good, so it clearly didn't need those changes.
Verdict: Recommended. Crash 3 has its weak points, particularly in how hit or miss the vehicle stages can be (once again), but it's easily the strongest out of the 3 PS1 Crash games. Those weak points don't ruin the experience, but they do add up for some particularly frustrating difficulty spikes from time to time (especially if you're going for 100%). I wouldn't call it a must-play or an all-time favorite of mine, but it's a fun time that's totally worth going through in an afternoon if you can pick it up for cheap.