Collection essentials #349: Crash Bandicoot (PS1)

For its first year, PlayStation really lacked a mascot. It proved that it didn’t need one as early sales were strong. But clearly there was a void there to be filled, and the one to come fill it was a company called Naughty Dog that hadn’t made very many games before. Enter Crash Bandicoot.

Crash 1 is a fairly straightforward game, though that’s not necessarily a bad thing. Crash is on a quest to rescue his girlfriend Tawny from the evil Dr. Neo Cortex, and he has to gradually ascend an island divided up in a series of levels to do so. 

This is a very early 3D platformer. It’s not the very first one, and it’s not super innovative. It launched around the same time as a bigger and more influential one featuring everyone’s favorite plumber. But this one came out on a different console, which helped it stand out more. Levels are fairly straightforward in Crash 1, with not a lot of open space to explore, with gameplay consisting of overcoming a series of enemies and obstacles to reach the goal.

As this is a 3D platformer, Crash can freely move in eight directions rather than being confined to moving left and right. This very much changes how platforming works, as there’s more work that goes into figuring out and executing the right way to jump. The game does feature some sequences that are side-scrolling too, however. 

Crash can often defeat enemies the same way that you typically can in a platformer, by jumping on them. But Crash also has a “spin attack” move in which he rapidly spins into a blur for a brief second, blowing away an unprotected enemy in his path. 

A major part of Crash Bandicoot is crates. You’ll see dozens of these boxes in every level. They’re kind of like blocks in Mario; sometimes crates grant you fruit, which are like this game’s equivalent of Mario’s coins, some act as checkpoints, some grant temporary invincibility, etc. TNT crates are red and explode a few seconds after they are touched (or immediately if they are attacked), so Crash has to be careful around those. A side objective of the game is to break all the crates in every level, and some are well-hidden. Breaking all crates in a level and not losing a life gives Crash a gem, and getting all of them triggers a special ending sequence.

There are bonus stages which are accessed by collecting three specific tokens in a stage. Bonus stages usually have Crash traversing a side-scrolling path of just crates that he can try to break as he goes. 

The game shows its age a bit, even in the context of the original PlayStation’s library, as sometimes it feels like it lacks a certain layer of polish that future PlayStation games had. You can only save your game after getting through bonus levels, which is just really odd. The quality of music isn’t really up to snuff with what you’d expect either. And the game’s boss fights are nothing to write home about. It also gets really difficult, and new players are not likely to beat it without dying over and over again.

Crash didn’t reach Mario or Sonic levels of personality, but his first game still sold several million units and was quite a success. He really didn’t have to carry the PlayStation anyway; I think that the PlayStation was better for Crash than the other way around. Interestingly, being an America-developed game, localizers in Japan decided to tweak Crash’s design for the game’s release there to appeal to Japanese audiences, and it worked wonders as Crash went on to be a hit over there in a way that very few American mascot characters have.

In terms of my personal history, I obviously was exposed to Crash’s games at a young age at friends’ houses. However, since I didn’t own my own PlayStation for quite a while, it took some time for me to really sit down and play his games for myself. I think it wasn’t until young adulthood that I actually sat down to beat Crash 1. And you know what? It’s actually my favorite game in the series as of now. Why? I actually really enjoyed the challenge! Dying a lot can be okay as long as it’s fun to keep trying and eventually win. In future games, they understandably toned down the difficulty.

Crash may not be the eternal household name like other mascots, but he’s still an iconic character and there’s no way he was going to not make this list. And, hey, Mario and Sonic are pretty great, there’s no shame in being overshadowed by them. In modern times, you can get the “Crash Bandicoot N Sane Trilogy” which includes a full remake of this game, which is a better way to experience it. Still, the original fully deserves its spot in my collection as an essential.