Following the events of the first one(that I have no idea what are, I haven't played it and it's not like these are that much about plot, anyway... I avoid it as I hear it's even harder than this, and life's too short for that much frustration), Dr. Neo Cortex comes upon very powerful crystals and then contacts Crash and tells him he needs his help, to collect all 25 of them. He insists that he's good this time, and we believe him right up until we read the title. I've tried this and the third game, and comparisons are unavoidable. They all come out in favor of the latter, I'm afraid. The one thing I can see as something some could call positive is that this is tougher(I'd say too much so, it ends up not being fun at least half of the time), and there are those who want the challenge(and hey, good on you). Other than that... there are bugs and glitches, and many places are rather awkward and just barely work right. Did they not have time to complete this properly? The difficulty goes back and forth, and several of the very last levels are by far the easiest, so some may give up near the middle of this, expecting it to get worse. Couldn't they just have rearranged the order? The graphics leave a bit to be desired, and better-looking stuff came out during and before this. And worse still, there is a distinct lack of color(it's straining to the eyes with all these gloomy, drab sights... and it's inconsistent with the tone, which is light and child-friendly) and creativity to this, the greatest aspect of "Warped". It feels remarkably uninspired, and I see no excuse for this. This isn't licensed, I don't see why it would have been rushed, and I personally would not have wanted my name attached to this as it was released. There are few cartoony, children-friendly(frankly, a couple of them are truly disturbing) deaths, the stages are the same handful of bland areas(including the sewer, the one that, as The Spoony One reminds us, always sucks) that are not memorable(and tend to be difficult to even define as where exactly they are, what they're meant to evoke), and all appear to be in the same time period(and I have no idea when that is, but I suppose it's a while from now, due to the futuristic stuff). For most of the enemies, I have no clue what they are supposed to be. They just look weird, and not even in an interesting manner. The ones that I know what are, are merely straightforward, appearing and/or moving in a dull way. You don't get any new moves as you play this, so what happens early on is the same as what happens later. Well, there are exceptions. Near the end you get a jetpack for a few segments, that has truly terrible controls(I honestly did not know you could screw something that inherently awesome up, particularly this badly), and before that, you run towards the player, away from something large chasing you, and you get to ride a polar bear cub, and that goes fast and is enjoyable, as are a few other portions of this. This doesn't mix the "concept" ones in with the rest enough, and there aren't very many of them. Thus, it gets to be tiresome and predictable almost immediately. For anyone who doesn't know these, this is the essential gameplay. You run, maneuver, jump and slide your way through about two dozen 3D missions, and fight 5 boss foes(those can be pretty cool). Collect 100 apples and you get an extra life, and there are 42 gems to get(either by breaking all of the boxes, or doing something else that you may have no idea how to do, so you just have to try everything... what a lazy and obnoxious way of prolonging the experience of going through this). There aren't Time Trials in this, and again, nothing to go back to earlier spots to use. It's annoying the initial time you go through this(don't get me started on all the stuff they just made to be a pain, not because of any semblance of logic... and what's with the things that don't even kill you even though they really seem like they should?), and I don't see much reason to go back for something that's just even worse. But hey, I'm not a gamer, (and) I want to be entertained by what I play in addition to something that requires skill to get through. The sound is nice, and relatively varied. Music is somewhat catchy. This takes you through a marsh, one of the Poles, an Aztek... village(?) and a technologically advanced factory(with pistons! Lots of them!). Other than you(who will spend most of this looking like he barely knows where he is, much less what he's doing) and your nemesis, this has your sister Coco(who takes forever getting to what she needs to say, even though she has almost no time to do it) also butting in and blathering on every so often as you progress through this, albeit she does little else than repeat herself each time... and she isn't the only one. When you have next to no story, just don't spend a lot of time expositing it, you just bring extra, unneeded attention to something negative about your product. I mean, did they think we had that short attention spans? Or is it that they think we'd spend weeks even completing a little of this? That, I get, but let's be realistic, either you get through this fast and without too many breaks, or you give up early on. There is no offensive material in this, other than the potentially upsetting things that can happen when you perish in this(this *is* for kids, right?). I recommend this to big fans of platform adventure action releases, especially the ones that are infuriating. 5/10
