Crash of the Titans

Crash of the Titans is the fourteenth installment in the Crash Bandicoot video game series, although it is the seventh chronologically. The game's story centers on the discovery of a substance known as "Mojo", which the antagonist of the series, Doctor Neo Cortex, plans to use to turn the inhabitants of the Wumpa Islands into an army of loyal mutants known as "Titans", or mutants in later games. The protagonist of the series, Crash Bandicoot, must stop Cortex by using the technique of "jacking" to take control of and destroy Cortex's titans while collecting the Mojo.

Gameplay
Crash of the Titans is a platform game in which the player controls Crash Bandicoot, whose main objective is to rescue his sister, Coco, and save his home, the Wumpa Islands, from being destroyed by the main antagonist's gigantic robot. The player's first goal is to rescue the sentient mask Aku Aku, who gives the player basic instructions, shields Crash from enemy attacks, and transforms into a skateboard to help Crash traverse slippery terrain. From there, each level (known as an "episode") asks players to complete fights against large groups of enemies or simply progress through the episode.

Crash starts the game with three lives. The length of each of Crash's lives is tied to his health meter, which decreases whenever Crash is damaged from enemy attacks or falls down a bottomless pit. The player can replenish Crash's health meter by instructing Crash to eat Wumpa Fruit. Each time the health meter is fully depleted, Crash loses a life. However, the player can win an additional life for Crash by collecting 25,000 units of the magical substance known as Mojo or by collecting a rare type of Golden Wumpa Fruit. After the last life is lost, the player can continue playing by restarting the current episode.

Each episode contains a portal leading to a simple mini-game arena, where the player must accomplish a task in a set time. Generally the task involves collecting a specified quantity of Mojo, using an enemy animal's attacks to snipe targets, or simply defeating a select number of enemies. At the end of each episode, the player earns a rank of a wood, bronze, silver, or gold voodoo object; the rank can be improved by defeating a set number of minions, destroying three robotic toilets or inflicting a minimum number of consecutive hits in combat. All three tasks must be accomplished in an episode if a gold voodoo object is to be obtained for that episode. Hidden voodoo dolls unlock concept art packages for each episode. Information on new Titans or enemies can also be viewed by selecting their voodoo doll after completing the episode. The Nintendo DS version of the game contains similar gameplay to that of previous Crash installments. The game takes place on four islands, each with two levels and a boss. When a boss is defeated, a new island is unlocked. Each island has its own "Pachinko board" where players can win "on-demand items"; items that can be used to restore health, provide temporary invincibility, and set off Nitro explosions among other things. Additional content can also be won at these Pachinko boards, such as gallery art, cheats and a large quantity of Mojo.

Combat
Whereas the previous games featured Crash spinning into or jumping on an enemy to attack, Crash of the Titans gives him more options for attack. Early in the game, Crash has a light-powered attack and a heavy-powered attack and can also block, dodge or break an enemy's block. When he defeats an enemy or destroys an object, a magical substance known as Mojo is released. When Crash collects enough Mojo, he will earn either an ability upgrade or a new move, such as the Norris Roundhouse or the Triple Dragon. His classic spin attack, named "Old Skool", is an unlockable move, along with an aerial variant that allows Crash to float over chasms. While small minions require only a single combo attack for Crash to defeat, larger enemies, known as "Titans", require more effort to subdue. Each of the fifteen unique Titans in the game possess a star meter that indicates how close they are to being stunned. The meter rises when Crash starts attacking a Titan, and depletes when he stops. When it is full, the Titan is stunned and susceptible to "jacking", meaning Crash can mount the creature and control it. While controlled by the player, the Titan possesses a similar move set to Crash, although some jacked Titans can shoot projectiles. Besides a greater health, the Titans controlled by Crash have a purple Titan Meter. When this meter is full, players can make the Titan unleash a special attack, which fully drains the meter in the process.

A Titan's durability depends on its size; larger Titans will take more effort to defeat than others and a few are immune to Crash's attacks. To defeat them, Crash has to jack a smaller Titan to fight them. On defeating the larger Titan, he can dismount the Titan he previously jacked and directly jack the larger Titan. The dismounted Titan will then be destroyed.

Co-operative play
A player using a second controller can join the game at any time in the form of a white-furred version of Crash known as "Carbon Crash". The second player appears in the first player's backpack, and can usually enter or exit the pack. However, the second player has to stay in the backpack if the first player is in mid-air or climbing a wall. This method of play is useful for overpowering enemies and collecting Mojo faster. There are two modes of co-op play; in "Leapfrog Mode", the players swap control each time the front player jumps, swings, or slides, while in "Piggyback Mode", each player is equipped with their own backpack and can hide in the other player's backpack if the action becomes too intense, such as when jumping over a chasm.

Story
In the beginning of the game, Crash Bandicoot aids Coco with a butter-recycling device. Doctor Neo Cortex arrives, captures Coco and Aku Aku and encases Crunch in ice. Crash throws Coco's machine at Cortex's airship, severing the chain holding Aku Aku's cage, which causes the cage to fall into the nearby forest. After Crash rescues Aku Aku, they discover that Cortex and Uka Uka are stealing Mojo from a nearby temple and decide to stop them. On reaching the temple, Cortex reveals his plot to use the stolen Mojo to create an army of loyal mutants, which will be used to build a robot known as the Doominator, that will crush the Wumpa Islands and take over the world. After failing to defeat Crash with his Yuktopus robot, Cortex boasts that Crash will never find his base and flies off, leaving Crash and Aku Aku to follow him.

At Cortex's base, Uka Uka derides Cortex for failing to destroy Crash, and replaces Cortex with his niece, Nina Cortex, despite protests from Neo, N.Gin and Tiny Tiger. Nina has Coco brainwashed and makes her participate in the construction of the Doominator. Throughout the course of the game, Crash and Aku Aku interrogate Tiny Tiger, Doctor N.Gin, and Uka Uka on the whereabouts of Coco to which they all tell parts of Nina's plan.

When they confront Nina Cortex inside the Doominator robot, Nina summons her Arachnina robot and fights Crash. Crash eventually destroys the robot, liberating Coco and disabling the Doominator. The Doominator collapses and barely misses the Bandicoot home (and Crunch), sparing much of Wumpa Island. Escaping from the collapsed Doominator, Cortex praises Nina for betraying him, and promises to be more evil in the near future, though saying he was still gonna "spank her stupid". The Bandicoots decide that it is time for celebration, leading Crash to shout his first word in the series and the object of their celebration: Pancakes!

The DS version of the game largely follows the story of the home console versions, but with minor alterations such as Nina Cortex having a greater role and the inclusion of Dingodile.

The Game Boy Advance version also includes Dingodile and some plot differences, such as the Arachnina (referred to by its old name, "Spiderbot") not being the last boss,= and Cortex being reinstated after Nina's defeat on N. Trapment Island.

The intro can be seen here.

Wumpa Island

 * A New Hop
 * A Succumbing to Age Story
 * A Zero's Journey
 * The Temple of Zoom

Lumber Yard

 * The Emerald Pity
 * Don't Eat the Yellow Brick Load
 * The Blizzard of Claws

N.Sanity Island

 * Life's A Beach
 * Operation Overboard
 * A Sludge Too Far
 * Shock and Awesome
 * Weapons of Mass Construction
 * Doomraker

Uka Tree

 * Family Tree
 * Calamityville Horror
 * Timber Trials
 * Adolt Edumacation

Doominator

 * War of the Whirls
 * Minority Rapport
 * Revengeance 2: The Revengicide

Cast

 * Jess Harnell as Crash Bandicoot, the main protagonist of the game. He is a bandicoot who must defeat the main antagonist Doctor Neo Cortex and use the Titans against each other while collecting Mojo to upgrade his fighting techniques.
 * Greg Eagles as Aku Aku, an ancient wooden mask who acts as a shield, a skateboard and a weapon for Crash.
 * Debi Derryberry as Coco Bandicoot, Crash's genius younger sister.
 * Chris Williams as Crunch Bandicoot, Crash's muscular friend. He is absent in the Nintendo DS version of the game.
 * Williams also voices Tiny Tiger, a minion of Cortex`s.
 * Lex Lang as Doctor Neo Cortex, a mad scientist who captures Coco and wants to use stolen Mojo to create an army of mutants.
 * John DiMaggio as Uka Uka, the mastermind behind Doctor Cortex's plots for world domination. He is absent in the Nintendo DS version of the game.
 * Amy Gross as Nina Cortex, Neo Cortex's cyborg niece and his replacement as the main antagonist of the story when Uka Uka tires of the elder Cortex's incompetence.
 * Nolan North as:
 * Doctor N.Gin, the hysterical right-hand man of the Cortexes.
 * Tiny Tiger in the Nintendo DS version of the game.
 * Dingodile, another minion of Cortex`s. He exclusively appears in the Nintendo DS and Game Boy Advance versions of Crash of the Titans as a boss character.

Minions
Aiding the villains are a number of small fodder enemies that attempt to hinder Crash in his journey. Each fodder is affiliated with a certain villain in the game.
 * Ratnicians - Bipedal rats dressed as laboratory researchers. They work for Doctor Neo Cortex.
 * Koo-alas- Southern-accented koalas who work for Tiny Tiger
 * Doom Monkeys - Monkey wrench-wielding gibbons who work for Doctor N.Gin.
 * Voodoo Bunnies - Spear-chucking rabbits who work for Uka Uka.
 * Brat Girls - Teenage cat girls who work for Nina Cortex.
 * Spybots - Toilet robots that appear 3 in every level.
 * Minebots - Exploding robots that appear in several levels.
 * Turtballers- They work for Dingodile (DS version only)

Titans

 * Spike
 * Goar
 * Snipe
 * Yuktopus (Boss)
 * Rhinoroller
 * Shellephant
 * Magmadon
 * Stench
 * Scorporilla
 * Sludge
 * Ratcicle
 * Battler
 * Ee-Lectric
 * Uka Uka (Boss)
 * Arachnina (Boss)

Reception
Crash of the Titans received mixed reviews upon its release. GameSpot credited it as a "fairly sturdy, combat-heavy platformer with a good hook", but concluded that it lacked the distinctive style of past Crash Bandicoot games. The DS version of the game was reviewed positively, with IGN naming it "one of the better handheld Crash games to hit the market". Nintendo World Report gave the DS version a higher score than the home console version by half a point, but dismissed it as "a short game that has very little gameplay variety". GameSpot proclaimed that "there's plenty to do, and controlling the enemy is a neat twist", but criticized the game's small length of only six to eight hours.

The more negative reviews include those from Nintendo Power, who criticized the game for its "fixed and unforgiving" camera, which they felt made the platforming experience "frustrating". GameSpy also criticized the game for its camera along with its unsteady framerate, but praised the game's attractive graphics and offline co-op mode. IGN described the game as "a good idea wrapped in a mediocre game", dismissing the game's music as "forgettable", and hoping that the jacking concept would be refined for a possible sequel. EuroGamer was also critical of Crash of the Titans, deriding its graphics as "designed primarily with the PS2 and Wii in mind, with a fairly lazy high-def makeover late in development". The PSP version received less praise than its console counterparts, with IGN remarking that it "loses out to the consoles in a number of areas; especially when it comes to multiplayer".

Crash of the Titans was a nominee in the Write's Guild To America's inaugural video game writing awards, competing against Dead Head Fred, The Simpsons Gamer, The Witcher and World in Conflict''. 'Crash Of The Titans was also selected as a nominee in the "Best Sound Design" and "Best Character" categories of the Second Annual Elan Awards.

In Australia, Crash of the Titans was the second highest-selling game in its first week below Halo 3. The game was not as successful in the United Kingdom, where the PS2 version of the game debuted at #32 in the sales charts. The game made £3.35 million in the U.K. by the end of 2007.[73] Despite the poor sales in the U.K., the game was re-released on Platinum for the PlayStation 2 and for the Xbox 360 classics

Monster Edition
This game saw a limited special PS2 edition in Europe called "Monster Edition".

This pack came with the normal PS2 game, a bonus DVD, a hanging decor for mobile phones (in the shape of Crash's head), a fuzzy orange pencil case, temporary tattoos, and a character sticker sheet.

The bonus DVD includes an interview with the developers, the trailer for the game, the trailer for The Legend of Spyro: The Eternal Night, hints and tips, cheat codes and a link for exclusive goodies for the Crash Village website (which, incidentally, never actually worked, as the website changed its address before this edition was released).

Trivia

 * This is first game in the entire series (canon or otherwise), to have Crash without his gloves on revealing that he has tribal-like tattoo's on his hands leading up to his forearms.
 * On that note the main cast had a different redesign that includes them looking more punkish to appeal to a wider audience.
 * This is the first Crash Bandcoot game on Wii and Xbox 360, and the last game on the Game Boy Advance.
 * It is also the first game to include a health bar for Crash instead the traditional Aku Aku mask serving as protection.
 * This game marks the first appearance of Carbon Crash.
 * According to the pre-production manual there were major differences that was set to be in the game:
 * 1) Coco and Crunch were planned to be playable characters, while Baby-T and Pura were centered to be the main plot for the game's storyline being kidnapped instead of Aku Aku & Coco.
 * 2) Crash was originally going to wear gloves similar to his classic design along with an entire line up of different mutants.
 * 3) Aku Aku had a feather meter to determine how much longer he could hold against an enemy attack.
 * 4) Crash had an extra set of moves that wasn't launched in the game those moves included a gravity defying wall-slide, a normal ground slide (upon landing), and a triple jump.
 * 5) Crash's counter move was supposedly planned to be in this game, however it was scrapped. It made a return in the sequel Crash Mind Over Mutant.
 * Aku Aku and Uka Uka have different voice actors for this game instead of Mel Winkler and Alex Fernandez who has voiced them in previous games.
 * This game marks the first time that Crash actually spoke his first word being "Pancakes". In the Game Boy Advance version he said: "Pancakes? I thought you'd never ask!"
 * This is the first Crash Bandicoot game that was not released in japan.
 * This is the first Crash Bandicoot game to be on the most consoles being on the Wii, Xbox 360, PlayStation 2, PSP, Nintendo DS, and Game Boy Advance.
 * This is the only game in which Crash doesn't get harmed if he makes any psychical contact with the enemies.
 * In the GBA version, Nina's purple skirt was replaced with a grey pair of shorts.
 * The game incorrectly refers Wumpa Island as Whumpa Island.

Crash of the Titans Crash of the Titans