Crash Bandicoot: The Wrath of Cortex - 12. Secret Hub [Time Trials + Last Boss]
1In what could be the most frustrating series of videos I have worked on, here is Crash Bandicoot: The Wrath of Cortex - The (now non-canonical) fourth mainline title in this seminal series of 3D Platformers.
While Naughty Dog had in a hand in the entire Crash series up until this point (with the one otherwise notable exception being Crash Bash), The Wrath of the Cortex was handled by an entirely different studio altogether. Traveller's Tales were the ones tasked with this entry in the series, a fitting replacement given their already rich history in making platformers, including Mega Drive classics such as Toy Story, Mickey Mania and Puggsy.
On a technical level, The Wrath of Cortex holds up to the promise of bringing PlayStation 2 tier graphics to the Crash Bandicoot series. The visual design in particular is noticably vibrant and well animated, with a fast and responsive frame-rate, Traveller's Tales seemingly had alot of fun with the way in which particular effects rendered on Sony's, then, new machine. Levels in Wrath of Cortex can have plumes of smoke pouring in, layers of mist softening-up the edges of objects, and fire that is so red and invasive it looks like the heat could burn the borders of your TV screen.
The gameplay itself however is more of a re-tread on Crash Bandicoot 3's existing map design template. As Crash, you access environments through a hub world featuring 6 areas, each containing 5 unique levels, with 25 obtainable crystals, and a further 41 gems from completing death routes and breaking all the boxes that stand in your way. On-top of that, there are Relics that can be earned by getting the best times in stages, and special boss fights between zones that lead to The Wrath of Cortex's overall completion.
Crash himself controls as he did on PSone, although the physics definitely feel lighter and the camera work is more dynamic. Both of these changes inadvertedly make The Wrath of Cortex more frustrating to play. It probably does not help either that it anticipates players to have a working understanding of Crash's mechanics and mobility, despite feeling so different on new hardware. There are, annoyingly, a couple blind jumps which are easily made worse by the unresponsive camera. Besides an added focus on vehicle sections, which feature Crash flying a glider, riding a jeep and even piloting a mech, The Wrath of Cortex has Atlasphere specific levels where you spin in a ball, with navigation not feeling too different from games like Marble Madness. These, thankfully, are a fun little interlude from the main game and offer plenty of challenge during the time trials.
Unfortunately the same cannot be said for the Coco levels, which introduces Crash's sister as a fully playable replacement for the titular Bandicoot, minus the majority of his moves (including the spindash). Coco is not very fun to play, to say the least, and her clumsy jumps led to more than a few accidental deaths during my playthrough of this game (thankfully, I edited them out).
On the subject of this playthrough, I do play to 106% (i.e. full game completion) aiming for all the crystals, gems and even platinum relics on each level. A minor point, but one that needs to made irrespective, I DO NOT AIM FOR SPEEDRUNNING TIMES... And honestly, it isn't something I want to look into. Crash's time trials are tough, and RNG definitely plays some part in my scores. You are welcome to do better than my times. I do not care.
Amusingly enough, this is probably my third attempt at making a video playthrough of The Wrath of Cortex. I wanted to put this series of videos out in-time for the release of Crash Bandicoot 4, which has not only revitalised public perspective of the orange rodent, but furthered the legend of the older games too.
Although, despite my obvious bitching and moaning, I do really like Crash Bandicoot: The Wrath of Cortex. It is a pIatformer that I put alot of time into, back when it first released in late 2001, and provided enough of a Crash fix that it didn't matter too much as to how Traveller's Tales failed to fully recapture the magic found on PSone. Perhaps it was never going to either, since Naughty Dog were moving away from the series in order to work on Jak & Daxter. The best Crash fans could hope was for something different to come out under a new studio. Eventually Traveller's Tales would do just that with Crash Twinsanity... Although that is a story better told for another time.
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A LEGAL NOTICE:
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Any copyrighted footage I use is covered under fair use laws, or more specifically those listed under Section 30(1) of the UK Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1989 and under section 107 of US Copyright Act 1976. This video exists purely for the purpose of research and criticism. I do not make a profit from any uploaded content, nor do I intend to. Thank you for watching.
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