How is the new Crash looking?
I’ve spent the past few days with the Crash 4 demo, which is now available to download if you’ve pre-ordered the game. The demo consists of 3 levels, one of which you play as Cortex while the other 2 are more traditional Crash with an ice-based level and a level where you are being chased by dinosaurs.
The first level introduces us to one of the new mechanics of Crash 4, which slows time down for a short period so you can almost freeze platforms in place temporarily while you make it across the gap and other time-based things involving crates. The demo is in the Modern mode which means you don’t lose lives upon dying, but it does display how many times you’ve died throughout…which can be highly embarrassing if you have a bad run of deaths. There is a bonus stage here as well that you can retry as many times as you like as well.
The Cortex level handles very differently to traditional Crash games, Cortex can only do a singular jump but he can use his ray gun to turn enemies into still or jumpable platforms, it’s certainly a new way of getting around and will take you a while to get used to, but it’s a nice change of pace and I can’t wait to see the other levels starring Crash’s long-time nemesis.
The chase level is as you would expect from the series, but there’s a new mechanic thrown in here as well. Crash gets a device that makes certain items disappear like crates or things that will get in his way like mushrooms. The switch is with a tap of a button but there are some rails sections where you need to switch very quickly and hopefully don’t stumble into accidentally hitting the button when you are already safe from being knocked off.
Because it’s a demo, its not representative of the final product…but I have to say that Crash 4 looks and plays amazing. It runs smoothly and while it made my PS4 Pro louder than God of War did, it was silent as a mouse on my PS4 Slim. Having said that, my PS4 Pro is ridiculously loud with anything so its more likely just my console than the game itself.
Overall, the demo shows off some great new game mechanics for the series while showing that it can still be true to its roots. Will it be able to stand tall among the original trilogy? We’ll find the answer in a little over 2 weeks…