This is a sub-page of Crash Bandicoot.
Crash Bandicoot has three distinct versions that were released, one version for each of the three regions. They were made and released in the order NTSC-U, PAL, and then NTSC-J. The NTSC-U version will be considered the base version, as it was released first. Each version carries over all fixes made from the previous versions.
PAL
Most of the PAL differences will come down to timing changes necessary due to the conversion from 30 frames per second to 25 frames per second. The region-agnostic "velocity" function used throughout the game's code will, at full speed (25 frames per second), output a value that's around 100.09766% of the truly correct value, versus the approximate average of 99.61% in the NTSC versions. This means that objects move faster, gravity is more powerful, etc. Various frame values are run through a *25/30 operation to convert them to PAL framerate.
- A texturing bug with the lizards has been fixed.
NTSC-J
- The title logo and loading screen images were localized accordingly.
- The title menu uses the PAL background, which has a resolution of 512x256, instead of the NTSC-U one, which has the correct resolution (512x240).
- Wumpa fruit and gems are localized as "apples" and "diamonds", respectively.
- The level names are changed to sound more like Japanese idioms and expressions.
- Crash is overall a lot more vocal, such as making expressions whenever he ends a level, gets hit, enters a level or gets hit with a box in the level end screen. All of his previous voicelines have also been dubbed to Japanese expressions, along with Brio and Cortex.
- Various actions that previously required pressing X to continue now require X or Circle (and sometimes even Start), as is customary for Japanese games.
- During the map screen, camera rotation is done using R1/L1 instead of Square/Circle, as Circle and X are both used to select the level.
| NTSC-U |
NTSC-J |
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- TNT boxes now have a bomb icon instead of the text "TNT".
| NTSC-U |
NTSC-J |
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- Passwords are no longer used as alternatives to saving the game. All menus have had their password options removed. The game also no longer gives you Final Passwords. All of the code for these screens that no longer appear was not removed, and their text wasn't localized, so they remain just as functional if accessed through hacks.
- ...except for the password input menu, which is instead now accessed with a cheat code on the title menu: Up, Up, Down, Down, Left, Right, Left, Right, Left, Right, Circle.
- Aku Aku will give the player a hint whenever he's collected. Each level has specific hints which are played depending on how many hints Aku Aku has tried to give in the level. Aku Aku will not try to give a hint if he would otherwise give Crash invincibility when collected. The hints are skipped with X or Circle, which unfortunately still make you jump or spin afterwards.
- The first Aku Aku box in "N. Sanity Beach" was removed, as the game gives Crash an Aku Aku at the beginning automatically (but not if you die). Along with this change is a (luckily inoffensive) bug, where Aku Aku will read certain pointers as if they were game coordinates and initially spawn way out of bounds if the player skips the intro cutscene instead of letting it play out.
- Due to the first level giving an Aku Aku automatically, entering it with 2 or more will downgrade it to just one Aku Aku mask, making it so the automatic hint does not grant Crash invincibility.
- Two levels were swapped on the map due to difficulty: "Sunset Vista" and "Slippery Climb", despite the latter taking place in Cortex's castle and the former having the castle in the background. Not that the level order in the original release made much more sense anyway.
- A few colored gems were moved around: "Hog Wild" now gives the green gem, "The Lost City" now gives the red gem (making a revisit to "Road to Nowhere" no longer necessary for 100%) and "Slippery Climb" gives a clear gem.
- Four levels have been given Tawna bonus rounds for extra save points: "Temple Ruins", "Slippery Climb", "Cortex Power" and "Castle Machinery". As such, the box count has increased by 3 in those levels. Since "Jaws of Darkness" saves at the next level, completing its bonus round will make the "Castle Machinery" bonus round inaccessible.
- Tawna in the bonus round disappears after she gives you the save point, instead of sticking around and looking to the side every now and then.
- You can now die at any time and still get a gem in a level, but boxes broken are still not saved with checkpoints. In the level end screen, only one box ever falls on Crash's head. According to developer Dave Baggett, this was because the version where multiple boxes fall was disturbing to children.
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NTSC-J |
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- The level end screen will still tell you the amount of gems and keys you have acquired, even if you missed boxes.
- Regardless of the type of save point that's acquired (save point, gem save or key save), the flavor text with the game completion percentage will always say "SAVE POINT" (セーブポイント), leaving the untranslated "GEM SAVE" and "KEY SAVE" textures unused.
- Crash has an extra idle animation, the full version of the animation that plays when Crash earns a gem. In this idle animation, Crash spins and celebrates before looking around and getting back up with an embarrassed face.
- The boulder has been slowed down by 2%.
- The platforms in the river levels "Up the Creek" and "Upstream" are larger. The venus fly traps are 10% larger, the branch leaves are 20% larger, and the floating leaves are 30% larger.
- The river levels now have an ambience sound.
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NTSC-J |
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- Papu Papu has two extra hit points, and he swings his club 25% and 50% faster than normal on the 4th and 5th phases respectively.
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NTSC-J |
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- "The High Road" was significantly cut down in length. The level is simply an empty void past where it ends on this version.
- For some reason, the pushers and slide platforms in "The Lost City", "Sunset Vista", "Slippery Climb" and "Stormy Ascent" will try to normalize their cycle timers based on the game lag when they spawn, which has the adverse effect of extending the cycle timers far too much if Crash dies and the game has to read the disc before he can respawn, as it is considered game lag. One of the flags for the pushers bypasses this.
- An Aku Aku box was added to "Toxic Waste", the start of "Jaws of Darkness", and the start of "The Lab".
- Some of the box code was altered, with no functional difference besides one unused box type no longer functioning.
- The PAL anti-piracy warning screen present in all PAL PlayStation games is left unused (9MapP).
- Different rolling demos and a different demo order, to accommodate for any possible gameplay changes: Intro, "Jungle Rollers", "Papu Papu", "The Great Gate", "Boulders", "Jaws of Darkness", "The Lab". This means "The Lost City" no longer has a demo.
- The memory card menu now uses the BIOS font for the save block names, due to the large amount of characters that can be displayed. The old font and old text code is left unused.
- The idle animation of Crash throwing up a wumpa fruit and having it land on him has been improved. It now uses a flag to determine when Crash has been hit with it, instead of simply doing the head scratch six times (the maximum amount of head scratches is now 50).
- A potential bug where the fruit does not spawn from combo kills has been fixed.
- A possible softlock when the memory card screen tries to spawn at the end of bonus rounds has been fixed.
- A potential bug where the fruit does not spawn from bat auto-kills has been fixed.
- The cut-off point for frametime at which gold Aku Aku spawns particles quickly has been lowered from 30ms to 27ms.
- The speed value for the path-following platforms which must be stood on to start moving used throughout the game (usually horizontally) has been changed from a "units per frame" value to a "units per second" value, making it more stable and scale with the amount of lag. On spawn, it multiplies its spawn parameter for speed by 30 (NTSC framerate).
- The speed value for the turtles has been changed from a "units per frame" value to a "units per second" value, making it more stable and scale with the amount of lag. On spawn, it multiplies its spawn parameter for speed by 30 (NTSC framerate).
- The speed value for the ruins crushers has been from a "units per frame" value to a "units per second" value, making it more stable and scale with the amount of lag.
- The speed value for the ruins bats has been from a "units per frame" value to a "units per second" value, making it more stable and scale with the amount of lag.
- Brio now makes a "gibberish" sound when you come near him in his boss fight.
- Lab Assistants can now be killed with invincibility even while they're electrified.
- There is now a 1 in 3 chance for Cortex to laugh whenever he charges his gun, instead of being guaranteed.
- Cortex only has one "attack" sound, instead of two.
- Cortex now has a sound effect for getting hit.
- Cortex's hoverboard now only has a 1 in 2 chance to make an explosion sound if it explodes when it breaks.
- The game waits half a second longer at the end of the Cortex boss fight to take you to the game end cutscene level.
- The credits are much longer.
Japanese-Exclusive Music
| Level
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Music
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| Bonus Round (Tawna)
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| Koala Kong
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| Pinstripe Potoroo
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| Dr. Nitrus Brio
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| Dr. Neo Cortex
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The Japanese version contains five exclusive music tracks that replaced some themes of the international versions: the themes for the Tawna Bonus Round, Koala Kong, Pinstripe Potoroo, Dr. Nitrus Brio, and Dr. Neo Cortex, respectively. The original Dr. Neo Cortex theme is still heard in the intro cutscene and in his and N. Brio's bonus rounds – only the final battle theme is replaced.
According to the game's music composer, the replaced tracks for the Japanese release were
An 11th hour decision made by the Sony people in Japan. They felt that the boss rounds needed to sound more 'video game-like'. The only reference they gave was music from the Main Street Electrical Parade at Disneyland. I only had a day or so to write all those themes. My favorite comment was about the original Tawna bonus round music. It roughly translated into 'the sound of the guitar mixed with the tree imagery is too nostalgic-sounding'. I’m still scratching my head on that one.
— Josh Mancell
