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| Crash Bandicoot 2: Cortex Strikes Back (1997) |
After his defeat in the previous game, Cortex discovers a new source of power in the form of ancient crystals, and wishes to gather all of them in order to power his Cortex Vortex and enslave the world. However, with his animal army disbanded, he turns to Crash himself, tricking him into thinking he needs the crystals to save the world from an upcoming planetary alignment. Though Crash believes Cortex, Dr. Brio from the previous game also gets in touch, telling him that the gems are needed to stop Cortex, and as long as Crash is working for him, he will be sending his minions out to kill him in the form of the boss battles. So, a little bit more story here than in the previous game, and while it's an interesting one, it's ruined by the fact that the player character has motivations that conflict with what the player knows. Call it dramatic irony, that has no place here. Yes, it's not a big deal but it is a little frustrating that to advance the game, you have to do the one thing you've been told is a bad thing to do. All of the gameplay from Crash 1 is back, though Crash has more moves in his repertoire. He can slide into enemies, belly-flop onto enemies, slide jump for greater height and distance, and there are a wider variety of vehicles. While the first game only had the hog riding, this game has polar bear riding, jet-skiing and jetpack flying.
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| Crash Bandicoot and Dr. Neo Cortex |
So, this game takes everything that made Crash 1 great, culls everything that didn't, and adds more into the mix, truly making it a phenomenal sequel. The graphics are so much cleaner than they were in the previous; everything just seems a lot less polygonal and more smooth, and Crash's model received an overhaul. It also helps that the environments are much more varied this time, and we have locales such as the Antarctic, a sewer, space, a swamp, ancient ruins, and they all look stellar. The soundtrack also received a welcome buff, and these tracks are much more melodic than the previous game. This game features some of my favourite video game tracks of all time, with the jet-pack music and the Cortex boss music being significant highlights. Crash also controls much better, particularly in the air. You have a lot more control over where Crash goes whilst in the air, making those terrifying jumps over bottomless pits much more manageable. Slid-jumping feels amazing to do, and when you get good with it you can pull off some really impressive shortcuts. The vehicle segments also handle really well, though some (the jet-pack) take a bit of getting used to. Even if you're not a fan of these gameplay segments, they're over really quickly, and there's not many of them anyway.
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| Snow Go |
While the core gameplay of 'get to the end of the level' hasn't changed, there is a lot of new stuff here. You know have a central warp room for accessing levels, and you can pick 1 of 5 levels in any order you wish, and once you beat them all, you can take on a boss fight for access to the next area. While I miss the feeling of going on one big adventure, this is a far better option for gameplay. The crystals themselves are really hard to miss, and really just serve as a vessel for playing the levels themselves rather than being a final goal for you. The gems are back, and you still get 1 in each level for breaking all the boxes, but this time you can die as much as you like in a level, and still get the gem if you've broken every crate, which is a more than welcome improvement. The take-away is that it's generally a lot harder to break every box. There are a lot of hidden paths throughout levels which lead to other levels and give you new areas to break boxes. Some gems are flat-out impossible to get on a first playthrough, and you have to really experiment with what looks out of place in order to find everything, which I really like. For a linear platformer to do something like what an open-world platformer would do is really impressive. Not to mention, some levels also have a second gem which you get for completing some other objective. The majority of the time it's through the Death Routes, which you must access without dying up to that point (a holdover from Crash 1) and finish the path you're taken to. Other times, it could be practically anything, and this is where the experimenting comes into play. The secrets themselves are not so hidden as to be impossible, but they're subtle enough that you feel like a genius when you figure it out. 100%ing this game for the first time is one of the most satisfying things I've ever done in a game, and it's something that I can now do in one sitting if I feel like it. I know the level paths inside and out, a testament to the amazing level design at play here.
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| The Eel Deal |
Even though there's a bigger variety of levels on display, the core bottomless pit level design hasn't changed, though sometimes the 'bottomless pits' are water for Crash to drown in, or pools of electric eels. It's not always hopping over pits like it was in the first game, and even though some levels don't have any pits at all, the level design never gets boring or predictable. Just when you think you've seen all there is to see from a level type, they throw something new at you, and you have to stay on your toes and not get too complacent. Not to mention, the enemies have adjusted somewhat for Crash's new moveset. There are some enemies that can only be defeated with a slide, or just a spin, or even some that alternate between the two. Especially when it comes to the tight corridors packed with enemies, you need to be on alert, juggling between the 3 action buttons at maximum efficiency, otherwise you'll slip up and die. That said, the challenge is never too ridiculous or hard to overcome. The progression of difficulty throughout is a perfect rise, and it's all done so effortlessly it's almost upsetting. The only real drawback to this game is that the boss battles are still a little too easy. Granted, they're more entertaining to play, for the most part, and this time 3 out of the 5 bosses are what I'd consider genuinely good fights. Unfortunately, one of the two that disappoints is the final fight against Cortex, if you could call it a fight. It's just a chase down a corridor, it's so disappointing. The music can only do so much, and though it doesn't ruin the game, it's the one misstep that pulls this game back from what could have been a perfect score.
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| Tiny Tiger |
But, honestly, I have too much fun with this game to care. Crash Bandicoot 2: Cortex Strikes Back (1997) is just amazing. Childhood me wasn't wrong: this is one of my favourite video games I've ever played. Only time and future reviews will tell if it ends up being the best. 9.5/10.
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