Time Twister – Crash Bandicoot 3: Warped – Part 3

After a short break, we’re ready to continue our adventures through time. We’re so close to our inevitable confrontation with Dr. Cortex and the evil Uka Uka that it won’t be much longer now.

But first, I lose my patience with bastard cops who keep ramming into me. All Cops Are Bastards.

Apologies for the audio in this one. I suspect I know why it’s such buggy, and I should be able to fix it next time.

In case anyone is curious, the reason why OBS was crashing so often was that I kept forgetting to turn off the desktop recording. I have multiple layers in my OBS setup, one of them is the PS4/Switch footage from my capture card. Another is the Desktop recording for when I stream games from my PC.

For my setup, the Desktop is “under” the PS4/Switch footage, so when I stream from my PC, I disable/hide the console footage. However, I didn’t think I needed to do the same for console games because they’re already on top. Unfortunately, that also mans OBS still has to take it both streams of footage, so it’s performing double duty when it doesn’t have to. So during this recording, I experimented by seeing if turning off the desktop footage improved performance, and it looks like the test is successful. We should see less OBS hiccups from now on as a result.

As for the game, we’re now at a point where we have all of the additional abilities granted to us by the bosses. While some of these late-game stages absolutely are designed around making use of them to cross gaps and distances that would be otherwise impossible, in many ways having access to them just feels like cheating. You see it a lot in the recording, but I’m frequently using the Slide -> Double-Jump -> Death Tornado Spin technique in order to bypass sections that I’d need to time correctly or avoid without it.

Having said that, I’m sure what they could really do to stop players from abusing that string short of making every jump one that requires it, which would be it’s own brand of tedious. An almost natural consequence of giving players access to all of these abilities and forcing them to master them for 100% completion is knowing that they can use them to trivialize large segments of the game. And this is all before we get into the Bazooka, which allows us to deal with pretty much any thread we see coming before it ever has a chance to get in our way.

Though considering that we don’t unlock it until right before the end, it can also serve as a good way to make the player feel like they’ve come a long way since the start of the game. There’s no denying that Crash is much more capable of dealing with threats towards the end than he was at the start.

Hopefully we’ll be completely finished with the trilogy at the end of the next recording. We may be able to start a new game, but I wouldn’t hold my breath. Even with Crash Dash at our disposal, we still have our work cut out for us getting the rest of the gems and relics.

Remember that Black Lives Matter and All Cops Are Bastards:

Time Twister – Crash Bandicoot 3: Warped – Part 1

After our detour through the wreckage of Raccoon City, it’s time to go back to our PlayStation platforming nostalgia series. Though a few months have passed since our last sojourn with the blunder from down under, neither Crash nor his sister Coco are any worse for wear.

With a new threat from old enemies on the loose, we’re in for one final adventure. The crystals are scattered through the ages, and it’s time for us to step into the Time Twister to reclaim them before Dr. Cortex can.

As I said in the Let’s Play, this particular game has a special place in heart. It was one of the first  three games I ever got for my PlayStation when my parents bought it for me. That makes it one of my most formative gaming experiences.

That’s why I chose to play the Spyro and Crash games in the order that I did. The first Spyro and the third Crash games are both really positive experiences for me, so I figured they would make excellent bookends. Additionally, playing one franchise and then switching to the other was my way to avoid being fatigued with either one.

Watching the footage back, I am so glad that the enthusiasm I have for the Warped comes through while I’m playing. Even the commenters on stream noticed that I wasn’t getting frustrated, smiling even through any/all death I may have suffered.

I said that Crash 2 is my favorite in the trilogy and I do stick behind that, since I’m of the opinion that platforming games are at their best when they stick to a core set of mechanics and explore them to the fullest. That said, it’s clear that by the third entry Naughty Dog had learned much from building two whole games prior.

The most obvious example being the chase sequences, which are paced much more reasonably than they were back in the other two games. You can see that I had more time to react to the obstacles coming up than I did in those game. Though I still made mistakes, those were all mostly my fault for trying to rush when I didn’t have to.

Even in the world of gimmick levels, this game is much better about them than it’s earlier siblings. Aside from the racing levels, which can get pretty annoying later in the game, most of them are polished and feel great to control. In doesn’t hurt that I’m particularly fond of both the jet-ski levels and the Great Wall levels where Coco hops on Pura.

It’s good to play Crash again. I’m excited to continue this series. Until next time, I leave you with this: