[LINKED] GamesRadar: How Beenox is building “a love letter to the original Crash Team Racing” in Nitro-Fueled

It’s easy to feel a mixture of joy and trepidation when approaching any remaster. The joy of an old favourite returning clashing with the understanding that it might spoil your memory of the original; that’s the effect of nostalgia for you. Still, developer Beenox is helping to alleviate our fears as it continues to lovingly craft Crash Team Racing: Nitro-Fueled.

OPM sat down with Beenox creative director and co-studio head Thomas Wilson to discuss the upcoming kart racer, covering the studio’s attempts not only to recreate what was once great but elevate for a new generation of players entirely.

READ MORE »

Canadian Guy Eh: Thomas Wilson of Beenox Interview (Crash Team Racing Nitro-Fueled)

Crash Team Racing is around the corner, but I was able to get an interview with one of the directors of the project, Thomas Wilson, lets see what he has to say!

• Crunch Bandicoot has been confirmed outright (Wilson said all characters from CNK were confirmed that were not previously seen in CTR)
• The game is built from the ground up (much like N. Sane Trilogy) with the geometric assets on Alchemy Engine (supposedly their own variant?)
• Like Polar Pass, Dragon Mines will receive some changes thematically, which includes putting the mining community that they might find a dragon stretch
  • Dressing up the entire cave with gold and gems, with a dragon on the side, watching and spinning (?)
• Although some assets are reused form N. Sane Trilogy with modifications, a lot of the assets used in Nitro-Fueled are all new
• Reconfirms that there will be the option to use the original soundtrack from the original Crash Team Racing (not preconsole)
• Characters and Tracks and intertwined in their uniqueness and elegance, which is why they’re doing their best to inject as much personality as possible
• Crash Nitro Kart’s inclusion was decided quite early on, had to be changed to fit the nature of Crash Team Racing
• Thomas Wilson’s favourite character is Nitros Oxide

[LINKED] BlogCritics: Crash Team Racing Nitro-Fueled uses “the core geometric assets” from both Crash Team Racing and Crash Nitro Kart (Beenox at PAX East 2019)

I was able to meet with the Beenox team and Activision at PAX East to check out what they were doing with CTR after all these years, and I came away impressed with not only their passion but the quality of the remastered game.

They leveraged the core geometric assets from the original titles to ensure the levels felt just right for experienced and new CTR players. They had a key mantra to make the game feel modern but also be something players of the original would feel instantly at home with when running through the tracks.

The team did not simply recreate the original game’s levels, they also introduced levels from the sequel Crash Nitro Kart in the form of tracks and characters. New characters can be unlocked through adventure mode, which is a full game mode next to the competitive racing and arena modes from the original releases.

READ MORE »

[LINKED] USGamer: Crash Team Racing Nitro-Fueled: Beenox Reveals How It’s Reworking a Classic

It’s been a long time since the halcyon days of the kart racing genre. Mario Kart has been a long-time staple, but for a brief era every vaguely kid-friendly character had a kart racer. Mega Man: Battle & Chase, Sonic Drift, and Diddy Kong Racing were just a few of the games that tried to challenge Mario Kart for dominance. Probably the most successful was the Crash Team Racing trilogy: Crash Team Racing, Crash Nitro Kart, and Crash Tag Team Racing. Now the series is getting a new lease of life with Crash Team Racing Nitro-Fueled, a remaster of the first game.

READ MORE »

[LINKED] Le Journal de Québec (French): Another Interview with Thomas Wilson of Beenox

To do so, weigh on start met Monday the co-director and creative director of the studio of Saint-Roch, Thomas Wilson, question to be updated about the long-awaited overhaul of the game of karting that marked the childhood of many people!

READ MORE »

Here’s a summary of what you should know:

• Josh Mancell and Mark Mothersbaugh, who produced and composed the original music, are consulting on the remastered music
• There will be an option to switch between the original soundtrack and remastered soundtrack like with Spyro Reignited Trilogy for the music of Crash Team Racing
• The story campaign of Crash Team Racing in Nitro-Fueled has been split into two modes:
  • Classic Mode, where the player cannot change the character after it’s been chosen, behaves much like the original game
  • Nitro-Fueled Mode, where the player can change, customize the character and karts as, so they please, this mode probably includes the content from Crash Nitro Kart (guess)
• Online multiplayer modes allows for up to 8 players, just like in Battle mode.

[LINKED] Le Journal de Québec (French): “All Crash Nitro Kart tracks and arenas will be in the game, including characters and vehicles” (Beenox Interview)

In an interview with Pèse sur start , the co-director of the developer Beenox, Thomas Wilson, revealed that the remaster of Crash Team Racing will include all the tracks, characters and vehicles of another part of the series, Crash Nitro Kart , for a total of 31 circuits.

“All Crash Nitro Kart tracks and arenas will be in the game, including characters and vehicles. We improve the experience, “said the one who is also creative director for the Quebec studio.

The team at Beenox will take the opportunity to update the content of Crash Nitro Kart , including by infusing the mechanics of Crash Team Racing and offering circuits to environments redesigned, full of small details.

“We took all the tracks of Nitro Kart and we had fun! We have completely redone the themes of each track because we wanted something distinctive,” said Thomas Wilson.

He also said that Crash Nitro Kart’s different “combat” modes of play will also appear in Nitro-Fueled , in addition to the “original” content of Crash Team Racing .

Released in 2003 on several platforms, Crash Nitro Kart wanted to be a “new generation” successor to Crash Team Racing, but had not achieved the same success with critics.

The game had left some good memories for a part of the community, the co-director of Beenox said.

A trailer highlighting the integration of Crash Nitro Kart tracks and characters in Nitro-Fueled Crash Team Racing is expected to be released shortly by Activision, while other announcements about the remaster content will be made during next few months.

Recall that the publisher had also unveiled earlier this week a taste of the character of Nitros Oxide with an interesting video on social networks.

READ MORE »

Regarding the characters bit: It’s confirmed. This interview was shared by Beenox on Facebook!