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Playstation | Driving | Crash Team Racing | Review

There is no Boxart for - Crash Team Racing
Crash Team Racing 6 screen shots
  • GRAPHICS: 5.0
  • SOUND: 4.5
  • CONTROL: 4.5
  • FUN FACTOR 5.0
  • AVG USER SCORE 4.3
  • AVG CRITIC SCORE 4.5
Winner of the GamePro Editor's Choice Award

Review: Crash Team Racing

Review by THED-PADDESTROYER | 11/24/2000 | 14:47:41 PM PST

Naughty Dogs of the world, unite! From the team that brought you Crash Bandicoots 1-3 comes Crash Team Racing, a kart racing game that aims a Bowling Bomb at Mario Kart and Diddy Kong Racing and blasts them off the track!

Naughty Dogs of the world, unite! From the team that brought you Crash Bandicoots 1-3 comes Crash Team Racing, a kart racing game that aims a Bowling Bomb at Mario Kart and Diddy Kong Racing and blasts them off the track!

Kart Racing Down Under
Crash Team Racing stars all your favorite Crash Bandicoot characters, including Crash, Coco, Cortex, Dingodile, Tiny, Polar and Pura, with more characters unlocked by solving the game. At its essence, it is just like Mario Kart - cute, large-headed mascots race on tiny cars and blast each other with comical weapons as they race for the finish line. It's in execution that CTR passes its nearest competitor. CTR controls better, plays faster and, in many instances, looks better than its N64 counterparts.

There is a story, which sets you up for CTR's thorough Adventure Mode, in which you race tracks and defeat bosses in hopes of shutting down the evil Nitros Oxide and ending his plans to turn Earth into a concrete parking lot. You'll race each track, then reenter them to collect crystals and solve other puzzles, opening up more and more secrets as you go. If you can get 100% in the Adventure Mode, you'll unlock the four bosses and Fake Crash. But there's more! Arcade, Versus, Time Trial and the awesome multiplayer Battle Mode round out the package. Crash fans will never run out of stuff to do.

You Make That PlayStation Talk, Baby
Crash Team Racing forces the PlayStation to outdo itself in the graphics department. There's nothing too complex here, but the cartoony look and the ingenious use of textures and colors really make the PlayStation look good. Water and explosive effects look quite impressive, and there's very little of the infamous texture-warping and polygon seaming that you'll see in other PSX titles. Even the loading screen's nice to look at.

Soundwise, the Crash team brings you whimsical background music that really is quite enjoyable. You'll hear sound bites as the various characters pass you, shoot at you or blow up, and they're varied enough to avoid becoming annoying. Explosions, splashes and other ambient effects sound just as they should. There's really nothing to annoy you in CTR's sound department.

Control is also nearly-perfect. It's simple and easy to learn, but there are little tricks that you'll pick up as you play to make your kart go faster, take curves better or jump farther. The transparent controls allow you to concentrate on racing and blasting your opponents, and so the races are faster, more fluid and more fun.

Crash's Last Stand
Naughty Dog has announced that CTR will be their final Crash Bandicoot game, and thankfully they made it a very good one. By taking an already fun concept and making it better, they have made a game worth of Crash's last stand.