Introduction
Crash Tag Team Racing is a racing videogame (The third one of the Crash Bandicoot series) that was published for the GameCube, Xbox, PSP and PS2. The game was released in 2005 for North America and a month later for Europe. This game was planned too for the DS but got cancelled, sadly because I imagine how fun could be playing this game with friends in any place.
This game is an indirect sequel for Crash Team Racing and our protagonist is nothing more and nothing less than Crash. The history is about Crash trying to find power gems before Neo Cortex in order to restore a ruined park. In his journey he will be jumping platforms and collecting Wumped coins in order to unlock weapon upgrade, unlock new cars, clothes or even play minigames. One of the thing that we need to find it's the power crystal for unlock the power gem at the end of every area. I obviously didn't forget about the principal thing of this game, the races that we will need to do in order to advance in the story, of course the principal genre of this game is Racing, sharing a portion of the gameplay with a Platformer.
Gameplay
First of all one of the best thing I think this game have is the both gameplay system that the game bring us, because we can be jumping and collecting coins like a normal Platformer or running races like every other racing game, some people say that the balance between a game that have both genres in one is just hard to reach but this game know how to make the things right and the result is just an incredibly hybrid gameplay.
Now centering more about the Main gameplay that are the races, some people actually don't like it too much because the lack of difficult and the controls but in my opinion the controls were really good and are comfortable, however about the difficult I'm not willing to argue that since yes, this game is more to enjoy and not for a challenge so you know how the thing it's going.
One of the thing that makes many people like this game and be remembered with nostalgia (I'm on it) it's the Clashing system. As the name says, Clashing is a thing on this game but what's so special about it? Well, the fact that you can press a button that will make you and the car you will clash into one car is just... Amazing. When you clash with you opponent both cars with transform into a new car with an special weapon, one character will be driving and the other will shooting in the back of the vehicle, but you could ask me easily "shooting WHAT?" And well, that's the special thing of the special thing, every character have its own bullet, for example Crash will fire fruits.
There are 8 playable characters and yes, I known is quite low for a racing game but that is compensated with the amount of skins for every character with 3-4 unique design, however those skins if I remember correctly doesn't give any bonus, it's just a skin but well, for some people is good, for others not. The playable characters are:
Playable characters since the start
•Crash Bandicoot
•Neo Cortex
Playable characters after completing a certain mission
•Pasadena O'Possum
•Crunch Bandicoot
•Coco Bandicoot
•Nina Cortex
•Doctor N. Gin
•Ebenezer Von Clutch
There aren't too much scenarios for racing too, but it's still enjoyable for me.
Features
There are a few features on this game that makes the game more entertaining, some of them are:
•The mentioned Clash system.
•Story mode with Racing and Platformer gameplay.
•Multiplayer mode. This is one of those games that you will enjoy a lot more with your friends.
•Minigames that you will enjoy if you don't want a normal race.
•Good soundtracks that will make more enjoyable the experience.
And other things that you will saw while playing the game, so why not give it a try?
Conclusion
Not a game for everyone I think, but for me like others this is one of those games that makes feel nostalgic because the moments I had when I was a kid and playing this game, at the point that I can easily say this is one of my Play Station 2 classic games. I was hoping that this game get more attention because he deserves it but well, I can't do nothing but sharing my experience with this.
9.5/10
