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The original Crash Bandicoot started development in 1994, and in the eyes of its original developers - Naughty Dog's Andy Gavin and Jason Rubin - it would be the very first 3D platform game. The concept was simple - summed up its creators as 'Sonic's Ass' - a 90 degree rotation of a 2D playfield into a rolling 3D platforming world. Gavin and Rubin would team up with others, including a certain Mark Cerny, and the original Crash Bandicoot trilogy on PS1 went on to break technical boundaries and sell millions. Still revered by many, today we can replay those games on PlayStation 4, with completely rebuilt, yet still authentic, remakes of those original games.Developer Vicarious Visions has bet the house on the original Crash formula holding up: there are some changes to the way the third-person camera behaves, but otherwise the gameplay is completely identical to the PlayStation releases. Fire up the PS1 code, and aside from a 'smoother' feel to the controls owing to the more modern animation, and that's pretty much exactly the experience you'll get today from the remake. And yes, that does mean that the original Crash Bandicoot remains unforgivingly difficult in a way that simply isn't much fun, while both sequels offer up radical improvements to the gameplay experience.
First up, let's get the rendering basics out of the way. The N.Sane Trilogy renders at 1080p on base PlayStation 4, while PS4 Pro owners see the same presentation running at a higher 1440p output, bolstered by very minor visual improvements including enhanced shadow map resolution and improved ambient occlusion [UPDATE: Yes, 1080p users do get downsampling support here]. But the real story isn't in the pixel-count, it's in the approach that Vicarious is taking with the core aesthetic of the game - specifically, an ambitious attempt to remake the originals almost like interactive CG movies, with a Pixar-like visual language.
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