Recent Posts
Entertainment July 5, 2017
This new title is gonna be N Sane.
“Crash Bandicoot” was born in the late 1990s as a game for Playstation. The game was a Playstation exclusive from its debut until 2000.
But since then, iterations of “Crash” have also appeared on popular systems like Xbox and Nintendo DS. “Crash” took a huge hiatus from the gaming world between 2011 and 2016.
Then developers Vicarious Visions took another stab at “Crash” and in partnership with Activision made, “Crash Bandicoot: N Sane Trilogy.” It’s a retelling of the first three Crash games. The release date for “Crash Bandicoot: N Sane Trilogy” was Friday, June 30, 2017 on PS4.
In honor of that, here are five things you may not know about one of our favorite marsupials.
Crash was originally named Willie. And Willie was a wombat. Fortunately for fans, Willie was just a temporary name as the moniker had already been taken by another company. They settled on the name “Crash” because of the character’s affinity for smashing boxes.
And the bandicoot because it was an animal that wasn’t widely known. Although if you ask me, Crash looks nothing like a wombat or a bandicoot. But hey, what’s in a name?
“Crash” was created by Naughty Dog for Playstation in an effort to create a mascot that could compete with Sonic the Hedgehog and everyone favorite plumber, Mario. Naughty Dog, in its early days, was a two-person team made up of a couple of childhood friends.
They set out to make “Crash” for Playstation and ended up making a hugely successful game. “Crash” was one of the first western games to do well in Japan, where American developers have historically had difficulty marketing. The title has since been through seven developers with Vicarious Visions working on the latest game.
Charlotte Francis, a texture artist and shader, worked as the only woman on the seven person “Crash Bandicoot” team. It was her first time working on a video game as she was transitioning from film. She told Polygon‘s Blake Hester about her experience, “I found it actually to be a really welcoming place. It was a lot of fun. Everyone was young, you know?”
Charlotte has gone on to work as a texture artist at Naughty Dog on their biggest titles “The Last of Us” and the “Uncharted” series.
Crash had a girlfriend named Tawna in the first game. She was allegedly based off of Pamela Anderson and the developers came under a bit of fire for the character’s objectification and “sexiness.”
They replaced Tawna with Coco as the main female character in the sequel, “Cortex Strikes Back.” She wasn’t gone completely, however, making cameo appearances in several “Crash” games. She appears with a redesign in “Crash Bandicoot: N Sane Trilogy.”
While the original Crash Bandicoot game did really well, the “Cortex Strikes Back” sequel did exceptionally well. So well in fact, that a manga series was created based on the events of the video game. Basically, Tawna leaves Crash for Mr.Pinstripe in the first chapter. And after flooding his home with tears, the bandicoot sets out to become “strong and irresistible” in an effort to get her back. This of course, leads to various shenanigans.
Reviews for the “Crash Bandicoot: N Sane Trilogy” are just rolling in, but it seems like this game is all the fun of the original Crash series. And it’s gotten a facelift with updated graphics and configurations for the PS4 system. It’s $40 at GameStop right now, so if you loved the original Crash series, now might be the time to get some serious nostalgia on.
Check out some other upcoming games here.
Watch the trailer for the “N Sane Trilogy” below:
