Coco Bandicoot

Coco Bandicoot is a deuteragonist in the Crash Bandicoot series. Debuted in Crash Bandicoot 2: Cortex Strikes Back, she's the younger sister of Crash Bandicoot and just like her brother and his girlfriend, she was an ordinary bandicoot until she was captured by Neo Cortex and N. Brio and mutated by N. Brio's Evolvo-Ray. Coco is one of the staple characters of the series, appearing in most games. She is highly intelligent, cute and spirited, helping her brother out armed with her laptop and technological know-how.

Crash Bandicoot 2: Cortex Strikes Back
Coco is first seen in the intro cutscenes for Crash Bandicoot 2: Cortex Strikes Back living on N. Sanity Island with Crash, when the battery for her laptop runs out, she sends Crash off to find a replacement battery. When Coco discovers that Crash is gathering crystals for Cortex, she becomes suspicious of Cortex and hacks into his computer to see what he's really up to. What she finds are detailed schematics for an improved Cortex Vortex and a suspicious-looking space station. She learns of Cortex's real plan just as Crash has gathered all the crystals, and reveals Cortex's intentions to Crash before he can give the crystals to Cortex. She appears beside her brother and N. Brio as they destroy the Cortex Vortex with N. Brio's laser beam.

Crash Bandicoot: Warped
In Warped, Coco is featured as a playable character for the first time. She and Crash are called upon by Aku Aku to use N. Tropy's Time Twister Machine and gather the powerful crystals scattered throughout time before Cortex can use them to brainwash the entire world. Coco helps by gathering the crystals in 17th century Imperial China, the 18th century Pacific Ocean, and World War I Europe. She is also responsible for the defeat of N. Gin on the moon, with her new pet tiger cub, Pura, assisting her.

Crash Bandicoot 4: It's About Time
Coco is a main character alongside Crash in It's About Time. After completing N. Sanity Peak, any level playable as Crash is playable with Coco as well (with the exception of Crash-specific flashback tape levels). As in the N. Sane Trilogy, the two control identically. She is unlocked as a playable character after completing N. Sanity Peak and opening the Dimensional Map. Coco is first seen at N. Sanity Peak, where she and Aku Aku have discovered a quantum rift, a literal hole in space that serves as a gateway between dimensions. With the help of the Quantum Masks and other allies, she and Crash travel the dimensions in order to stop Nefarious Tropy and Neo Cortex from rewriting history. Throughout the game's story, Coco frequently acts as Crash's "voice", delivering exposition and conversing with characters as her brother does not. In particular, she forms a strong bond with an alternate-dimension version of Tawna whom they meet during their journey.

Ten flashback tape levels are exclusive to Coco which delve into her backstory and relationships to other characters. She was created some time between the events of Crash Bandicoot and Crash Bandicoot 2: Cortex Strikes Back, and eventually snuck out of Cortex Castle via a "super secret emergency escape hatch".

In the 100% ending epilogue, it is revealed that Coco tried (and failed) to invent the world's first self-flying flying car, and later gained fame as an e-sports champion, naming herself "Kickass Coco".

Other major appearances
Coco is a playable character in Crash Team Racing, being one of the eight selectable racers in Adventure Mode. Her home track in the game is Coco Park. She appears in the intro, powering her kart through her laptop. Her garage, where she keeps her kart, doubles as a hi-tech computer room full of gigantic consoles and monitors which she constantly works on. In the game's epilogue, Coco opens up her own internet dating service after the events of the game. Even though it isn't going well, share prices are through the roof.

In Crash Bash, Coco is summoned by Aku Aku to battle against Uka Uka's team in a fight of good and evil alongside her big brother. But, Aku Aku forces Uka Uka to hand over two of his team as he has too many and chooses Tiny Tiger and Dingodile. Her stats are equal to her big brother. In the Crate Crush mini game, she can spin crates far while moving, although her throwing range isn't good. In Polar Push, she can push two times in a row and has great pushing power. In Tank Wars, she shoots average moving fireballs. Her best stat is in the Pogo mini games where she is faster than Crash on her pogo sticks. Her taunt is whistling at the other players in the game. When she wins, she laughs triumphantly.

In The Wrath of Cortex, Coco activates a new portal chamber she created for Crash to use when the Elementals wreak havoc on Earth. She helps Crash gather the power crystals needed to stop the Elementals by collecting them in a tsunami-ravaged Asia and an avalanche zone. She also stops an armada of Cortex's space stations from striking Earth. Near the end, she helps Crash and Crunch escape from Cortex's malfunctioning space station.

In The Huge Adventure, Coco builds a device that reverses the effects of Cortex's Planetary Minimizer with the power of the crystals. In the complete ending she uses the relics and the gems as well to destroy Cortex's space station.

In N-Tranced, Coco is abducted by N. Trance and is hypnotized alongside Crunch and Fake Crash. Coco battles Crash in a large battleship inside an active volcano, with Crash attacking the craft while it is reloading its weaponry. Upon snapping out of N. Trance's control, Coco becomes a playable character, gathering two crystals in space whilst escaping a fireball. See also Coco Bandicoot (Boss Fights).

In Crash Nitro Kart, she returns as a playable character and is a member of Team Bandicoot with Crash, Crunch and Fake Crash. She has good turning like N. Gin, Polar, Zam and Pura. In the intro, Coco is on her laptop and next to the kart. After Team Bandicoot defeats Nash, she hacks into his brain and puts him to sleep, saying he needed some. In the end, she's seen reading a book with Polar next to her.

In Crash Bandicoot Purple: Ripto's Rampage, Coco teams up with the Professor to track down Ripto and Doctor Cortex. Later in the game, they're both kidnapped by Doctor Cortex's niece, Nina Cortex, who keeps them locked up in cages. After being freed from her cage, Coco suggests that Crash and Spyro put a tracer on Cortex and Ripto as to allow the heroes to track the villains back to their hideout. Coco's last major contribution to the story is constructing a portal to Cortex's and Ripto's lair.

In the intro of Crash Twinsanity, Coco is happily chasing a butterfly before she's paralyzed by Cortex in order to lure Crash into a trap. Much later, Coco believes that Cortex kidnapped Crash, and travels to the Iceberg Lab to confront him. With a swift kick, she attacks Cortex and sends the Power Crystals he was holding flying into the Psychetron. The resulting chain reaction leaves Coco paralyzed again until the end of the game. She is last seen in the final cutscene, gasping in shock as the Psychetron shrinks down Cortex and deposits him inside Crash's brain.

Coco is a playable character in Crash Tag Team Racing. Her clashed weapon is the Sticky Lightning Gun. In the game's story, Coco discovers the sole clue to whoever stole Von Clutch's MotorWorld's Power Gems has led to Wumpa Whip. Because of Crash's high consumption of the beverage, she briefly believes (along with the others) that Crash is the culprit, despite the fact that Willie Wumpa Cheeks is the park's lone source of Wumpa Whip. At the end of the game, Coco, Crash and Crunch were offered the park's deed, but Coco returns it to Von Clutch, to whom she feels it belongs. Here, Coco's notable change is her personality, which differs from the other games. She is a lot more boisterous and rough. She seems to be a bit of a bully to Crash in this game when interacted with.

Coco plays a central role in Crash Boom Bang!, in which she is invited by the Viscount to the World Cannonball Race in his search for the Super Big Power Crystal. Coco's appearance is very different in this game.

In the opening sequence of Crash of the Titans, Coco is seen building a device to recycle butter. She is captured by Dr. Neo Cortex's airship. When Nina replaces her uncle, Dr. Neo Cortex, Nina has Coco brainwashed and is forced to finish the Doominator. She ends up completing the robot, but is rescued by Crash and is able to stop it at the end of the game. She eats pancakes with Crash and Crunch in celebration at the end of the game. When the Doominator crashes into Wumpa Island, she cares more about her stuff than any damage to the surrounding area.

At the beginning of Mind Over Mutant, Coco converts the Doominator's eye into an entertainment system. After seeing an infomercial advertising the "NV", a do-anything personal digital assistant, she receives an NV along with Crunch and quickly becomes addicted. Soon enough, the NV transforms her into a ferocious beast who tries to destroy Crash using a giant basketball-launching machine. After being defeated and informed (to her disappointment) that the NV had a negative influence on her, she uses the Doominator's eye to access Cortex's blog and learn what Cortex is planning. She is accessible as the second player's character from that point on. By the end of the game, Coco is still obsessed with trying to find a way to recycle butter for some reason. Coco has one other available skin that can be worn by accessing the chest inside of Crash's house. This other skin is the same clothing from Crash of the Titans (minus the headband) and her hair is in a pony tail. Carbon Crash is also one of Coco's skins.

In Crash Bandicoot N. Sane Trilogy, Coco reappears as a fully playable character for most levels in the remake's versions of the first three games, as opposed to only being playable in a few levels in Warped. In the game's story, she was able to achieve this by hacking into N. Tropy's Time Twister using her laptop and traveling through time. She is available from the start in the third game, but must be unlocked in the first two games by defeating the first boss in each game.

Coco can additionally use the Super Powers that have been collected from bosses in Warped. As mentioned before, there are levels that Coco cannot enter because they were specifically designed for Crash. For instance, Coco does not ride Crash's motorcycle in the original nor does she swim underwater, yet she's still fully playable in the plane stages. She also cannot enter any Boss stages, except for N. Gin in Warped. A full list of levels that cannot be entered by Coco can be seen below.

Coco is a playable character in Crash Team Racing Nitro-Fueled. In the game's epilogue, she begins a video game streaming service company. Despite the company not making enough revenue, its share prices remain high.

Nitro-Fueled also marks the debut of Baby Coco, an infant version of Coco, who is available alongside Baby Crash and Baby T during the Back N. Time Grand Prix. In a similar manner to Cortex and N. Tropy at the end of Warped, the premise of this Grand Prix explained that Coco and Crash were transformed into babies after Fake Crash stole and altered time with N. Tropy's staff. Just like the more grown-up Coco, Baby Coco is an Acceleration-specialized character in the Intermediate class. She is also carrying around a toy mobile phone, just like how the regular Coco carries around a smartphone in Crash Team Racing Nitro-Fueled. Baby Coco is bought in the game's Pit Stop as a Character Bundle for 3375 Wumpa Coins, which further includes a Baby Coco sticker, a Pastel paint job, and a Floating Flowers decal for the Nostalginator.

Coco appears in On the Run! as a playable character, helping Crash to defeat the villains. She had built a new base on Wumpa Island, using labs to create Portal Weapons to defeat the bosses and using the mission computer to track their location. Earlier on in the game she serves as the tutorial guide, giving Crash (and through him, the player) tips and advice on how to play the game.

Coco features as a playable character in Crash Team Rumble - she also appears as the game's tutorial guide. She is in the Booster role, which makes a Coco player's main goal activating gem platforms and collecting relics to activate relic stations. Her playstyle is largely the same as in It's About Time, with a few key adjustments made and new moves added to suit the game.

Other media
Coco briefly appears in the early chapters of Dansu! De Jump!, with a smaller role than the manga's source material, Cortex Strikes Back. When Crash falls into a depression after Tawna leaves him in the first chapter, Coco gives him a pep-talk and encourages him to improve himself in order to get over Tawna and become "irresistable" - though mostly, she just wants him to stop moping around. After Crash gets kidnapped by Cortex, she gets left behind. She reappears for a single page at the beginning of chapter 4, Deep in the ruins...!, where she reprimands Crash for leaving without telling her before going back home on her scooter. She has a more significant role in the two bonus chapters, since they're based on Warped rather than Cortex Strikes Back, matching her roles in said games.

Coco also appeared alongside her brother in the season three (and series) finale of Skylanders Academy.

Physical Appearance
Coco is generally depicted as a feminine youth antropomorphic bandicoot, with a more realistic body shape (compared to her brother), green eyes, a full head of long blonde hair, usually tied up in a ponytail, and with a blue/pink flower stuck on the side.

From the Naughty Dog games to The Wrath of Cortex, Coco wears a white shirt, light-blue overalls (with one strap undone), pink sneakers and hair tied up at the back.

In Crash Nitro Kart, Coco looks visibly older. Although she still wears a flower in her hair, Coco's clothes and physique became visually more mature and feminine. She also wears sky blue jeans with pink stripes and a white T-shirt with sky blue trims and a pink petaled smiling flower on it, while her sneakers' soles were slightly heightened, making her a little taller. She wears the same outfit in Crash Twinsanity, though her jeans are now dark blue; she also wears her jeans tucked into the back of her shirt and reveals her stomach.

In Crash Tag Team Racing, her outfit was altered: her flower symbol was replaced by a red star, her trademark sneakers gained orange lines and her jeans have a white belt to hold them up. An unlockable costume in the same game has Coco dressing up in a blue and pink princess attire.

In Boom Bang!, Coco wears a short white shirt with pink sleeves, short jeans, and pink and blue bracelet, she doesn't wear a flower anymore and she have a more anime-like appearance.

In Crash of the Titans, Coco's attire is very similar to what she wore in Crash Tag Team Racing, though the sleeves on her T-shirt have become a light-blue color. Coco does not wear her hair in a ponytail or wear a flower in it in this installment, instead of having her hair straight down and wearing a blue headband and is seen as much more grown-up. The shape of her head is also altered.

Coco's design is altered once more for Crash: Mind Over Mutant, in which her head is back to the original shape. She once again wears her hair in a ponytail with two strands up front, wears goggles on her forehead, and has larger, more expressive eyes. Coco now wears a pendant bearing a symbol of a cog with a heart-shaped hole over a lightning bolt (which is imprinted on the soles of her sneakers). Her jeans also became yellow with a holster for a flashlight, kneepads and her pink sneakers were replaced by brown boots. She can also wear her Titans clothes as a skin, with her sleeves and jeans now a faded purple. Coco's design in Skylanders Academy seems to be a combination of her appearance in Crash of the Titans and Mind Over Mutant, with her pants being brown, holding a holster for her boomerang and gloves with metal knuckles just like Crash.

In both the N. Sane Trilogy and Crash Team Racing Nitro-Fueled, Coco retains her original appearance from the first five games with some small additions, with her T-shirt now having pink trimmed sleeves and her overalls now have denim detailing and belt loops. In addition, she has on pink eyeshadow and wears a pink flower in her hair instead of a blue one.

As a baby in Crash Team Racing Nitro-Fueled, Baby Coco wears the same outfit but has the opposite button of the overalls undone and has shorter hair tied above her head in a swirl. She also has larger ears, no flower, and a pink pacifier. Instead of a smartphone, she carries a small pink toy phone with colored buttons and an antennae on it.

From Crash Bandicoot 4: It's About Time to Crash Team Rumble, Coco has more of a cartoony physical appearance and dresses similarly to her original design with the white T-shirt, overalls, ponytail, and pink shoes. However, she now wears several additional accessories that makes her look more like a mechanic, including a pair of goggles on her forehead, a pink utility belt with a item pouch attached to it, and a heart-shaped patch sewed to the right knee of her overalls. She no longer has a flower in her hair but now wears an earing on one ear, a pink bracelet over her right wrist, and has a pink sports bra and boyshorts which serve as her underwear. Coco now carries a sticker-decorated tablet in place of her usual laptop computer.

Personality
From the moment she is introduced, Coco is established as an "annoying younger sibling" sort of character and uses Crash to perform certain errands whenever she sees fit. Her work ethic can be best described as domineering; most of the time, she only works on what she wants to do and largely ignores what really needs to be done, such as cleaning the house (as displayed in Crash: Mind Over Mutant). Despite this, Coco is generally depicted as responsible, smart, kind-hearted, good-natured and high spirited, her educated wit often contrasted by an innocent demeanor. Despite their contrasting personalities, Coco is far from prissy and is generally tolerant, if not outright amused by Crash's behavior. She also shares his altruistic code, even to some enemies (as Crash had taken sympathy on Krunk in Nitro Kart, Coco felt pity for Nash, using her hack smarts to make the "poor shark thingy" take a much-needed nap).

One of Coco's most prominent traits is her genius-level intellect, possesing an IQ of 164, she is great with technology as she carries a pink/turquoise laptop occasionally and is skilled at hacking, as seen in Crash Bandicoot 2: Cortex Strikes Back, when she intercepts Cortex's messages to convince her brother not to listen to him. Below the Bandicoot House lies Coco's VR Hub System, which resides in a secret lab seen in Crash Bandicoot: The Wrath of Cortex. It works similar to the Time Twister in that it can warp to different places around the world, the only difference being that it remains in the present time. She is a fan of martial arts films and masculine sports such as wrestling and NASCAR. In Crash Tag Team Racing, Coco's personality is different: she is more preppy, loud, ditzy, sassy, often makes eccentric poses, and likes beauty and shopping. Coco has an unexplained grudge against Nina Cortex starting from Crash Tag Team Racing, something that ends up requited after she openly competes for superiority above her in Crash of the Titans.

Coco is generally depicted a lucid foil for Crash, often taking the role of straight man or spokesman whenever Aku Aku isn't around. She is not without her own ditzy moments, however, and is certainly not immune to the same slapstick buffoonery that so often befalls her brother, sometimes even quite wilfully. In general, if there is one personality vice that even Crash controls better than Coco, it is temper. Unlike her big brother, who is generally blasé or oblivious to humiliation and comical abuse, Coco can get easily frustrated, if not outright tantrum prone, when the joke is on her or the undesired results occur. She will frequently sulk or vent anger if she fails to complete her goal. Coco can also be impulsive as a result, when she believes Cortex to have kidnapped Crash in Crash Twinsanity she recklessly attacks him, ruining their cooperated efforts and electrocuting herself in the process. Some of Coco's less-thought-through inventions also often fabricate through this disposition. Coco sometimes had a penchant for getting easily captured or making vital errors that Crash would (surprisingly) avoid. Some titles such as Tag Team Racing also depict Coco as more arrogant and petulant than Crash due to her greater intellect (something which, along with her rather poor detective skills, gets her labelled as dumb as her peers by an irritated Willie Wumpa Cheeks).

From Crash Bandicoot N. Sane Trilogy onwards, Coco was given a lot more silly and cheerful personality that parallels with the goofball aspects of her brother, while also restoring her genius intellect and smarter approach to things from Crash 2 through CTR. Coco will frequently laugh at or even take part in Crash's silliness. This new aspect of her personality was first introduced in the N. Sane Trilogy, where she will laugh at Crash's idle animations, such as when he drops a wumpa fruit on his head or gets tangled up in his yo-yo. This iteration of Coco also tends to act like a goofball on her own, as she will often make silly faces while taking selfies and even has her own take on Crash's dance in her idle animations. These aspects of her personality are further developed in Crash Team Racing Nitro-Fueled, where she does silly things during her podium animations such as pretending to get poisoned by a wumpa fruit with her princess skin. In the ending, she even encourages her brother to do the Crash dance with her. This is also the first game where Coco was introduced to have a liking for video games, as she begins a game streaming service company in the epilogue.

Crash Bandicoot 4: It's About Time expands upon the new elements that were added to Coco's personality while also retaining the smarter and mature aspects of her personality. In addition to being a lot more cheerful and silly, she is more adventurous, outgoing, mischievous, dynamic, and easygoing. Coco also has a more excited, upbeat, and can-do attitude when it comes to joining Crash on his adventures or fighting enemies. She does occasionally get annoyed and grossed out by Crash such as when he jumped into her arms after being frightened by N. Brio and when he picked up the egg that N. Brio laid, but for the most part Crash and her often come to an agreement on things. In the ending, Coco cheerfully plays video games with Tawna and then encourages Crash to join them. Coco's interest in video games is further emphasized when it is revealed that she became an esports champion in the epilogue.

While earlier games tended to convey them more as an equal brains and brawn division, recent games imply Coco to be a more stable successor to Crash as a result of being the later of Cortex's bandicoot mutants. In It's About Time, she tends to outclass Crash as much in the physical side of things as the intellectual side, always being nimble and cautious enough to avoid the same pratfalls as her brother. Her On The Run bio states Coco could easily supplant Crash as the world's savior if she wanted to.

Coco also has a habit of taking her laptop, or tablet, anywhere she goes. In Crash Bandicoot N. Sane Trilogy and Crash Bandicoot 4: It's About Time, Coco always carries it while the player is controlling her. She doesn't appear to be too concerned with it getting damaged however, as she is willing to use it to shield herself from boxes falling on her head and to grind on rails. She treats her phone in a similar manner, as she will throw it in the air as it starts to malfunction in one of her idle animations and she even throws it on the ground and kicks it in one of her podium animations in Crash Team Racing Nitro-Fueled.

Behind-the-scenes information
Coco Bandicoot was created by Joe Pearson and as the younger siser of Crash Bandicoot. After had removed Tawna from the series by Sony's demand, they later suggested to Naughty Dog then create another female character with a more "juvenile" archetype and would serve as Crash's younger sister and to replace Tawna's role as the series' main female supporting character.

Trivia

 * Coco is voiced by Debi Derryberry, the voice behind many cartoon characters on TV including Jimmy Neutron.
 * Coco has her own theme in Cortex Strikes Back which plays during her holograms, although it's not easy to make out as it is masked by her dialogue. The game's composer Josh Mancell has uploaded a pre-console version of the theme onto his SoundCloud.
 * Coco uses leetspeak in Crash Nitro Kart for some of her in-race lines.
 * According to Coco's character profile in Crash Bandicoot: On the Run!. She loves tech, NASCAR, reading and Pura and she hates obviously Nina Cortex.
 * She was originally meant to be playable in Crash Twinsanity, where she would assist Crash and Cortex. Like in Wrath of Cortex, she would have her own levels.
 * Coco's laptop is hot pink in almost all appearances. However, in Crash Nitro Kart ' s intro and in some promotional artwork, it is same shade of sky blue as her jeans. The laptop returns to being pink during her podium defeat animation.
 * In Crash Team Racing, when Coco loses, there is the Naughty Dog Logo on her laptop that can be seen when she comes in second place. When she comes in third place, you can see the Naughty Dog signature paw print on the laptop's screen.
 * The Naughty Dog logo returns to her laptop in both the N. Sane Trilogy and It's About Time. The logo can also be seen on Coco's phone in the N. Sane Trilogy and Nitro-Fueled.
 * In some promotional artwork for Crash Nitro Kart her kart has a unique pink paintjob, but she uses a regular blue Team Bandicoot kart in the game itself.
 * She's the only character in Crash Nitro Kart to have five fingers.
 * In the Japanese epilogue of Crash Bash, it is stated that Coco dreams of becoming an idol singer. When her computer generates a holographic image of her future self as a matured music star, Crash briefly mistakes it for Tawna.
 * In Nitro-Fueled, silhouettes of Coco's default victory animation are used as the Nitro Squad's paparazzi for their podium animations.
 * According to Charles Zembillas, Coco was concepted as a teenager in the Naughty Dog titles.
 * The flashback tape "Overall Fitness Exam" of Crash Bandicoot 4: It's About Time reveals that Cortex picked out her overalls (which originally belonged to N. Brio) after trying out several outfits for her.
 * According to Japanese canon, Coco's birthday is on May 5th. It is because it can be formatted as 5/5, which can be read as "ko-ko" in Japanese, spelling her name.

Names In Other Languages

 * Coco Bandicoot


 * Baby Coco