A platformer (also called a platform game , and sometimes a jump 'n' run game ) is a sub-genre of action video games in which the core objective is to move the player character between points in an environment. Platform games are characterized by levels with uneven terrain and suspended platforms of varying height that require jumping and climbing to traverse. Other acrobatic maneuvers may factor into the gameplay, such as swinging from vines or grappling hooks, jumping off walls, gliding through the air, or bouncing from springboards or trampolines.
172-419: Spyro is a platform game series originally created by Insomniac Games as an exclusive for Sony 's PlayStation console. The series features the adventures of the main protagonist of the title character , a dragon. Since the series' introduction in 1998, there have been numerous sequels and a reboot trilogy. The series was originally produced by Universal Interactive , later became known as Vivendi Games ;
344-452: A manga series titled Crash Bandicoot—Dansu! de Jump! na Daibōken , loosely based on the events of Crash Bandicoot 2: Cortex Strikes Back . The series was drawn and produced by Ari Kawashima, with only two manga volumes being published to date, leaving the total number of comics unknown. During the production of Crash Bandicoot , a pair of cutscenes featuring hand-drawn animation were produced by Universal Animation Studios to serve as
516-608: A true 3D platformer is a French computer game called Alpha Waves , created by Christophe de Dinechin and published by Infogrames in 1990 for the Atari ST , Amiga , and IBM PC compatibles . Bug! , released in 1995 for the Saturn , has a more conservative approach. It allows players to move in all directions, but it does not allow movement along more than one axis at once; the player can move orthogonally but not diagonally. Its characters were pre-rendered sprites, much like
688-452: A 1980 arcade release by Universal , is sometimes credited as the first platformer. Another precursor to the genre from 1980 was Nichibutsu 's Crazy Climber , in which the player character scales vertically scrolling skyscrapers. The unreleased 1979 Intellivision game Hard Hat has a similar concept. Donkey Kong , an arcade video game created by Nintendo and released in July 1981,
860-401: A 2D plane are called 2.5D , as they are a blend of 2D and 3D. The first platformers to simulate a 3D perspective and moving camera emerged in the early-mid-1980s. An early example of this was Konami 's Antarctic Adventure , where the player controls a penguin in a forward-scrolling third-person perspective while having to jump over pits and obstacles. Originally released in 1983 for
1032-537: A 3D Sonic game, Sonic Adventure , for its Dreamcast console. It used a hub structure like Super Mario 64 , but its levels were more linear, fast-paced, and action-oriented. Crash Bandicoot Crash Bandicoot is a video game franchise originally developed by Naughty Dog as an exclusive for Sony 's PlayStation console. It has seen numerous installments created by various developers and published on multiple platforms. The series consists predominantly of platform games , but also includes spin-offs in
1204-489: A Titan for later use came from the play testing sessions of Crash of the Titans , in which the testers were found to be reluctant to leave the Titans behind after an epic battle was won. Fans of the series were also a source of inspiration for Crash: Mind over Mutant , having such wishes as a free-roaming environment, Coco Bandicoot being a playable character and the return of the character Doctor Nitrus Brio. Full camera control
1376-462: A balance between open-ended and guided exploration. Another platform-adventure released that year, Pony Canyon 's Super Pitfall , was critically panned for its vagueness and weak game design. That same year Jaleco released Esper Boukentai , a sequel to Psychic 5 that scrolled in all directions and allowed the player character to make huge multistory jumps to navigate the vertically oriented levels. Telenet Japan also released its own take on
1548-525: A black and white video game as opposed to the LCD games they were commonly known for. These were handhelds fitted with a dot-matrix screen, allowing for a wide variety of backgrounds and gameplay for a single game. Although running a software program stored in ROM, the systems were dedicated consoles , similar to the plug-and-play TV games of the 2000s decade. A Crash Bandicoot game, simply titled Crash Bandicoot ,
1720-481: A bouncing car that jumps on various platforms such as buildings, clouds, and hills. Jump Bug offered a glimpse of what was to come, with uneven, suspended platforms, levels that scroll horizontally (and in one section, vertically), and differently themed sections, such as a city, the interior of a large pyramid, and underwater. Irem's 1982 arcade game Moon Patrol combines jumping over obstacles and shooting attackers. A month later, Taito released Jungle King ,
1892-525: A brief burst of episodic platformers where the first was freely distributed and parts 2 and 3 were available for purchase. The abundance of platformers for 16-bit consoles continued late into the generation, with successful games such as Vectorman (1995), Donkey Kong Country 2: Diddy's Kong Quest (1995), and Super Mario World 2: Yoshi's Island (1995), but the release of new hardware caused players' attention to move away from 2D genres. The Saturn , PlayStation , and Nintendo 64 nevertheless featured
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#17327725727832064-579: A cappella band Spiralmouth composed the music for The Legend of Spyro trilogy. Finally, for Reignited Trilogy , Copeland's music was remixed in-house by the developer and remained mostly faithful to the original scores; Copeland himself composed a main theme for the compilation. As of 2007, the Spyro the Dragon series has sold over 20 million units worldwide. According to the Los Angeles Times ,
2236-415: A commercial success. As of 2007, the series altogether has sold over 40 million units worldwide and grossed over $ 1 billion. According to Gamasutra , the first Crash Bandicoot game had sold 6.8 million units as of November 2003, making it the tenth- best-selling PlayStation game of all time . Cortex Strikes Back sold 3.85 million units in the U.S., while Warped sold 3.74 million. The last 2 games on
2408-450: A forward-scrolling effect similar to Sega's 1985 third-person rail shooter Space Harrier . 3-D WorldRunner was an early forward-scrolling pseudo-3D third-person platform-action game where players were free to move in any forward-scrolling direction and could leap over obstacles and chasms. It was notable for being one of the first stereoscopic 3-D games . Square released its sequel, JJ , later that year. The earliest example of
2580-433: A gem if they break all the crates in a level. TNT and Nitro Crates are the only boxes that can damage Crash. TNT Crates have a three-second fuse when jumped on, but Nitro Crates will explode instantly upon any contact with Crash or anything else that runs into them. Switch Boxes (distinguished by an exclamation mark ) are used to make previously invisible crates appear. A green Switch Box will detonate all Nitro Crates in
2752-621: A glide, swimming underwater, climbing ladders, head-bashing, and the ability to use power-ups. Like its predecessor, it was critically acclaimed. Year of the Dragon was released in North America on 24 October 2000 and Europe on 10 November 2000 for the PlayStation, and it was Insomniac's last Spyro game. In the game, the dragons are celebrating the Year of the Dragon, an event held every twelve years in which new dragon eggs arrive in
2924-937: A guest appearance in the Skylanders Academy animated series. At the end of the episode "The Skylands Are Falling!", due to the actions of the Skylanders, Crash is inadvertently pulled through a dimensional rift while battling Cortex, ending up in the Skylands. The episode "Crash Landing" features Crash allying with Spyro and the Skylanders to recover the dark relic needed to return him to the Wumpa Islands. Crash's appearance in Skylanders Academy differs from his appearance in Skylanders: Imaginators , but unlike other appearances, he
3096-470: A high jump, high spin jump, body slam and slide attack. Warped expands on this by awarding the player with new abilities after each boss is defeated, which was carried over to The Wrath of Cortex . The player can also spin and slide at the same time when pressing the right buttons. The most common collectible in the series is Wumpa Fruit, which is found on the main path of most levels, as well as inside most crates. Collecting 100 Wumpa Fruits will award
3268-609: A high quality of animation. The 1988 shareware game The Adventures of Captain Comic was one of the first attempts at a Nintendo-style platformer for IBM PC compatibles . It inspired Commander Keen , released by id Software in 1990, which became the first MS-DOS platformer with smooth scrolling graphics. Keen's success resulted in numerous console-styled platformers for MS-DOS compatible operating systems, including Duke Nukem , Duke Nukem II , Cosmo's Cosmic Adventure , and Dark Ages all by Apogee Software . These fueled
3440-521: A hub world called a Warp Room, with levels divided up into sets of five. To progress, the player must find and collect a Crystal within each of the stages, which can be played in any order, before facing the boss of each room. From Twinsanity onwards, the games took a more free-roaming approach, with Crash travelling various areas on foot. Numerous composers have contributed music to the Crash Bandicoot series. Mutato Muzika 's Josh Mancell
3612-646: A level. Starting with Cortex Strikes Back , an additional five colored Gems can be obtained by completing special tasks or finding hidden areas. Crash Twinsanity contains six colored Gems per level, most of which are earned by solving a small puzzle. Crystals, which play a key role in the plot of most Crash games following Cortex Strikes Back , are usually required to make progress through most games. Relics, first introduced in Warped , are earned in Time Trial modes, with more valuable relics earned for higher times. In
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#17327725727833784-494: A life regardless). Crash can collect up to two masks for two extra hits of damage, with an additional mask granting him temporary invincibility. When Crash collects two masks, Aku Aku will turn gold in most games; however, in Crash Twinsanity , Aku Aku will sparkle. The other major recurring valuables Crash finds on his adventures include Gems and Crystals. Most Gems in the series are won by breaking open every crate in
3956-551: A machine malfunctions opening a portal, bringing Ripto back into the dragon realms following the events of Enter The Dragonfly. The Cortex Conspiracy , known as Spyro Fusion in Europe and Australia, and Spyro Advance Wakuwaku Tomodachi Daisakusen! in Japan, introduces multiple game screening. It is a crossover game between Spyro the Dragon and Crash Bandicoot , and a companion game to Crash Bandicoot Purple: Ripto's Rampage . In
4128-480: A multiplayer mode. While initially Naughty Dog was only signed on to make three games, Crash Team Racing was a possible Crash 3 as it started out in production after Crash 2 and the game which was finished first in production would be released first. However, Naughty Dog had already gotten far into the project and decided to finish it and release it. David Baggett produced the game's soundtrack, with Mark Mothersbaugh and Josh Mancell of Mutato Muzika composing
4300-644: A new time travel device, they sent him home. Crash appeared again in the season finale, "Raiders of the Lost Arkus, Part II", where he and Coco (voiced by Tara Strong ) were brought from the Wumpa Islands by the Skylanders and Flynn to stop Kaos from destroying the Core of Light. Coco's appearance in the series seems to be a combination of her Titans and Mind over Mutant design: like Crash, she also speaks in an Australian accent and seems to not only be capable of building her own weapons but able to control technology to
4472-631: A number of successful 2D platformers. The 2D Rayman was a big success on 32-bit consoles. Mega Man 8 and Mega Man X4 helped revitalize interest in Capcom 's Mega Man character . Castlevania: Symphony of the Night revitalized its series and established a new foundation for later Castlevania games. Oddworld and Heart of Darkness kept the subgenre born from Prince of Persia alive. The difficulties of adapting platformer gameplay to three dimensions led some developers to compromise by pairing
4644-696: A post-launch game update in August 2019. Spyro, Hunter, and Gnasty Gnorc appear as playable characters, along with Spyro -themed karts and a "Spyro Circuit" race track. Spyro-themed parade and pool floats appear in Crash Bandicoot 4: It's About Time , while both Spyro and Dark Spyro have major roles in Crash Bandicoot: On the Run! Spyro, Elora and Ripto made appearances as playable characters in season 3 of Crash Team Rumble . Spyro Ever After
4816-441: A quarter and a third of all console games. By 2006, the genre had experienced a decline in sales, representing a 2% market share as compared to 15% in 1998. In spite of this, platformers are still being commercially released every year, including some which have sold millions of copies. A platformer requires the player to maneuver their character across platforms to reach a goal while confronting enemies and avoiding obstacles along
4988-655: A quest to various worlds to rescue the other three Guardians; Volteer, the Electric Guardian, Cyril, the Ice Guardian, and Terrador, the Earth Guardian. Each guardian trains him in a new elemental breath to help him on his journey and eventual fight with Cynder herself. Discussions around the relaunch of Spyro began as early as 2014. In a July 2014 interview with The Daily Telegraph , Sony Computer Entertainment CEO, Andrew House stated that his team
5160-447: A sequel, N-Tranced , which would also be met to similar reception. During this time Traveller's Tales' Oxford Studio were developing a new Crash game for consoles. This game was to be Crash Nitro Kart but due to unknown circumstances Universal moved development of Crash Nitro Kart over to Vicarious Visions. Traveller's Tales Oxford Studio then moved on to their next project, Crash Bandicoot Evolution . Crash Bandicoot Evolution
5332-417: A shift in design. Later 3D platformers like Banjo-Kazooie , Spyro the Dragon , and Donkey Kong 64 borrowed its format, and the "collect-a-thon" genre began to form. In order to make this free-roaming model work, developers had to program dynamic, intelligent cameras. A free camera made it harder for players to judge the height and distance of platforms, making jumping puzzles more difficult. Some of
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5504-406: A side-scrolling action game some platform elements: jumping between vines, jumping or running beneath bouncing boulders. It was quickly re-released as Jungle Hunt because of similarities to Tarzan . The 1982 Apple II game Track Attack includes a scrolling platform level where the character runs and leaps along the top of a moving train. The character is little more than a stick figure , but
5676-414: A special crate found exclusively in Time Trial mode. They will freeze the clock for the number of seconds displayed on the box, increasing the player's chance of beating the time trial. The original Crash Bandicoot uses a fairly linear structure in which Crash clears through levels on a map, with some areas accessible by locating gems. Beginning with Cortex Strikes Back , the game usually takes place in
5848-487: A statement they said, "just keep asking". Spyro Reignited Trilogy was officially announced on 5 April 2018 and was originally going to be released on 21 September 2018 for PlayStation 4 and Xbox One , before being delayed to 13 November 2018. The game was developed by Toys for Bob and was ported to Microsoft Windows and Nintendo Switch, with a release date of 3 September 2019. In addition to Crash Purple and Spyro Orange , Spyro has made various crossover appearances in
6020-725: A teenager with a rebellious personality to appeal to gamers who saw the previous generation of consoles as being for kids. The character's speed showed off the hardware capabilities of the Genesis, which had a CPU clock speed approximately double that of the Super NES. Sonic 's perceived rebellious attitude became a model for game mascots. Other companies attempted to duplicate Sega's success with their own brightly colored anthropomorphisms with attitude. These often were characterized by impatience, sarcasm, and frequent quips. A second generation of platformers for computers appeared alongside
6192-473: A template for what were initially called "climbing games". Donkey Kong inspired many clones and games with similar elements, such as Miner 2049er (1982) and Kangaroo (1982), while the Sega arcade game Congo Bongo (1983) adds a third dimension via isometric graphics . Another popular game of that period, Pitfall! (1982), allows moving left and right through series of non-scrolling screens, expanding
6364-524: A timed partnership with Activision, that the first three games from the original PlayStation would be remade from the ground up. Crash would also be a playable character in Activision's then-upcoming toys-to-life game Skylanders: Imaginators , released on October 16, 2016. It was announced at Gamescom 2016 that Dr. Neo Cortex would also be playable in Imaginators , and that a Crash -themed level
6536-427: A way to bring him back, if we could." Andy Gavin, co-creator of Crash Bandicoot, has said that he would love to see an HD version of the marsupial's first four games, or even a full-blown reboot. Jason Rubin, co-creator of Crash Bandicoot, said he was hopeful that Activision would "bring Crash back to their glory days and that the character is still very dear to fans between 18–49 years". A new design of Crash Bandicoot
6708-413: Is capable of speaking full sentences with an Australian accent. The third season of Skylanders Academy brought the character back starring Rhys Darby , who replaces Eric Rogers due to stepping down as a showrunner. Crash returned in the episode "Days of Future Crash", in which Dark Spyro and Eruptor brought him to the future for different reasons, messing up their timeline in the process. After retrieving
6880-488: Is central to the genre, though there are exceptions such as Nintendo 's Popeye and Data East 's BurgerTime , both from 1982. In some games, such as Donkey Kong , the trajectory of a jump is fixed, while in others it can be altered mid-air. Falling may cause damage or death. Many platformers contain environmental obstacles which kill the player's character upon contact, such as lava pits or bottomless chasms. The player may be able to collect items and power-ups and give
7052-474: Is in a vector game called Major Havoc , which comprises a number of mini-games, including a simple platformer. One of the first raster -based platformers to scroll fluidly in all directions in this manner is 1985's Legend of Kage . In 1985, Enix released the action-adventure platformer Brain Breaker . The following year saw the release of Nintendo's Metroid , which was critically acclaimed for
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7224-465: Is the endless runner , where the main character is always moving forward and the player must dodge or jump to avoid falling or hitting obstacles. Various names were used in the years following the release of the first established game in the genre, Donkey Kong (1981). Shigeru Miyamoto originally called it a "running/jumping/climbing game" while developing it. Miyamoto commonly used the term "athletic game" to refer to Donkey Kong and later games in
7396-626: The Atari 2600 , with 256 horizontally connected screens, became one of the best-selling games on the system and was a breakthrough for the genre. Smurf: Rescue in Gargamel's Castle was released on the ColecoVision that same year, adding uneven terrain and scrolling pans between static screens. Manic Miner (1983) and its sequel Jet Set Willy (1984) continued this style of multi-screen levels on home computers . Wanted: Monty Mole won
7568-537: The Crash Bandicoot series was something that they have been thinking about, saying "It's never off the table.", and Naughty Dog also revealed through an IGN interview the possibility that they may revive both series of Crash Bandicoot as well as Jak & Daxter . In January 2015, however, Naughty Dog's Josh Scherr stated in an interview with Game Informer that Naughty Dog did not miss working on either series and had no intention of bringing them back to life. Despite this, Naughty Dog co-president Evan Wells stated that
7740-641: The Crash Bandicoot series. Spyro appears as a playable character in the Game Boy Advance version of Crash Nitro Kart , and makes a cameo appearance in Crash Twinsanity . The characters Spyro, Cynder, Dark Spyro, Sparx the Dragonfly and Malefor also made appearances in the Skylanders series, including all six mainline games and the television series . Elements from the Spyro series were added to Crash Team Racing Nitro-Fueled as part of
7912-683: The MSX computer, it was subsequently ported to various platforms the following year, including an arcade video game version, NES , and ColecoVision . 1986 saw the release of the sequel to forward-scrolling platformer Antarctic Adventure called Penguin Adventure , which was designed by Hideo Kojima . It included more action game elements, a greater variety of levels, RPG elements such as upgrading equipment, and multiple endings . In early 1987, Square released 3-D WorldRunner , designed by Hironobu Sakaguchi and Nasir Gebelli . Using
8084-530: The Master System with Alex Kidd in Miracle World . It has horizontal and vertical scrolling levels, the ability to punch enemies and obstacles, and shops for the player to buy power-ups and vehicles. Another Sega series that began that same year is Wonder Boy . The original Wonder Boy in 1986 was inspired more by Pac-Land than Super Mario Bros. , with skateboarding segments that gave
8256-466: The N. Sane Trilogy was eventually ported to the Nintendo Switch , Xbox One , and Microsoft Windows on June 29, 2018 with assistance from Skylanders developer Toys for Bob . During an interview with Metro Game Central, Vicarious Visions producer Kara Massie refused to rule out the possibility of a remaster of Crash Team Racing for the PlayStation 4. Massie has also acknowledged that she
8428-631: The Nintendo Entertainment System in 1985, became the archetype for the genre. It was bundled with Nintendo systems in North America, Japan, and Europe, and sold over 40 million copies, according to the 1999 Guinness Book of World Records . Its success as a pack-in led many companies to see platformers as vital to their success, and contributed greatly to popularizing the genre during the third and fourth generations of video game consoles. Sega attempted to emulate this success with their Alex Kidd series, which started in 1986 on
8600-453: The kart racing and party game genres. The series was originally produced by Universal Interactive , which later became known as Vivendi Games ; in 2008, Vivendi merged with Activision , which currently owns and publishes the franchise. The games are mostly set on the fictitious Wumpa Islands, an archipelago situated to the south of Australia where humans and mutant animals co-exist, although other locations are common. The protagonist of
8772-537: The virtual camera , it had to be constrained to stop it from clipping through the environment. In 1994, a small developer called Exact released a game for the X68000 computer called Geograph Seal , which was a 3D first-person shooter game with platforming. Players piloted a frog-like mech that could jump and then double-jump or triple-jump high into the air as the camera panned down to help players line up their landings. In addition to shooting, jumping on enemies
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#17327725727838944-631: The "Shadow Realm" which features returning levels from the Dragon Kingdom, Avalar, and the Forgotten Realms. The Legend of Spyro is a game trilogy that is part of the Spyro the Dragon series. It acted as a reboot to the original series. The games use a combination of close-combat and platforming gameplay, though the gameplay is more oriented towards combat than previous games in the Spyro series were. The story revolves around Spyro ,
9116-613: The 2018 Game Awards. The remaster, titled Crash Team Racing Nitro-Fueled , was formally revealed at the awards show and released on June 21, 2019 for the PlayStation 4, Xbox One, and Nintendo Switch with no current plans for a PC version. The remaster was developed from the ground up by Beenox , another subsidiary of Activision, and also incorporates remastered characters, tracks & karts from Crash Nitro Kart (previously developed by Vicarious Visions) as well as remastered characters, karts, and skins from Crash Tag Team Racing . The game also features retro-themed content exclusive to
9288-584: The Cheetah, a loyal friend of Spyro's who sometimes helps him on quests; Moneybags, a money-obsessed bear who in some games is needed to make pathways for Spyro for a small fee; and Zoe, a fairy who serves as checkpoints in each land that Spyro visits. The Dragon Realms are the main setting of the series where most of the dragons including Spyro live. Avalar is a separate world that was being threatened by Ripto in Spyro: Ripto's Rage . The Forgotten Realms are
9460-542: The Dark Gems, alongside Sparx, Hunter, Sgt. Byrd, and Blink. Shadow Legacy acts as a sequel to Spyro: A Hero's Tail and was released only on the Nintendo DS . This is the first Spyro game that plays as a role-playing game as opposed to a platformer and the game allows Spyro to gain experience, level up and learn new spells and combat moves. Spyro must use his new skills to save his allies when they are trapped in
9632-535: The Dragon was released in North America on 9 September 1998 and Europe in October 1998 for the PlayStation . It is a platform game that placed the player as Spyro, a small purple dragon set with the task of freeing his fellow dragons from crystal prisons, which are scattered around their world. Each level is accessed through 'portals' from a main world. The game closes out with the climatic battle between Spyro and
9804-405: The Dragonfly is available for the PlayStation 2 and Nintendo GameCube, and was developed by Equinox Digital Entertainment and Check Six Studios. It had received mixed to negative responses from reviewers, referring to the numerous glitches, lack of storyline, originality, and long load times. The story begins with the baby dragons preparing to receive their dragonflies and celebrating. Ripto captures
9976-468: The Enchanted Castle , which was only modestly successful. That same year, Capcom released Strider in arcades, which scrolled in multiple directions and allowed the player to summon artificial intelligence partners, such as a droid, tiger, and hawk, to help fight enemies. Another Sega release in 1989 was Shadow Dancer , which is a game that also included an AI partner: a dog who followed
10148-480: The Hedgehog into 3D. Their project, titled Sonic Xtreme , was to have featured a radically different approach for the series, with an exaggerated fisheye camera and multidirectional gameplay reminiscent of Bug! . Due in part to conflicts with Sega Enterprises in Japan and a rushed schedule, the game never made it to market. In the 1990s, platforming games started to shift from pseudo-3D to "true 3D," which gave
10320-499: The PlayStation 4 version and monthly timed Grand Prix races with additional unlockable characters at no extra charge. On June 21, 2020, the official Crash Bandicoot social media channels posted a teaser revealing the title of the next Crash Bandicoot game, Crash Bandicoot 4: It's About Time ; the game was released for PlayStation 4 and Xbox One on October 2, 2020, and for Nintendo Switch , PlayStation 5 , and Xbox Series X and Series S on March 12, 2021. Crash Bandicoot: On
10492-406: The PlayStation 4, PlayStation 5, Xbox One and Xbox Series X/S, at The Game Awards . The game was released on 20 June 2023. In 2024, video game leaker Liam Robertson claimed that Activision had cancelled what could have been a direct sequel to Crash Bandicoot 4 , submitting alleged artworks and story concepts as its proof. The project was pitched by Crash Bandicoot 4 developer Toys For Bob, and
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#173277257278310664-461: The PlayStation. The game introduced new characters including Hunter, a cheetah ; Elora, a faun ; The Professor, a mole ; and Zoe, a fairy . The structure of the game is similar to the first, with levels being accessed from the three main home worlds: Summer Forest, Autumn Plains, and Winter Tundra. The game ends with the climatic duel between Spyro and the primary antagonist, Ripto. The game introduces some abilities for Spyro, including hovering after
10836-475: The Run! , an endless running game for Android and iOS , was announced in July 2020, after soft launching on Android in select regions in Southeast Asia on April 22, 2020 under the title Crash Bandicoot Mobile . The game, developed and published by King in collaboration with Activision, was released on March 25, 2021. In December 2022, multiplayer game Crash Team Rumble was announced for
11008-406: The Titans and Mind over Mutant were developed by Radical Entertainment . Boom Bang! was developed by Dimps . Team Racing Nitro-Fueled was developed by Beenox . It's About Time was developed by Toys for Bob . The first five Crash titles were published worldwide by Sony Computer Entertainment. Wrath of Cortex up until Twinsanity were published by Universal Interactive (now
11180-497: The Titans , Radical's second title, began after the completion of Crash Tag Team Racing . The graphics of the Wii version of the game was one of Radical Entertainment 's main focuses in the game's development, with Radical stating that the Wii has "a lot of horsepower under the hood" and expressing their desire to make full use of it. They also considered implementing a feature to connect
11352-619: The Titans and Mind Over Mutant were composed by Baril alone. The first four Crash Bandicoot games were developed by Naughty Dog . Bash was developed by Eurocom Entertainment Software . The Wrath of Cortex and Twinsanity were respectively developed by Traveller's Tales and its Oxford studio. The Huge Adventure ( Crash Bandicoot XS in Europe), 2: N-Tranced , Nitro Kart , Purple: Ripto's Rampage ( Crash Bandicoot Fusion in Europe) and N. Sane Trilogy were developed by Vicarious Visions . Tag Team Racing , Crash of
11524-469: The United Kingdom press. Examples include referring to the " Super Mario mould" (such as Kato-chan & Ken-chan ) as platform games, and calling Strider a "platform and ladders" game. The genre originated in the early 1980s. Levels in early platform games were confined to a single screen, viewed in profile, and based on climbing between platforms rather than jumping. Space Panic ,
11696-616: The Universal Interactive backlot, Gavin and Rubin met with Mark Cerny, discussed the design of the game and made an agreement to go into production. In September 1994, Gavin and Rubin decided to develop their new game for the PlayStation , after which Rubin began character design. In November 1994, Naughty Dog hired Dave Baggett, their first employee and a friend of Gavin's from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology . Together, Gavin and Baggett created
11868-412: The Wii to DS during gameplay, but stopped due to technical issues and time limitations. The Xbox 360 version got a few extra months of development time to improve its graphics before setting a final release date. The game was the last of the series to be published by Vivendi Games before its merge with Activision . While the game was being developed, the title's main character, Crash Bandicoot, became
12040-404: The Year". Another term used in the late 1980s to 1990s was "character action games", in reference to games such as Super Mario Bros. , Sonic the Hedgehog , and Bubsy . It was also applied more generally to side-scrolling video games , including run and gun video games such as Gunstar Heroes . Platform game became a common term for the genre by 1989, popularized by its usage in
12212-529: The acrobatics evoke the movement that games such as Prince of Persia would feature. B.C.'s Quest For Tires (1983) put a recognizable character from American comic strips into side-scrolling, jumping gameplay similar to Moon Patrol . The same year, Snokie for the Commodore 64 and Atari 8-bit computers added uneven terrain to a scrolling platformer. Based on the Saturday morning cartoon rather than
12384-592: The ancient home of the dragons before being driven out by the Sorceress and serve as the setting for Spyro: Year of the Dragon. The Fairy Realms are a separate series of realms that are inhabited by fairies and only appear in Spyro: Season of Ice . After collecting enough orbs in Spyro 2: Riptos Rage , the Dragon Shores can be accessed, which has games and a special power-up for Spyro. A large part of
12556-415: The basis for the non-linear mission structure found in most open-world, multi-mission, sidequest -heavy games. Another Capcom platformer that year was Bionic Commando , which popularized a grappling hook mechanic that has since appeared in dozens of games, including Earthworm Jim and Tomb Raider . Scrolling platformers went portable in the late 1980s with games such as Super Mario Land , and
12728-484: The character's backside, the game was jokingly code-named " Sonic 's Ass Game". The basic technology for the game and the Crash Bandicoot series as a whole was created somewhere near Gary , Indiana . The rough game theory was designed near Colorado . Soon afterward, Gavin and Rubin discarded their previous game design for Al O. Saurus and Dinestein , a side-scrolling video game based on time travel and scientists genetically merged with dinosaurs . After moving into
12900-536: The characters and environments of the game, eventually creating a character named "Willy the Wombat ". The marketing director of Universal Interactive insisted that the character be named "Wez", "Wuzzles" or "Wizzy the Wombat". On creating the levels for the game, Zembillas and Pearson first sketched each environment, designing and creating additional individual elements later. They aimed for an organic, overgrown look to
13072-409: The company for three additional games. In August 1994, Andy Gavin and Jason Rubin began their move from Boston , Massachusetts to Los Angeles , California . During the trip, Gavin and Rubin decided to create a 3D action-platform game, taking inspiration from 16-bit-era game series such as Donkey Kong Country , Mario and Sonic . Because the player would be forced to constantly look at
13244-425: The company would love to return to Crash Bandicoot but did not see it as viable. On December 5, 2015, rumors of a possible Crash Bandicoot return flared up once again when SIE Worldwide Studios Chairman and SCEA President and CEO Shawn Layden appeared onstage at PlayStation Experience wearing a Crash Bandicoot shirt. Layden, however, never mentioned the series at the event, and has yet to address why he wore
13416-609: The console as the Super Nintendo Entertainment System in North America, along with Super Mario World , while Sega released Sonic the Hedgehog for the Sega Genesis . Sonic showcased a new style of design made possible by a new generation of hardware: large stages that scrolled in all directions, curved hills, loops, and a physics system allowing players to rush through its levels with well-placed jumps and rolls. Sega characterized Sonic as
13588-651: The console's memory. The Wii version of Crash: Mind over Mutant was created first, with the graphics scaled up for the Xbox 360, and scaled down for the PlayStation 2. In 2010, rumors appeared that Radical Entertainment was developing a fourth Crash Bandicoot title, under the name Crash Landed , but due to large layoffs in the studio, the game was cancelled with all remaining developers put to work on Prototype 2 . The DS edition of this game would be in development by Renegade Kid for approximately two weeks before similarly being cancelled by Activision. High Impact Games
13760-421: The criteria of a platformer, and was billed as an action adventure . It used true 3D characters and set pieces, but its environments were rendered using a rigid engine similar to the one used by Wolfenstein 3D , in that it could only render square, flat corridors, rather than suspended platforms that could be jumped between. Sega had tasked their American studio, Sega Technical Institute , with bringing Sonic
13932-717: The defunct Vivendi Games ). Tag Team Racing , Boom Bang! and Crash of the Titans were published by Sierra Entertainment. All games since Mind over Mutant have been published by Activision . From Wrath of Cortex until Nitro Kart , Konami handled publishing and distribution for the Japanese market and also co-published the worldwide release of The Wrath of Cortex for PS2. The Japanese versions of N. Sane Trilogy were published by Sony Interactive Entertainment for PS4 and by Sega of Japan for Nintendo Switch; Sega subsequently handled Team Racing Nitro-Fueled for Japan as well. In 1998, Coro Coro Comics developed
14104-416: The development tool "Game Oriented Object LISP " (GOOL), which would be used to create the characters and gameplay of the game. In January 1995, Rubin became concerned about the programmer-to-artist ratio and hired Bob Rafei and Taylor Kurosaki as additional artists. Needing a lead character for the game, Naughty Dog recruited artists Charles Zembillas and Joe Pearson and met with them weekly to create
14276-474: The dragon worlds. Bianca, an anthropomorphic rabbit , steals the eggs, and Spyro follows her down a rabbit hole. The rabbit hole leads to the Forgotten Realms, which are under the rule of the game's primary antagonist, The Sorceress, to whom Bianca is apprenticed. As in the previous games, levels are accessed from a central home world, of which there are four: Sunrise Spring, Midday Gardens, Evening Lake, and Midnight Mountain. The game also features levels in which
14448-464: The dragonflies, making the dragons helpless, and accidentally scatters the dragonflies across the world with a spell. Spyro must recover the dragonflies. Attack of the Rhynocs , also known as Spyro Adventure in Europe and Australia, is the third and final game to be developed by Digital Eclipse. Spyro is tasked with collecting the "Heart" of each land in order to stop Ripto's latest evil scheme after
14620-419: The earlier Clockwork Knight . The game plays very similarly to 2D platformers, but lets players walk up walls and on ceilings. In 1995, Delphine Software released a 3D sequel to their 2D platformer Flashback . Entitled Fade to Black , it was the first attempt to bring a popular 2D platformer series into 3D. While it retained the puzzle-oriented level design style and step-based control, it did not meet
14792-414: The enemy planes were programmed to come out in front of the player and give the player ample time to shoot them before they turn around and shoot the player rather than come up behind the player and hit them from behind. The Relic system was introduced to give players a reason to return to the game after it has been completed. Also in 1998, Tiger Electronics released a series called 99X , each containing
14964-596: The fairies in the various Fairy Realms after they are frozen by an evil monster named Grendor. Season of Flame was the second Digital Eclipse title and was released for the Game Boy Advance. It is the sequel to Season of Ice , and introduces new features, such as the ability to breathe other elements besides fire. In the game, Spyro must recover the stolen fireflies scattered across the Dragon Realms and foil an evil plot by Ripto and his minions. Enter
15136-415: The first Spyro game has sold over 4.8 million units worldwide as of November 2007 making it the seventeenth best-selling PlayStation game of all time, Ripto's Rage! sold 3.45 million units and Year of the Dragon sold 3.28 million units. Platformer The genre started with the 1980 arcade video game Space Panic , which has ladders but not jumping. Donkey Kong , released in 1981, established
15308-521: The first award for Best Platform game in 1984 from Crash magazine. Later that same year, Epyx released Impossible Mission , and Parker Brothers released Montezuma's Revenge , which further expanded on the exploration aspect. The first platformer to use scrolling graphics came years before the genre became popular. Jump Bug is a platform-shooter developed by Alpha Denshi under contract for Hoei/Coreland and released to arcades in 1981, only five months after Donkey Kong . Players control
15480-482: The foreground and background, and the camera panning and curving around corners. Meanwhile, Pandemonium and Klonoa brought the 2.5D style to the PlayStation . In a break from the past, the Nintendo 64 had the fewest side scrolling platformers with only four; Yoshi's Story , Kirby 64: The Crystal Shards , Goemon's Great Adventure , and Mischief Makers —and most met with a tepid response from critics at
15652-418: The franchise was not mentioned anywhere in the game's credits, sparking rumors that the franchise had been purchased by Sony. Lex Lang , the then-most-recent voice actor of Dr. Neo Cortex, also hinted on Facebook that he was asked to reprise his role. However, shortly after, the rumors and speculations were derailed when Sony VP of Publisher Relations Adam Boyes confirmed on Twitter that Activision still owns
15824-414: The game Crash of the Titans , titled Crash Bandicoot: No Use Crying , Crash Bandicoot Monster Truck , Crash Bandicoot – Titan Idol and Crash Bandicoot – Have Another , all lasting for about three minutes. These are available for free download on the Xbox 360 video service or are available to watch on the web, originally available for viewing on the Crash Bandicoot official website. Crash also makes
15996-470: The game a greater sense of speed than other platformers at the time, while its sequel, Wonder Boy in Monster Land added action-adventure and role-playing elements. Wonder Boy in turn inspired games such as Adventure Island , Dynastic Hero , Popful Mail , and Shantae . One of the first platformers to scroll in all four directions freely and follow the on-screen character's movement
16168-435: The game and worked to completely avoid straight lines and 90-degree corners. A Naughty Dog artist sketched every single background object in the game before it was modeled. The artists were tasked with making the best use of textures and reducing the amount of geometry. Dark and light elements were juxtaposed to create visual interest and separate geometry. The Naughty Dog artists would squint when sketching, texturing and playing
16340-444: The game consist of the tweaked engine used in the previous games. Jason Rubin explained that the "classic" engine and game style was preserved due to the success of the previous two games and went on to say that "were we to abandon that style of gameplay, that would mean that we would be abandoning a significant proportion of gamers out there". An arbitrary plane z-buffer was created for the jet-ski and flooded Egyptian hallway levels of
16512-418: The game during development, Rubin realized that there were many empty areas in the game due to the PlayStation's inability to process numerous on-screen enemy characters at the same time. Additionally, players were solving the game's puzzles too fast. Rubin soon came up with the idea of a box and putting various symbols on the sides to create puzzles. Breaking these boxes would serve to fill in the boring parts of
16684-471: The game features "Making-of" videos, water-on tattoos, game hints, a cheat code list, and the game's E3 and theatrical trailers in multiple languages. Due to its "mild cartoon violence and language", the game received a PG rating from the BBFC . Development on Crash: Mind over Mutant , Radical's third and final Crash title, began immediately after the completion of Crash of the Titans . The idea of preserving
16856-541: The game in Japan) for the PlayStation 2 , and was followed by ports for GameCube and Xbox in 2002; it received mixed reviews but made the Greatest Hits lineup due to strong sales. The following year, Universal would release their first Crash Bandicoot game, a handheld exclusive called The Huge Adventure developed by Vicarious Visions for the Game Boy Advance and released to favorable reviews. It would warrant
17028-498: The game's intro and outro, as well as act as source material for a potential animated series if the game was well-received and commercially successful. The hand-drawn cutscenes were dropped after Sony Computer Entertainment picked up Crash Bandicoot for publication, as Sony desired to push the PlayStation's 3D polygonal graphics. The cutscenes were uploaded to YouTube by producer David Siller in 2015. In 2007, The Animation Picture Company produced four web-short films, to promote
17200-556: The game, Spyro travels through Crash 's universe in a side-scroller, rather than the traditional isometric, top-down view. A Hero's Tail is available for the PlayStation 2, Xbox and Nintendo GameCube, and was created by Eurocom . The game revolves around an evil plot by the villain Red, a former Dragon Elder, who begins to plant Dark Gems around the Dragon Realms, sucking the life out of these worlds. He also works alongside Gnasty Gnorc and Ineptune. Spyro then begins his journey to destroy all
17372-409: The game. Programmers Andy Gavin, Stephen White and Greg Omi created three new gameplay engines for the game. Two of the three new engines were three-dimensional in nature and were created for the airplane and jet-ski levels; the third new engine was created for the motorcycle levels in the style of a driving simulator . The new engines combined make up a third of the game, while the other two-thirds of
17544-596: The game. To create a completely fluid feel for the water on these levels, an environment map that reflects the sky was fitted onto the surface of the water. A real shadow was given to the Crash character at the request of the Sony Computer Entertainment America producers, who were "sick of that little discus that's following him around." To create an "arcade" experience in the airplane levels and to differentiate them from flight simulators,
17716-577: The game. The game first became functional in April 1995 and became playable in June 1995. The first 3 levels in the game were completed by August 1995. However, they were judged to be too difficult to appear so early in the game and were moved to the game's power plant area. Artist Charlotte Francis joined Naughty Dog at around this time. In September 1995, a videotape of Crash Bandicoot was shown to Sony Computer Entertainment behind closed doors. While playing
17888-498: The gameplay from its precursor but traded the frog-like mech for a cartoony rabbit mech called Robbit. The title was successful enough to get two sequels and is remembered for being the first 3D platformer on a console. Rob Fahey of Eurogamer said Jumping Flash was perhaps "one of the most important ancestors of every 3D platformer in the following decade." It holds the record of "First platform videogame in true 3D" according to Guinness World Records . Another early 3D platformer
18060-457: The genre continued to maintain its popularity, with many games released for the handheld Game Boy and Game Gear systems. By the time the Genesis and TurboGrafx-16 launched, platformers were the most popular genre in console gaming. There was a particular emphasis on having a flagship platform title exclusive to a system, featuring a mascot character. In 1989, Sega released Alex Kidd in
18232-413: The genre, such as Super Mario Bros. (1985). Donkey Kong spawned other games with a mix of running, jumping, and vertical traversal, a novel genre that did not match the style of games that came before it, leaving journalists and writers to offer their own terms. Computer and Video Games magazine, among others, referred to the genre as "Donkey Kong-type" or "Kong-style" games. "Climbing games"
18404-438: The level. Crates marked with a "C" are checkpoints that Crash will return to if he is killed during play. Locked Crates are protected by a metal casing that can only be destroyed with Crash's body slam move, while Spring Crates allow him to reach high up areas by bouncing on them. Slot Boxes rapidly switch between multiple types of crates, and if they are not broken in time, will become metallic and indestructible. Time Boxes are
18576-453: The levels and give the player additional puzzles. The first "crate" was placed in the game in January 1996, and would become the primary gameplay element of the series. Willy the Wombat's destruction of the crates would eventually lead him to be renamed "Crash Bandicoot". In March 1996, Sony agreed to publish Crash Bandicoot , which went into the alpha stage in April 1996. Crash Bandicoot
18748-426: The levels to make sure they could be played by light value alone. Correct use of color was an important goal for Naughty Dog's artists; for example, mutually accentuating colors were chosen as the theme for the "Lost City" and "Sunset Vista" levels. The interior of Doctor Neo Cortex's castle was designed to reflect Cortex's twisted mind. After the main character's creation, the team went into three months of developing
18920-454: The levels were open and had objectives. Completing objectives earned the player stars, and stars were used to unlock more levels. This approach allowed for more efficient use of large 3D areas and rewarded the player for exploration, but it meant less jumping and more action-adventure . Even so, a handful of boss levels offered more traditional platforming. Until then there was no settled way to make 3D platformers, but Super Mario 64 inspired
19092-451: The main character new abilities for overcoming adversities. Most games of this genre consist of multiple levels of increasing difficulty that may be interleaved by boss encounters, where the character has to defeat a particularly dangerous enemy to progress. Simple logical puzzles to resolve and skill trials to overcome are other common elements in the genre. A modern variant of the platform game, especially significant on mobile platforms,
19264-489: The maze game, Namco's 1984 Pac-Land is a bidirectional, horizontally-scrolling, arcade video game with walking, running, jumping, springboards, power-ups , and a series of unique levels. Pac-Man creator Toru Iwatani described the game as "the pioneer of action games with horizontally running background." According to Iwatani, Shigeru Miyamoto described Pac-Land as an influence on the development of Super Mario Bros. . Nintendo's Super Mario Bros. , released for
19436-405: The more linear 3D platformers like Tork: Prehistoric Punk and Wario World used scripted cameras that limited player control. Games with more open environments like Super Mario 64 and Banjo Kazooie used intelligent cameras that followed the player's movements. Still, when the view was obstructed or not facing what the player needed to see, these intelligent cameras needed to be adjusted by
19608-582: The music. Sound effects were created by Mike Gollum, Ron Horwitz and Kevin Spears of Universal Sound Studios. This marked the end of Naughty Dog's Crash Bandicoot games. With the release of Crash Bash , Universal Interactive's publishing deal with SCE had ended. Crash's prominent status within the video game community prompted the company to make Crash a multiplatform series, giving the series to Mark Cerny and Vicarious Visions to develop two separate but connected games. Crash Bandicoot: The Wrath of Cortex
19780-621: The new mascot of the Leukemia & Lymphoma Society 's "School and Youth" programs in an effort to promote the battle against blood cancer. In a bid to further promote the game, a Hummer was painted with imagery from the game and displayed at the Annual Balloon Fiesta in Bristol , United Kingdom. A "Monster Edition" of the game was released exclusively in Europe on October 12, 2007 for the PlayStation 2. This special edition of
19952-534: The new wave of consoles. In the latter half of the 1980s and early 1990s, the Amiga was a strong gaming platform with its custom video hardware and sound hardware . The Atari ST was solidly supported as well. Games like Shadow of the Beast and Turrican showed that computer platformers could rival their console contemporaries. Prince of Persia , originally a late release for the 8-bit Apple II in 1989, featured
20124-415: The original conflict with Cortex. In that context, you could reprise classic Crash 1 and 2's settings and villains. It would make sense to use a more modern, free-roaming style. I would concentrate on Looney Tunes -esque animation and really addictive action. That's what we did with the original Crash , and there's no reason it couldn't be done today. Given the current Crash games, people forget that he
20296-418: The original game, players can also obtain two keys after completing two Cortex bonus rounds, which are used to unlock two extra levels. Crates come in several varieties and can be found in abundance across Crash's world. Most crates will assist the player's journey through the game, providing Wumpa Fruit, additional hit points in the form of Aku Aku masks and extra lives. In most games, players will be awarded
20468-453: The original series revolves around item collection. When the player collects a certain amount of items, they can move on to the next area. The most common of these are gems , which are often used not only for collecting, but also for buying skills, passageways, items, and more. In A Hero's Tail there were special dark gems, which the player had to destroy to proceed to new areas within the game, while collecting light gems allowed use of some of
20640-408: The platform-action game, Valis , which contained anime -style cut scenes . In 1987, Capcom 's Mega Man introduced non-linear level progression where the player is able to choose the order in which they complete levels. This was a stark contrast to both linear games like Super Mario Bros. and open-world games like Metroid . GamesRadar credits the "level select" feature of Mega Man as
20812-416: The play area. Nintendo 's flagship Super Mario Bros. (1985) was a defining game for the nascent genre, with horizontally scrolling levels and the player controlling a named character—Mario, which became a mascot of the company. The term platform game gained traction in the late 1980s, as did the alternate form platformer . During their peak of popularity, platformers were estimated to comprise between
20984-623: The player an extra life . Wumpa Fruit takes on other uses in most spin-off titles, such as restoring health in certain Crash Bash levels and increasing weapon power in Crash Team Racing . In recent titles, Wumpa Fruit is used to replenish Crash's health, with Mojo effectively replacing it as the new main collectible item. By collecting Aku Aku masks, Crash can be protected from harm from most enemies and obstacles (though certain elements such as bottomless pits will cause him to lose
21156-561: The player around and aid in battle. In 1990, Hudson Soft released Bonk's Adventure , with a protagonist positioned as NEC 's mascot. The following year, Takeru's Cocoron , a late platformer for the Famicom allowed players to build a character from a toy box filled with spare parts. In 1990, the Super Famicom was released in Japan, along with the eagerly anticipated Super Mario World . The following year, Nintendo released
21328-633: The player controls "Sparx", Spyro's companion dragonfly, in a bird's eye view shooting game as well as four new playable characters: Sheila the Kangaroo , Sgt. Byrd, Bentley the Yeti , and Agent 9 the Monkey . Season of Ice was the first Spyro game not to be developed by Insomniac Games or be on a Sony console, released for the Game Boy Advance and developed by Digital Eclipse . It is known as Spyro Advance in Japan. Spyro must use his fire breath to rescue
21500-405: The player more control over the character and the camera. To render a 3D environment from any angle the user chose, the graphics hardware had to be sufficiently powerful, and the art and rendering model of the game had to be viewable from every angle. The improvement in graphics technology allowed publishers to make such games but introduced several new issues. For example, if the player could control
21672-1048: The player. In the 1990s, RPGs , first-person shooters , and more complex action-adventure games captured significant market share. Even so, the platformer thrived. Tomb Raider became one of the bestselling series on the PlayStation , along with Insomniac Games ' Spyro and Naughty Dog 's Crash Bandicoot , one of the few 3D games to stick with linear levels. Moreover, many of the Nintendo 64 's bestsellers were first- and second-party platformers like Super Mario 64 , Banjo-Kazooie , and Donkey Kong 64 . On Windows and Mac , Pangea Software 's Bugdom series and BioWare 's MDK2 proved successful. Several developers who found success with 3D platformers began experimenting with titles that, despite their cartoon art style, were aimed at adults. Examples include Rare 's Conker's Bad Fur Day , Crystal Dynamics 's Gex: Deep Cover Gecko and Legacy of Kain: Soul Reaver , and Shiny Entertainment 's Messiah . In 1998, Sega produced
21844-525: The point of utilizing a thought-controlled boomerang in battle. On January 13, 2021, test footage from a scrapped Crash Bandicoot series was leaked on Reddit . The series would have been a co-production between Activision and Amazon Studios . The series was allegedly canceled due to a script dispute. The earliest-known bandicoot fossil, from the Miocene of Australia, has been given the binomial Crash bandicoot . The Crash Bandicoot series has been
22016-521: The primary antagonist, Gnasty Gnorc. The game sold well, with a total of five million copies being sold worldwide. The game received favorable reviews from IGN giving Spyro the Dragon a 9 out of 10. It received acclaim for its musical score by Stewart Copeland . Ripto's Rage! , known as Gateway to Glimmer in PAL regions , followed on from the success of the first title, making its release on 2 November 1999 in North America and 5 November 1999 in Europe for
22188-510: The primary goal in Spyro 2: Ripto's Rage! , as the devices are used in a portal to get Spyro back to his home. Dragonflies are the primary collectibles in Spyro: Enter the Dragonfly where Spyro catches them using his bubble breath. In Spyro: Season of Ice freeing fairies is the main goal, and in Spyro 2: Season of Flame collecting fireflies is the goal. Stewart Copeland composed
22360-579: The professor's inventions and opened certain doors. Freeing dragons is the main goal in Spyro the Dragon , while retrieving dragon eggs is the main goal in Spyro: Year of the Dragon . In Spyro the Dragon , dragon eggs are also collected by chasing down thieves (but their color designs are different from those of the third installment). They also appear in Spyro: A Hero's Tail , and collecting them will unlock concept art. Collecting Talismans and Orbs are
22532-556: The protagonist, and his efforts to stop Malefor, The Dark Master, from destroying the world. The first installment of this game is titled The Legend of Spyro: A New Beginning . It focuses on Spyro's origins as a legendary purple dragon and his quest to stop Cynder, the black dragon waging war against the world. He meets Ignitus the Fire Guardian, a red dragon who tells him about his past and offers to train him in his newly discovered ability to breathe fire. Spyro must then embark on
22704-415: The rights to the franchise, and Lang clarified that he was not teasing a Crash Bandicoot revival, and that he had not been asked to return to the series, but would be open to potentially lending his voice to a new Crash game in the future. At E3 2016 during Sony's press conference, after years of rumors, speculation and outcry, Crash Bandicoot finally made his official return when it was announced, in
22876-550: The rights to the intellectual property were acquired by Activision after its merge with Vivendi in 2008. The series went dormant for a decade until a collection of remakes of the original Spyro PlayStation trilogy called Spyro Reignited Trilogy , developed by Toys for Bob , was released for the PlayStation 4 and Xbox One in November 2018, and later for Microsoft Windows and Nintendo Switch in September 2019. Spyro
23048-482: The screen, towards the player or left and right in a side-scrolling manner. Several levels place Crash in unique situations which require the use of motorbikes, jet skis, submarines and various wild animals to complete the level. In the original Crash Bandicoot , Crash's move-set is rather limited; he can run, jump and spin his way through treacherous environments and hostile creatures. Cortex Strikes Back introduces several new moves for Crash to utilize, including
23220-463: The series is a genetically enhanced bandicoot named Crash , whose quiet life on the Wumpa Islands is often interrupted by his creator and the games' main antagonist , Doctor Neo Cortex , who attempts to eliminate Crash as a constant hindrance to his plots for world domination. After presenting Way of the Warrior to Mark Cerny of Universal Interactive Studios , Naughty Dog was signed on to
23392-471: The shirt. In February 2016, a new Crash game appeared to be on the horizon when NECA Director of Product Development Randy Falk stated in an interview with YouTuber Pixel Dan that the company had "a lot of stuff going on with Sony" before mentioning that "I see they're bringing Crash Bandicoot back, so there's some great stuff there." Shortly after, however, an NECA representative clarified with GameSpot that Falk's comments were misunderstood, and that Falk
23564-399: The soundtracks for the first four Spyro games. Copeland made music for each world in the games as well as music devoted to each level, often playing each level so he could tailor the mood of the music to the level. As with the voice cast in A Hero's Tail , Stewart Copeland was replaced and the soundtrack was composed by Steve Duckworth and Paul Lawler. Rebecca Kneubuhl and Gabriel Mann of the
23736-489: The time. Despite this, Yoshi's Story sold over a million copies in the US, and Mischief Makers rode high on the charts in the months following its release. The term 3D platformer usually refers to games with gameplay in three dimensions and polygonal 3D graphics. Games that have 3D gameplay but 2D graphics are usually included under the umbrella of isometric platformers , while those that have 3D graphics but gameplay on
23908-540: The top down perspective, Frogger (1981) as climbing games. In a December 1982 Creative Computing review of the Apple II game Beer Run , the reviewer used a different term: "I'm going to call this a ladder game, as in the 'ladder genre,' which includes Apple Panic and Donkey Kong ." That label was also used by Video Games Player magazine in 1983 when it named the Coleco port of Donkey Kong "Ladder Game of
24080-437: The video game industry internationally. The following year, Donkey Kong received a sequel, Donkey Kong Jr. and later Mario Bros. , a platformer with two-player cooperative play . It laid the groundwork for other two-player cooperative games such as Fairyland Story and Bubble Bobble . Beginning in 1982, transitional games emerged with non-scrolling levels spanning multiple screens. David Crane's Pitfall! for
24252-455: The visual flash of 3D with traditional 2D side scrolling gameplay. These games are often referred to as 2.5D. The first such game was Saturn launch title , Clockwork Knight (1994). The game featured levels and boss characters rendered in 3D, but retained 2D gameplay and used pre-rendered 2D sprites for regular characters, similar to Donkey Kong Country . Its sequel improved upon its design, featuring some 3D effects such as hopping between
24424-428: The way. These games are either presented from the side view, using two-dimensional movement, or in 3D with the camera placed either behind the main character or in isometric perspective . Typical platforming gameplay tends to be very dynamic and challenges a player's reflexes, timing, and dexterity with controls. The most common movement options in the genre are walking, running, jumping, attacking, and climbing. Jumping
24596-432: Was Crash Bandicoot Purple: Ripto's Rampage for the Game Boy Advance, a crossover with the Spyro franchise and companion game to Spyro Orange: The Cortex Conspiracy . Although Cortex Chaos and the sequel to Crash Twinsanity were cancelled, Traveller's Tales was nonetheless commissioned to develop one final Crash Bandicoot game. It was to be a kart racing game titled Crash Clash Racing . However, Traveller's Tales
24768-413: Was Floating Runner , developed by a Japanese company called Xing and released for PlayStation in early 1996, before the release of Super Mario 64 . Floating Runner uses D-pad controls and a behind-the-character camera perspective. In 1996, Nintendo released Super Mario 64 , which is a game that set the standard for 3D platformers. It let the player explore 3D environments with greater freedom than
24940-453: Was a primary way to attack. This was the first true 3D platform-action game with free-roaming environments, but it was never ported to another platform or released outside Japan, so it remains relatively unknown in the West. The following year, Exact released their follow-up to Geograph Seal . An early title for Sony's new PlayStation console, Jumping Flash! , released in April 1995, kept
25112-429: Was abandoned when magazines and the public began to heavily criticize other developers for using fog to hide polygon count. Sunlight and depth accentuation was experimented with for these levels. Wanting to have some "dirty" locations in the game, Naughty Dog worked in the sewer levels and added color contrast to the levels to show depth and break up the repetitive monotony of the endless sewer pipes. A flat plane z-buffer
25284-414: Was considered for the game, but was rejected for graphical reasons and to avoid having to insert a split-screen view in the cooperation mode. Online gameplay was also considered as a feature in the finished game, but was omitted due to the brief development schedule. Coco Bandicoot as a playable character was omitted from the PlayStation 2 version of the game due to her distinct animations taking up much of
25456-411: Was considering bringing Spyro back. House stated that he believed video gamers would be interested in revisiting a character from their youth. Later that same year, Insomniac Games CEO Ted Price also stated that making a new Spyro game was a possibility. In 2017, developer Vicarious Visions stated that they were aware of how high the popular demand was for a revival of the classic Spyro series. In
25628-460: Was created for the game, "Thumpin' Wumpa Islands". The Crash Bandicoot N. Sane Trilogy , a collection of remasters of the first three games in the series, was developed by Vicarious Visions and released for the PlayStation 4 on June 30, 2017. Vicarious Visions had also expressed interest in making a new Crash Bandicoot game following the N. Sane Trilogy ' s release. Two additional levels were added as post-launch downloadable content, and
25800-451: Was created for the game; because the water surfaces and mud in the jungle had to be a flat plane and be exactly flat on the Y-axis, there could be no waves and the subdividing plane could not be at an odd angle. The effect only worked on objects in the foreground and was only used on Crash, some enemies and a few boxes at the same time. The soundtrack of Crash Bandicoot 2: Cortex Strikes Back
25972-596: Was developing a reboot of Crash Team Racing for PlayStation 3, Xbox 360 and Wii, but the game was cancelled by Activision before the initial prototype. Several ideas for the game eventually made it into DreamWorks Super Star Kartz . On a Kotaku interview with then-Activision CEO Eric Hirshberg regarding the future of the Crash series, he said, "I don't have anything official to announce, but I can speak as an individual, I love Crash Bandicoot . Those were some of my favorite video games growing up. And I would love to find
26144-585: Was first shown at the Electronic Entertainment Expo in May 1996. Development of Cortex Strikes Back began in October 1996. For the game, Andy Gavin created a new engine and scripting language named "Game Oriented Object LISP 2" (GOOL 2) that was three times faster than the previous game's engine, could handle ten times the animation frames and twice the polygon count. The jungle levels were originally to have featured ground fog, but this
26316-532: Was found in any previous game in the genre. With this in mind, Nintendo put an analog control stick on its Nintendo 64 controller, a feature that had not been seen since the Vectrex but which has since become standard. The analog stick provided the fine precision needed with a free perspective. In most 2D platformers, the player finished a level by following a path to a certain point, but in Super Mario 64 ,
26488-516: Was going to be the first Spyro educational game where Spyro meets fairy tale characters like The Three Little Pigs , Little Red Riding Hood , Puss in Boots , Goldilocks and the Three Bears and Golden Goose . However, the game never passed the storyboard, and was cancelled. Agent 9 was a James Bond -like parody spin-off game starring Agent 9 as the main character as he does spy missions. It
26660-489: Was once cool. Our Crash had a certain whimsical edge to him. Sure, it was goofy—but it wasn't dumb.". In November 2013, rumours began circulating that Sony bought the rights to the franchise from Activision. Speculations were fueled after the release of PlayStation 4 's #4ThePlayers campaign, featuring a road sign with a silhouette of Crash , and an arrow pointing towards the orange diamond logo of Sony Computer Entertainment . Publications such as IGN reported that Crash
26832-436: Was only speaking of a hypothetical return of the series after seeing a fan-made Crash art just before being interviewed. Naughty Dog's 2016 game Uncharted 4: A Thief's End features protagonist Nathan Drake playing a level from the original Crash Bandicoot , further adding to the rumor that a return for the series was imminent. Speculation was fueled even further when it was discovered that Activision's legal ownership of
27004-431: Was originally to be designed by Cerny and published by Sony. After a falling-out between Universal and the two entities, developer Traveller's Tales was forced to alter the game from a free-roaming title to a standard Crash title. Traveller's Tales had to begin development of the game from scratch and were given only twelve months to complete it. The game was released in 2001 by Universal and Konami (who would publish
27176-539: Was provided by Mutato Muzika (consisting of Mark Mothersbaugh and Josh Mancell ), while the sound effects were created by Universal Sound Studios (consisting of Mike Gollom, Ron Horwitz and Kevin Spears). The characters were designed by Charles Zembillas of American Exitus, Incorporated. Clancy Brown provided the voice of Doctor Neo Cortex, while Brendan O'Brien voiced the dual role of Doctor N. Gin and Doctor Nitrus Brio and Vicki Winters voiced Coco Bandicoot. The game
27348-402: Was released as part of this series. Despite its name and being a platformer like its predecessors, it is not an adaptation of nor bears any relation to the 1996 game, instead featuring a plot of its own involving Crash retrieving treasure from a mansion haunted by a ghost named Mr. Crumb and his cronies. This was the first handheld game to be released in the series, as well as the first to include
27520-457: Was released on July 20, 2006 for the Nintendo DS . Due to the game being developed in Japan it features redesigns of the characters originally used in Japanese promotion artwork of the original PlayStation games, though Crash's model was altered to resemble his Twinsanity model in international releases. The game received highly negative reviews from critics and is considered one of the worst Crash games of all time. Development on Crash of
27692-424: Was removed from Activision 's official website, which seemed to add further credibility to the rumor. However, shortly after, this was proven false, as an Activision representative told Game Informer that "[Activision still owns] Crash Bandicoot and we continue to explore ways in which we could bring the beloved series to life". In July 2014, Sony Computer Entertainment CEO Andrew House revealed that reviving
27864-426: Was repeatedly asked about revivals of Crash Team Racing and Spyro the Dragon by fans. At the time, Massie had not confirmed if the games would be in the works following the release of N. Sane Trilogy . A remake of Crash Team Racing was teased on December 4, 2018 when then-PlayStation Access presenter Hollie Bennett shared an image of two orange fuzzy dice on Twitter, with an announcement to come two days later at
28036-463: Was responsible for the music of the first four games. After the fourth game, numerous other composers were responsible for the music in other games. Steve Duckworth composed music for Crash Bash , Andy Blythe and Marten Joustra for The Wrath of Cortex , Ashif Hakik and Todd Masten for Crash Nitro Kart and Spiralmouth composing a cappella for Twinsanity . The music for Tag Team Racing was composed by both Spiralmouth and Marc Baril, while Crash of
28208-472: Was scrapped by Digital Eclipse. Game Boy Advance Nintendo DS Game Boy Advance Nintendo DS Nintendo DS The main character of the series is Spyro the Dragon , a young purple dragon. In the original series, he is accompanied by Sparx, a dragonfly that performs many functions such as helping protect Spyro from damage and collecting gems. Most of the games before the Legend of Spyro series include Hunter
28380-402: Was set to be developed by Blue Tongue Entertainment and Backbone Entertainment and be published by Universal Interactive. The game's production was cancelled for undisclosed reasons. After the cancellation of Agent 9 , Digital Eclipse reworked the game into a full Spyro the Dragon title, that took place in a large desert environment. The video game title was never released to the market, and
28552-426: Was set to create a new form of gameplay for Crash, with the game planned to be a platformer/RPG with many different elements planned for the game; it eventually became Crash Twinsanity . Although Traveller's Tales planned on creating a Crash Bandicoot game titled Cortex Chaos and a sequel to Crash Twinsanity , Universal never picked up the games, effectively cancelling them. Vicarious Visions's fourth and final game
28724-482: Was spotted in a photo from the Vicarious Visions 's studio, raising rumors that a new game might have been in development, though this was later confirmed to be concept art from a previous Crash Bandicoot cancelled game. In June 2013, co-creator Andy Gavin suggested ways to revitalize the series. "Crash needs a total reboot. There's an opportunity to reset the history, and go back to his creation story and
28896-449: Was taken off the project as it was given to Radical Entertainment . The new studio proceeded to change the project into an entirely new game, keeping only two core ideas, clashing and fusion. The game marked the first game published under Universal's Sierra Entertainment brand, and the first game to use Radical's Titanium Engine, receiving the title Crash Tag Team Racing . The following year Dimps developed Crash Boom Bang! , which
29068-418: Was the first game to allow players to jump over obstacles and gaps. It is widely considered to be the first platformer. It introduced Mario under the name Jumpman. Donkey Kong was ported to many consoles and computers at the time, notably as the system-selling pack-in game for ColecoVision , and also a handheld version from Coleco in 1982. The game helped cement Nintendo's position as an important name in
29240-413: Was to feature multiverse elements and a crossover with Spyro . Robertson argued that Activision canned the game in early stage of development because it considered Crash Bandicoot 4 ' s sales underwhelming and found live service games preferable. Crash Bandicoot is primarily a platforming series. The goal of each level is to guide Crash from the beginning to the end, travelling either into
29412-622: Was unveiled at the Electronic Entertainment Expo in Atlanta , Georgia in June 1997 to a positive response from the game industry. The game went into the alpha stage in August 1997. Around that time, Dan Arey, the lead designer of Gex: Enter the Gecko , joined Naughty Dog and streamlined the level design. Like the first, the second game was a commercial success, green-lighting a third game. Production of Crash Bandicoot: Warped began in January 1998, with Naughty Dog given only 10½ months to complete
29584-540: Was used in Steve Bloom's 1982 book Video Invaders and 1983 magazines Electronic Games (US)—which ran a cover feature called "The Player's Guide to Climbing Games"—and TV Gamer (UK). Bloom defined "climbing games" as titles where the player "must climb from the bottom of the screen to the top while avoiding and/or destroying the obstacles and foes you invariably meet along the way." Under this definition, he listed Space Panic (1980), Donkey Kong , and despite
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