Crash Nitro Kart

Crash and his gang take their upgraded kart racing to the PS2 with tons of colorful gameplay.

Crash Bandicoot has been dropped into the kart-racing genre before with Crash Team Racing on the PlayStation in 1999. Now that he and his pals are free to wander onto any console, it?s no surprise to see the latest Crash Nitro Kart cross platform boundaries?and look good doing it.

Racing ? la Mode
CNK dishes out fast-paced kart fun across a slew of single-player and multiplayer gameplay styles, including Cup Tournament, Team Race, five Battle modes and two Time Trial formats. Adventure mode offers a mild story line to connect racing through five different worlds. As with other kart games, tracks are filled with power-ups, bonuses, weapons, and hazards, such as fruit crates, boost pads, homing missiles, and the old favorite, the bowling bomb.

The controls are easy to pick up but hard to master. While, as in most driving/racing titles, you can get by for a while with simple gas-and-brake pumping, skillful use of CNK?s other elements?such as power slides, boosts, and the collaborative Team Frenzy?will enable access to deeper parts of the game.

Kolorful Karts and Kreatures
The visuals are brightly colored and smoothly animated, though the Xbox?s more powerful hardware offers slightly cleaner graphics over the PS2 version's. Otherwise, the gameplay and control mechanics are identical. Both games also include clear and entertaining character chatter with star appearances from such voice actors as Debi Derryberry (the voice of Jimmy Neutron) and Billy West (Futurama, Ren & Stimpy).

While CNK may not break new ground, it does a quality job of delivering another kart racer in Crash?s universe. It will put gamers' mettle to the test and offer hours of "wait, one more time..." gameplay.

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