"Hey-a, folks! I'm back for some reason! If you're offended, I'd like to apologize! I really don't know what happened to my life since the 1990s! Interesting fact: I lack the common decency to kill myself!"
These are the words of Crash Bandicoot as his tortured grimace stares at us from yet another title in the franchise: Mind Over Mutant, the fifteenth game in the series. Fifteen! The only consolation we have is the fact that the cover art for this multi-platform platformer seems to depict Crash's utter shame and possible substance abuse problems. He's the Corey Haim of homeless mascot characters.
So why does he still exist? Well, if you happen to be a youngin' (AKA, younger than me), it's entirely possible that you cut your teeth on the early Bandicoot games and are coming back to the new ones for a quick hit of nostalgia. If this is the case, remember that the childhoods of old people like me were much better than yours; please cope with your wrongness in the appropriate manner. But even after getting that issue out of the way, one disturbing truth remains: modern children may find Crash Bandicoot appealing. Just remember, it's illegal to hurt them.
I guess Crash did have his place in the 32-bit console wars; the commercials of a man in a Crash suit shouting insults at Nintendo HQ were worth a few low-intensity chuckles. But Sony's answer to Mario 64 ended up being a soulless alterna-mascot who was nothing but a low-rent Tasmanian Devil. I'll admit, the Naughty Dog Crash games were much, much better than the ones that would follow in the subsequent decade--and Naughty Dog even managed to make a kickass cart racer out of their gaggle of awful characters. But now Crash is this strange artifact from the 90s, existing in a world where the Punky Skunks and Impossamoles have been dead and buried for well over a decade.
Still, it doesn't look like he's going away anytime soon; and that depresses me almost as much as the upcoming Presidential election. Okay, maybe not quite that much.
Related Links:
Sonic Bound: After Three Botched Reboots, Sonic the Hedgehog May Finally Get His 3D Due
Character Case Study: When Good Characters Get Bad Attitudes
Sony Fans, Meet Your New Totem: Sackboy