Crash Bandicoot 4: It's About Time

É uma mistura das melhores ideias de vários jogos da franquia, só que mais bem executadas. Difícil ao fã dos Crashs antigos querer mais que isso.

O level design desse jogo é o melhor da série. Desafiador, mas poucas vezes injusto, já que dá ao jogador várias opções de movimentação e uma responsividade afiada que permitem passar dos desafios de plataforma quase sempre de mais de um jeito. O conteúdo opcional também é legal, mas não tanto quanto a primeira vez que você passa pelas fases principais. Em especial, algumas fitas são ridiculamente complicadas de pegar todas as caixas e pegar todas as gemas em boa parte das fases é um teste de paciência. No fim, até quebra um pouco o ritmo do jogo e dá uma enfraquecida na divertida narrativa.

Além de um balanceamento mais fino da dificuldade, gostaria de mais coisas como as últimas fases do jogo, que misturam as várias máscaras e criam desafios de plataforma mais interessantes e intimidadores. Senti que boa parte do jogo é um pouco tímido no uso das mecânicas

This is a game that wants you to think that no time has passed since warped was releases in the late 90s. For the most part it succeeds as it retains all of the elements that make the ps1 trilogy iconic both the good and the bad.

Let's start with the bad as it's thankfully a much shorter list than the first two games in the franchise, it's hard as hell even when completing the campaign without collecting all of the items, this is noticeable in the later levels which requires precise platforming with the different elemental masks huts to complete, let alone to acquire the gems and videotapes they each have to offer. The videotapes unlock bonus levels which detail the creation of crash and Coco which are also bonkers to complete, thankfully there’s an option to not have a life counter in this game because I can't imagine clearing these stages with a limited number of lives. There are six gems that each level has to offer, one for breaking all of the boxes, one that is hidden in the level, one for clearing the level with less than three deaths and three of which is obtained depending on how much wumpa fruit you collect in a level. The levels also have "nverted" version of themselves where you have to complete these tasks with some sort of filter applied to a level i.e., colour splashing as you progress or there's underwater physics. The problem here is the same in cortex strikes back in that boxes are well hidden and often placed out of sight and usually requires a walkthrough to even know they exist, to say nothing of finding them all with the filters applied to each level. Thankfully the other requirements are straightforward, although the three-life requirement is best tackled separately from the others to avoid frustration. Time trail mode is also a waste of time as all you get to help you out here is the tornado spin that's meant to speed up our heroes like the crash dash but is so hard to pull off that you get an achievement for doing so. This is nitpick, but I don't see the point of skins here as most of the time our heroes will be wearing the elemental armour whenever they're equipped with a mask, although I appreciate how the game embraces multiculturalism by offering our heroes Japanese outfits even though many idiots will claim that to be racist due to cultural appropriation (it's only offensive when this is done to mock a culture, not to appreciate it like this game clearly does.) One final complaint I have is the polar stage, this was clearly meant to be a skiing section given that's how the momentum works here, however you're never going to realise that in game due to the image of our heroes riding our cuddly friend.

Time for the positives which this game has a ton of, first off this is a beautiful looking game as we have the masterminds of the reignited trilogy handling this title after the awkward job that the nsane trilogy developers did. Its clear toys for bob love both franchises as they not only made the games beautiful to look at, but also successfully recreate the move sets from those old games which they do a good job with here for the most part (seriously what is with that tornado spin?) As difficult as the levels are, this is clearly by design as they're each well-constructed and take full advantage of the move set from our heroes. Playing as Coco is always a bonus for me as I've always preferred her as a character over crash, however we have other playable characters here as Tawna, dingodile and cortex are among our line of heroes (albeit temporarily for the latter.) Cortex controls similar to what he did in twinsanity, dingodile is a bit clunky here due to how big he is compared to the other heroes; however, his levels do accommodate for this nicely, and Tawna is a hybrid of Lara croft and Coco from wrath of cortex as this is an alternate reality version of the one from the first game. The story does have a multiverse element to it, however that's thankfully restricted to explaining the cast as only Tawna and female n tropy are from an alternate dimension and are in this one due to our two main leads being dead from the dimension they're from. While cortex is a bad guy in this game, the primary antagonists are the two n tropys as they betray him early on to merge the dimensions as one so that they can rule over them, sort of like yubel from yu-gi-oh gx if you're familiar with that series. The humour is a bit of a mixed bag as there’s some really clever double entendre (usually in reference to the two villains flirting with each other) whilst others are what I can only describe as 4kids writing, basically the bottom of the barrel humour that ruined some of the greatest anime of all time in the 00s which sadly did affect the humour in the reignited trilogy. It's very sparse here so it's not worth complaining about.

It's far from perfect, however I don't judge games by technical excellence and instead how much joy they bring into my life which this game has successfully brought a ton of during my playthrough.

Just a really solid return to a classic platformer. It's fun, it's challenging, it's extremely charming with the characters, it's a great time. Even the Switch version performs and looks fantastic. I had a wonderful time playing through this game, and I will never in a million years 100% it. I've seen the pain that it has caused and I'd rather not lose the tiny bit of sanity I still have left.

Really great, plays smoothly, and unlike the other Crash Bandicoot games, the difficulty actually comes from the unique level design and not the inherently wonky game mechanics. This game plays well, and the variety of characters and levels always provide something fresh upon booting up. I do wish some of it wasn't SO difficult, but it was still an absolute blast to play.

There hasn't been a game that feels like a Crash game since Wrath of Cortex in 2001, and that game wasn't that good anyways. It was decent, but nothing when compared to the original trilogy, that trilogy that I always felt it was underrated and that it made me so happy got recognized and appreciated a lot in the last couple of years thanks to what's probably my all time favourite game now, the N. Sane Trilogy.
That adaptation was so FUCKING good, but the challenge was to now actually grab that and create a new game with it. One that is faithfull but that also updates some stuff, because the original trilogy is quite old by now. But you know what? It nails it! And it nails it so God damn well.
The main things from Crash 3 are still here, spinning, the dash, the double jump (unlockable from the start this time around), all the crates and a few new ones. It does bring back some stuff from Crash 1, there are no pink gems, but there's a total of 12 gems to unlock per level, which the maximum I've done on one was 11, so there's a ton of replayability, specially since half of those gems are part of the new N.Verted mode, which not only mirrors the level but throws interesting visual twists to it. And that's not even talking about the time trials and tapes that unlock hard special levels (and so far I was only able to unlock one of them). The game map is also akin to Crash 1, with a linear level selection.
There are a few changes made to make the game more fair/easy, the jump is way more forgiving, I feel like I can be more exact on where I want to be, and panic save myself more often as well. The circular thing that tells you where Crash is going to land also helps a lot, and of course, the lack of lives, which means infinite tries, instead it counts your deaths (My record was 140 deaths on one level, tho there was a lot of suicides trying to catch four crates, I spent an hour and half in one 5 second spot just trying to catch all the crates there). The last two changes are optional, you can turn them off, if you want, but the game seems to have been designed around this. Each level awards you a gem for dying a maximum of 3 times over it's course, and the woompa fruits are not rendered useless, as collecting them can give you up to three gems at the end as well. And of course, the game is fucking super fucking hard.
It's easily the hardest game I've played in the series. and unless the Crash of Titans series are harder, it's the hardest overall. The bonus levels in specific are assholes, it requires pitch perfect precision, timing and a good sense of enviorment as well to actually complete these with all the crates. And actually, the game is probably easier if you just ignore most of the boxes... But who does that? The game can be very frustrating, but it's also incredibly rewarding, and with more precise jumping mechanics, this time it's really all on you.
The masks were the thing I was most worried about, because they are giving up game changing powers, but these powers actually blend so well with the gameplay, and instead of making things easier, each power actually brings different challenges and puzzles that would be impossible in previous games.
The new characters (Tawna, Dingodile and Cortex) are a mixed bag. I want to give props to make them all actually feel and play differently from one another, and Tawna feels really nice to play as (and I'm not a furry, but those thighs), but Cortex and Dingodile, while not horrible to play as, have mechanics that just don't feel as pleasing to play as the others, and I'm talking about mostly the jumping system of both, but other than that, pretty cool, pretty cool.
There is a couple bugs here and there, none that game breaking, mostly visually, like the time trial clock being there in the first run of a level, tho not interacteable, and slippery floor where the slippery part was actually floating above the floor. I also managed to clip over some platforms like twice, but thank God, because that saved my life. I hope they patch these up tho.
And that's it. sorry for the big text, but I'm so passionate for this series, and this game just did such a beautiful job at keeping what the games are about and what makes them fun, and that's such a rare thing for franchises as old as this one, specially those that change teams often. So thanks Toys for Bob, I really love it!

Is it a good sequel to the original trilogy? Yes. Did it finally manage to fill the huge gap with its Nintendo competitor? Definitely not. The ones who liked the old games will keep liking the saga, and the ones who didn’t like it will keep not liking it. There are some new elements and multiple characters available, but the gameplay feels almost the same as the recent remakes.

The level design tends to rely on “Warped”, but areas got noticeably bigger and a little more varied. The quantum masks are the most obvious addition to the gameplay, but unfortunately, they can only be used in specific areas of the levels. The whole multiverse/time travel idea could have been used for much more interesting gameplay dynamics.

I liked the introduction of levels that let you use other characters with completely different movies, even though it’s only very short sections that ultimately force you to go through segments you have already cleared with Crash but on a harder difficulty.

The level of challenge is my biggest issue with this game. 106% completion is nearly impossible, and even clearing all areas once without caring about crates and gems drove me crazy. I like games that push your limits, but honestly, the last couple of areas felt more like conscious trolling rather than smart level design choices. You won’t have to repeat levels once you run out of lives like in the old games, but you will keep repeating the same checkpoints dozens of times and dying every five seconds during the most difficult sections.