Back in mid-2017, I was so excited for the arrival of the Crash Bandicoot N. Sane Trilogy. The potential of reliving these three iconic PS1 games on modern hardware was an enticing one, but at the same time I wondered whether Activision and developer Vicarious Visions would somehow drop the ball. That definitely didn't end up happening.
Today, it's been announced that the Crash Bandicoot N. Sane Trilogy is coming to Xbox Game Pass on Thursday, August 8th, and I implore that you try it if you enjoy platforming games! This is a masterful remaster that really should be called a remake, as Vicarious Visions essentially rebuilt the first three Crash Bandicoot games from scratch, including all characters, levels, cutscenes, hub worlds and more. You can truly feel how much love and care went into each individual aspect of the game, and the result is the best Crash Bandicoot experience ever in my opinion.
In fact, can I quote myself? Here's what I had to say in GamesMaster Magazine a few years ago!
"The end result will conjure nostalgic memories for anyone who experienced Crash the first time around, with everything from box-breaking to jet ski riding feeling near identical to the original designs. There's rarely a wholly different, immersion-breaking sequence in which you're left muttering "it wasn't like this in the original game".
"Each of the warp rooms, cutscenes, sound effects, and character animations possess their original, unique traits, as well as minor additions that better equip them for today's audiences. By going the extra mile to replicate each individual title rather than lump all three into a single formula, the N. Sane Trilogy ends up feeling larger than the sum of its parts."
We've seen a lot of remasters since the Crash Bandicoot N. Sane Trilogy made its debut, and while some have been great, others have felt like cheap cash grabs. In my opinion, the N. Sane Trilogy is the furthest away from a cheap cash grab that you can get, in a situation where would have been so easy to cut corners by ditching the individual hubs and cutscenes for each game, or just recycling the music rather than re-recording it entirely.
Of course, Crash Bandicoot doesn't hit the mark with everyone, and if you didn't enjoy Crash 1, 2 or 3 on the PlayStation 1, you probably won't like the N.Sane Trilogy either. But looking back at what Vicarious Visions created here, it surely has to be celebrated (alongside Tony Hawk's Pro Skater 1+2) as the best product the studio ever made before merging into Blizzard Entertainment, and I can't wait for new and returning fans to experience it for the first time on Xbox Game Pass.