Crash Bandicoot: Wrath of Cortex

While at the beach soaking up a few rays, evil is plotting to crush Crash with
Crunch! Confused yet? That’s right, Crash Bandicoot in the newest and
first ever Xbox title Crash Bandicoot: Wrath of the Cortex
is here. Coming from a very successful 3 game series on the Playstation, we
now have the orange rodent running rampant in the Green Box, with only a few
changes.

For the first time ever you’ll be able to play Crash’s sister Coco, and drive
more vehicles than were available in the previous versions combined. In over
thirty levels you’ll go around collecting Wumpa Fruit and Crystals, in an effort
to stop Dr. Neo Cortex from using the elemental powers to create Crunch, who
will seek to destroy Crash.

Gameplay is quite simple, and fans of the series will be able
to jump right in and get going, newcomers will find that the controls are relatively
simple, yet some of the targets will take some practice to acquire. This is
a linear game, played in the third person view with a restrictedly fixed camera
that will make some of the simplest maneuvers difficult to achieve.Speaking
of maneuvers, every time you defeat a boss you get a new power, like tip toe,
super double jump, death tornado, crash dash, and bazooka, in addition to the
moves you already have from the start.

Dr. Neo Cortex is still trying to destroy Crash, he has built Crunch, a Super
Bandicoot, who’s sole reason of existence is to destroy Crash. With the help
of Uka Uka, and the four elemental masks, he’ll have enough power to destroy
him. The basic goal in each level is to get through alive, finding all 25 crystals
throughout the game. Getting the crystals will keep the elemental masks under
control and make powering up Crunch impossible. Throughout the journey, you’ll
come across different types of crates, as you are familiar with from the past
games in the series. Breaking the crates will reveal Wumpa Fruit, or other items
such as bonus lives or a surprise. There is a storyline delivered between levels
that ties them together, but not much more. There is also a Time trial mode,
where you go through the levels as fast as you can and try to win different
relics, Sapphire, Gold and Platinum. Platinum is the hardest to achieve.

As we mentioned above, you can also play as Coco, Crash’s sister who is also
a super-smart computer expert, in certain levels of the game. These levels concentrate
mainly on more skilled jumping, rather than crushing enemies and boxes, and
as usual, one false slip and your dead. Aku Aku is your guide, a witch doctor
mask that follows you around, and aids Crash and Coco at stopping Dr. Cortex
and his buddies. the many vehicles offer a variety of gameplay methods, and
require some practice to perfect. Some of the levels are hit and miss, as they
put Crash coming towards you, without being able to see anything coming up ahead,
evidently just to add a bit of frustration.

The capabilities of the Xbox hard drive were used sparingly
in the creation of Wrath of Cortex. While they did a good job creating the little
rodent’s fuzz, and popping in some colorful scenery, they really only scraped
the surface in terms of really making the graphics shine as the first Crash
into the Xbox. Don’t get me wrong, the title looks good, but lacked that last
bit of polish that it may have had if it wasn’t rushed over to the shelves.
With that being said, the graphics still rate highly based on the creativity
of the characters and imaginative levels.

With Dolby Digital sound the character
come to life, well, as much alive as some of these characters can get. They
have an interesting music score, which will quickly get on your last nerve.
All in all, the happy go lucky upbeat nature of the soundtrack fits the game,
but may not fit the player. Lack of being able to use some of your ripped music
is a drag.

There is allot of fun to be had playing levels over and
over, sometimes not by choice. Allot of areas are not required to finish the
game, mainly the bonus areas, and coming back to refine your skills can be quite
enjoyable.

Overall Score: 6.0 [Not an Average]

While overall it a decent game, the frustration
level at times can be a deterrent. Had the jumping mechanics been tweaked a
bit, and dying after barely touching an enemy been altered, this game could
have easily scored higher. It’s no secret that fans of the series will enjoy
the Wrath of Cortex, but you’ll probably have hoped they put a bit more into
it.

• Official Wrath of
  the Cortex Website
• Universal Interactive
• Crash
  Bandicoot Screenshots (Temporarily Unavailable, Sorry.)
• Wrath
  of the Cortex Hints and Cheats

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