A lot of the headlines surrounding N Sane Trilogy have been just outing the gaming media for their incompetence. Yes, Crash Bandicoot was always hard lol.
Some people gave it great reviews, some people criticized the original game because its level design hasn't aged well in some areas (in case you forgot: it
is possible to mess up
depth perception in a 3D game. It just hasn't happened in a while).
But, in my opinion, shouldn't you judge this game, most of all, on how faithful the remake is? Not to say that changing anything at all makes it bad but... if there are changes that
lessen the quality of life of the player, shouldn't those get called out?
You're seriously not expecting me to believe that out of all the people who work for a major gaming news outlet,
none of them know Crash Bandicoot: Warped as well as I do? All I've done is played it through about three times in the last 3 years or so (in addition to playing it a lot as a kid). Have none of them done that? Did none of them obsess over it as kids hard enough that they don't remember what certain parts of it play like?
But HylianDev, what are you talking about?Well, so far, I've spent enough time with it to get to level 10 in Warped, just before Dingo Dile, both on my personal profile and on the family profile.
I watched the trailers up until the release, I remember feeling kind of... disappointed. The graphics looked all updated, sure, but it seemed to be trying a little too hard for realism, if you ask me. I listened to game critics praising how pretty the water looked but... is that what it takes for water to look pretty these days? To turn solid white -- every pixel #FFFFFF with 0 variation -- when any tiny bit of light hits it? Whatever.
But it's not as big of a deal as I thought it was. There's a liberty or two here and there in the design of the levels, but hey, that stuff's actually great. Once the game was in my hands, I didn't care anymore, I was having fun.
I mostly played Warped, the one I had spent the most time with by far. Here is my experience with it:
The first level was fine. Classic forward-moving "sonic's ass" level.
The second level is an underwater level. Strange that they would break up their classic gameplay for such an unlikeable gimmick right out of the gate, but alright. Nothing was really messed up too bad, except one thing: there was a stack of boxes right next to one of those chained explosive devices. I died several times because my instincts told me that I could spin those boxes without flying headlong into the explosive device. I had to come down on the boxes vertically, more than once, to prevent myself from dying. A small touch they needed to fix. Since getting the boxes is necessary for getting all of the achievements, you'd think they would've caught this in testing.
Then there was the third level. A much more likebale gimmick: Coco Bandicoot riding Pura along the Great Wall of China. I don't think anybody dislikes these levels. The remake did them justice.
Then, number four. Bone Yard. Crash is back in some type of Jurassic era or something. I don't know dinosaurs. There wasn't much to complain about. Before it always took two spins (or, much more efficient, one spin and one jump) to get through patches of grass without slowing down; this time, one spin took care of it. Yeah it's not the same, but hey, it's more fun. So this level was improved upon, right?
WRONG.Look at this. Look at this
trash. This literally made me ragequit for the night.
Look at the gem at the top of the screen.
Imagine: the dinosaur is chasing you down a narrow pathway. You're doing everything you can to not be squished. You reach the end of the pathway, the gem box opens up, and... you miss it.
You've never once missed it before. In fact, you've wondered many times if it's even
possible to miss it, as it seems like the game is almost... grabbing it for you, to make sure this doesn't happen.
Well, welcome to N. Sane Trilogy. Where little goofs and quality-of-life failures occasionally pop up to remind you that this game was not given the same level of care as the original, and apparently just wasn't even tested properly.
I'm going to go ahead and wrap up:
the next level, Coco's jet ski level, controls badly. Like, worse than it did before.
The fight with Tiny felt different than the original. I can't articulate it, I might be imagining it, and I'm not even saying it's worse, but it did feel different, for what it's worth.
The motorcycle levels feel a little different. It seems like it's slightly harder to steer when you get a boost, but letting go of the button while you're being boosted cuts off your speed entirely, which is also new.
----------
In conclusion, N. Sane Trilogy is a great game, but it is not a 100% faithful remake. In my experience, the quality-of-life differences are minimal, if you notice them at all, but there are a few somewhat ugly differences that should've been caught in testing.
A lot of the headlines surrounding N Sane Trilogy have been just outing the gaming media for their incompetence. Yes, Crash Bandicoot was always hard lol.
Some people gave it great reviews, some people criticized the original game because its level design hasn't aged well in some areas (in case you forgot: it [i]is[/i] possible to mess up [b]depth perception[/b] in a 3D game. It just hasn't happened in a while).
But, in my opinion, shouldn't you judge this game, most of all, on how faithful the remake is? Not to say that changing anything at all makes it bad but... if there are changes that [i]lessen[/i] the quality of life of the player, shouldn't those get called out?
You're seriously not expecting me to believe that out of all the people who work for a major gaming news outlet, [b]none[/b] of them know Crash Bandicoot: Warped as well as I do? All I've done is played it through about three times in the last 3 years or so (in addition to playing it a lot as a kid). Have none of them done that? Did none of them obsess over it as kids hard enough that they don't remember what certain parts of it play like?
[b]But HylianDev, what are you talking about?[/b]
Well, so far, I've spent enough time with it to get to level 10 in Warped, just before Dingo Dile, both on my personal profile and on the family profile.
I watched the trailers up until the release, I remember feeling kind of... disappointed. The graphics looked all updated, sure, but it seemed to be trying a little too hard for realism, if you ask me. I listened to game critics praising how pretty the water looked but... is that what it takes for water to look pretty these days? To turn solid white -- every pixel #FFFFFF with 0 variation -- when any tiny bit of light hits it? Whatever.
But it's not as big of a deal as I thought it was. There's a liberty or two here and there in the design of the levels, but hey, that stuff's actually great. Once the game was in my hands, I didn't care anymore, I was having fun.
I mostly played Warped, the one I had spent the most time with by far. Here is my experience with it:
The first level was fine. Classic forward-moving "sonic's ass" level.
The second level is an underwater level. Strange that they would break up their classic gameplay for such an unlikeable gimmick right out of the gate, but alright. Nothing was really messed up too bad, except one thing: there was a stack of boxes right next to one of those chained explosive devices. I died several times because my instincts told me that I could spin those boxes without flying headlong into the explosive device. I had to come down on the boxes vertically, more than once, to prevent myself from dying. A small touch they needed to fix. Since getting the boxes is necessary for getting all of the achievements, you'd think they would've caught this in testing.
Then there was the third level. A much more likebale gimmick: Coco Bandicoot riding Pura along the Great Wall of China. I don't think anybody dislikes these levels. The remake did them justice.
Then, number four. Bone Yard. Crash is back in some type of Jurassic era or something. I don't know dinosaurs. There wasn't much to complain about. Before it always took two spins (or, much more efficient, one spin and one jump) to get through patches of grass without slowing down; this time, one spin took care of it. Yeah it's not the same, but hey, it's more fun. So this level was improved upon, right?
[b]WRONG.[/b]
[img]http://i.imgur.com/1BbEZ96.jpg[/img]
Look at this. Look at this [i]trash[/i]. This literally made me ragequit for the night.
Look at the gem at the top of the screen.
Imagine: the dinosaur is chasing you down a narrow pathway. You're doing everything you can to not be squished. You reach the end of the pathway, the gem box opens up, and... you miss it.
You've never once missed it before. In fact, you've wondered many times if it's even [b]possible[/b] to miss it, as it seems like the game is almost... grabbing it for you, to make sure this doesn't happen.
Well, welcome to N. Sane Trilogy. Where little goofs and quality-of-life failures occasionally pop up to remind you that this game was not given the same level of care as the original, and apparently just wasn't even tested properly.
I'm going to go ahead and wrap up:
the next level, Coco's jet ski level, controls badly. Like, worse than it did before.
The fight with Tiny felt different than the original. I can't articulate it, I might be imagining it, and I'm not even saying it's worse, but it did feel different, for what it's worth.
The motorcycle levels feel a little different. It seems like it's slightly harder to steer when you get a boost, but letting go of the button while you're being boosted cuts off your speed entirely, which is also new.
----------
In conclusion, N. Sane Trilogy is a great game, but it is not a 100% faithful remake. In my experience, the quality-of-life differences are minimal, if you notice them at all, but there are a few somewhat ugly differences that should've been caught in testing.