Crash Team Racing

"The old kart-racing formula gets a kick."

When wind first reached me about the next Crash Bandicoot game being a kart racer, I was pretty skeptical. ''Looks like Naughty Dog is resting on their laurels a bit,'' I thought. The three Crash games on PlayStation had all been top-notch action-platform experiences, but this move seemed too... well, predictable and unoriginal. Though I despised the derivative concept, I picked up CTR, and don't regret it for a second. Naughty Dog has not quite reinvented the kart-racing genre with this title, but it's clearly not just an attempt to make a quick buck, either.

Video: 8/10
Previous Crash games have been graphical phenomena, showing off the absolute best that can be accomplished with the oft-maligned PlayStation hardware. In this game, as in previous Crash games, pop-up is never a problem, texture warping is non-existent, and Naughty Dog continues to eschew the severe dithering that's found in virtually every other PSX title. Characters are also rendered in 3D, as opposed to the sprites that Mario Kart 64 used as a shortcut. While CTR is a technical marvel, the animated, lush nature of previous Crash games' environments seems to be gone. I'm sure there were hardware limitations that required the track graphics be kept simple, but it's still rather a shame that this title doesn't have the ''life'' the series is known for.

Audio: 8/10
Nothing new here. The soundtrack to Crash hasn't changed a whole lot since the first game, which really isn't bad... it was well-suited to the series in the first place, so why fix what isn't broken? Nothing about CTR's music particularly jumped out at me, but there is a separate tune for each track, and a cool gimmick in Adventure mode changes the instruments to reflect the zone you're in--sleigh bells in the snow area, for instance. If you've played previous Crash games, you should know what to expect.

Sound and voices are competent and unobtrusive as well. Missiles whoosh by, adorable little ''boing'' sounds punctuate the karts' hops, and TNT explodes with the familiar blast. I would have liked to hear more taunts from the characters during races, though--they seem to only have one or two, and don't shout them too often. Then again, Crash himself has always been a man of few words. The only major speaking roles are that of Aku Aku (the spirit guide of previous Crash games, who appears to give you hints and tips here) and Nitrous Oxide, the villain of the game; both do their jobs fine.

Control: 10/10
Caveat bandicoot'or: there is a learning curve to the control in this game. If you've played Mario Kart, you're only halfway there; if you're highly accustomed to any other racing game (Gran Turismo, Wipeout, whatever) then you've got some unlearning to do. But, once you put in the time to master it, the control scheme of CTR is unparalleled.

You've got your gas, brake, and analog steering, sure, but the key is learning to use the R1 button to hop and throw your kart into a powerslide. Fans of Mario Kart will likely likely bristle at the lifting of this concept from their game, but Naughty Dog has done one better: keep the R1 button held down during your slide, and turbo boosts can be executed by tapping the L1 button with the right timing (watch the exhaust of your kart, or the boost meter on the display). Up to three boosts can be done if you can sustain the slide that long, and of course the third one has a little extra punch. This mechanic truly takes the gameplay to the next level--instead of revolving around finding the best line through a course (fine for a simulation, but no fun in a kart game) the experience becomes a lot looser, faster, and just plain more fun, as you throw your kart into slides and blast around corners with flames shooting out your exhaust.

While I haven't had a chance to try it out, four-player is supported through the MultiTap for track race and battle modes.

Gameplay: 9/10
So it's a kart-racing game. The cartoony characters of the Crash universe race each other (the whole thing was organized by an alien calling himself Nitrous Oxide) on various tracks, most of them inspired by stages from Crash games, or the characters' homes. Drive through a box and you'll get a weapon, like a missile, bomb, shield, or invulnerability, to use against your opponents. Or maybe you want to skip the whole race thing and just shoot weapons at each other in a huge arena, so fire up Battle Mode. We all liked it the first time we saw it, when it was called Mario Kart. So what's the big deal?

Well, as I said in the introduction, this was clearly not a half-assed effort on the part of Naughty Dog. A huge amount of characters (15 at least), tracks (18, plus the Battle Mode), and modes (adventure, arcade, time-trial, versus, and battle) make this an immensely playable game, whether you're looking for single- or multi-player kicks. Further, the track design is superb--the whole turbo-boost powerslide mechanic could have been wasted if the tracks had been narrow and unforgiving, but most courses are wide, with turns that are fairly easy to see coming. I found this a nice change from racing games where you have to learn tracks by trial-and-error; instead of having to worry about the next tight turn coming up, the game becomes more about getting the best slides (and thus, the most shots of turbo) out of your run of a course. I can only imagine that the forgiving track design must make multiplayer a lot more fun, too--those who are unfamiliar with the game can pick it up and go without having to know the tracks very well, and can learn the control without slamming into walls all the time.

There's a ton of these fun-to-race tracks, and almost as many characters. All the major heroes and villians from the Crash games thus far are playable, as are some bosses, once they're unlocked through Adventure mode. I have to complain a bit here--the characters' karts don't really seem to perform too differently. Each character's kart is supposedly unique, with some being focused on handling, others on acceleration or speed, et cetera. But the fact is, I ran through Adventure mode with Crash, a ''balanced'' kart, and had little problem adapting to the other characters' vehicles (except for Pura and Polar's handling-optimized karts, which were too slow). More pronounced differences in the performance of the karts would have made the game a little more interesting, but given the quantity and quality of everything else I can't be too critical here.

All this stuff is experienced through the Adventure mode if it's the single-player game you're looking for. Your character, in their kart, drives around a world map of sorts, taking portals to different tracks and racing various challenges to unlock items and finish the game. Simply win a race to get a trophy and move on, but items such as gems and relics are acquired through the CTR Challenge (not only win the race, but also pick up three hidden tokens from the track along the way) and the Relic Race (complete the track in a certain amount of time). Bosses appear at the end of each area and challenge you to a one-on-one race on their home turf. Like in previous Crash games, the menu screen keeps track of your percentage progress in the adventure, and getting all the items (tokens, relics, and gems) is necessary to unlock the boss characters as playable and see the most complete ending. While it's not quite as lengthy or varied as, say, Crash 3, the Adventure mode alone is worth the price of admission for those who liked previous Crash games.

Overall: 88/100 (gameplay score weighted x4, each other score x2)
In a world of kart-racing clones, Crash Team Racing is far more than a thrown-together attempt to cash in on a franchise (Chocobo Racing, I'm talking to you). The control takes a little getting used to, but the track design ensures that it's easy to pick up, and it provides as much enjoyment as any of the Crash titles thus far (and I only played the single-player mode!). I don't hesitate to recommend it to Crash fans, mascot-racing fans, and anyone looking for a great single- or multi-player racing experience that's not trying to be a simulation.

Reviewer's Score: 9/10, Originally Posted: 03/08/01, Updated 05/13/01