Game Publisher: Sierra

Like his counterpart Crash Bandicoot, Spyro the Dragon kind of lost his way in his transition to the Playstation 2.  Their respective founders casting them aside certainly didn't help matters, but the new developers assigned to each franchise didn't exactly elevate the series to creative heights.  If that wasn't bad enough, the PS2 Jak/Ratchet/Sly triumvirate cleaned house and enveloped every trace of genre innovation.  They had all the bases covered, and it seemed like, technologically speaking, you couldn't go anywhere those three hadn’t already visited.

To many gamers, myself included, Crash Bandicoot was a character who lived and died in the 90's. The first entry was one of the first crown jewels in Sony's lineup, and the two sequels were the finest platformers of their generation. Sure, they didn't offer near the amount of freedom of Mario 64 or the limitless imagination of Nights, but Crash had it where it counted in the gameplay department. With the advent of the PS2, Naughty Dog moved onto Jak, and most loyalties moved right over to their new superstar. Crash wasn't dead, but his severance as Sony's mascot and some less than compelling adventures from new developers removed him from the A list of platformers.

I almost bought a Jaguar. You see, Alien vs. Predator was released for the system in 1994 and, along with Tempest 2000, nearly justified owning the system.  I didn't know about the comic books, so the very proposition of Aliens and Predators (and Space Marines!) satisfying their seemingly insatiable bloodlust by fighting each other was mind blowing.  I didn’t play the game until recently, but I did see the first AvP film in 2004.  After it was over, the overwhelming disappointment nearly matched that of the new Star Wars films.  Sure, it wasn't a complete failure, but it just felt like, given the source material, such a waste of an opportunity.  Hearing 2007's holiday timed sequel, Requiem, was actually worse, I decided to preserve the sanctity of Christmas and skip its theatrical run.  Of course, just like in real life, one cannot escape from Aliens or Predators, and I'm charged with the task of reviewing the PSP exclusive title based (somewhat) on the film. 

Spartans, Fox Hound, COG Soldiers, SOLDIER, and Koopa Troopas all share one extremely desirable hallmark; they're all squads of super elite badasses in the realm of interactive entertainment.  Unfortunately few of us will ever get the chance to join any of these organizations due to their default status as works of fiction.  Life may imitate art, but until turtles grow wings or men can carry swords twice the weight of their body, we'll have to settle for closest real life equivalent - the SWAT Team.  Sure, they may not have superpowers, but have you seen Heat?  They're entirely capable of some next level prowess.  They’re trained, ready, and willing to distribute unbridled badassery on the criminal populace. 

TimeShift is a pretty standard first-person shooter with some equally common futuristic and science fiction aspects. As such, the game requires a gimmick to maintain some semblance of creativity, and it delivers appropriately by allowing users to temporarily slow, stop, and reverse time. This gimmick aside, though, TimeShift is just another unremarkable and mediocre contender in the satiated first-person shooter genre.

Crash Bandicoot first came to the Playstation in a time when I was still solely a PC gamer. Since coming back to consoles in force several years ago, I have yet to go back and play through those old Crash games, although I do have a fair interest in doing so. When Crash of the Titans, the first Crash adventure on the Xbox 360 came in for review, I was fairly excited. It looked like a fun, simple, 3D platformer that would make an excellent supplement to the more serious and hardcore titles of the season. Sure enough, that’s exactly what I got.