Interview avec Brian Kirkness & Alex Mickus (Crash of the Titans GBA)
Interview led by: JumpButton
Questions by: Crash Mania community
We've brought you interviews about the main and DS versions of Crash of the Titans. It only seems fair that we'd get one for the GBA version, don't you think? Way ahead of you! Brian Kirkness and Alex Mickus answer all of our questions about this version. As a nice little bonus, they were kind enough to lend us 4 exclusive screenshots.
Q: Kind of an odd one to start with, but is the game depicted in full 2d with sprites or is it pre-rendered 3d sprites?
A: We used pre-rendered 3D sprites.
Q: How many worlds does the game have? Is it divided into islands like on the DS, or is it another style?
A: The GBA version is similar to the DS, we have 5 Islands instead of their 4 islands: Wumpa Island, Tiki Island, N-Sanity Island, N-Trapment Island, and the Floating Fortress. Each area introduces new, tougher titans and of course a devious mini-boss at the end. We've also created some cool transitional sections that enable the player to use vehicles such as jet-skis, motorboats, and hang gliders to get from island to island.
Q: What familiar characters appear in the GBA version?
A: Expect to see popular Crash villains like Dingodile, Tiny Tiger, N-Gin, Nina, Uka-Uka and of course Dr. Neo Cortex showing up at various points in the game. Also friends of Crash, Coco and Crunch, appear at various points in the game. And lastly let's not forget Aku-Aku who will be journeying with Crash, his appearance comes from when you use his powers to Jack an enemy.
Q: What about the storyline? Is that the same as on the consoles, or is it mostly like them, but slightly not, like on DS?
A: The storyline is very similar to the consoles and the DS version and we've put in a few plot twists and turns of our own.
Q: How will the jacking work in GBA Titans?
A: During combat, as the titan's health goes down they become susceptible to being stunned. When they are stunned, they can be “jacked” using the power of Aku-Aku's mask just like all the other versions. Since our game is a 2D side scroller we present jacking in a slightly different visual manner. We elected to save screen space, which is quite valuable on the GBA, and show jacked enemies with Aku-Aku's mask on their face and a color shift to look like Crash.
Q: Speaking of, how many of the titans in GBA are unique?
A: The majority of the enemies we borrowed from the console version and we added in some additional ideas that we thought up. Both teams were excited to add additional enemies to the Crash universe. We mirrored the console enemy attacks and changed their powers a bit to fit our format better.
Q: Any DS to GBA connectivity? (I.E. If the DS game is running, and the GBA game is in the GBA slot then... stuff?)
A: There is, however it's all on the DS end. If you insert the GBA version into your DS and then run the DS game you'll receive a mojo bonus when you start the DS game. Don't get greedy though, we only allow this bonus to appear once per save slot. Hum...perhaps other games will add to this bonus for the DS also. I wonder which ones?
Q: Any voice acting in the GBA version?
A: Due to cart space restrictions we did not add any voice acting into this version of the game. We do have emotes for all the enemies. These are especially distinct for the boss. Another interesting thing is about 1/3 of the music uses vocal effects from a local musician before he recently catapulted on to the world stage.
Q: Any Aku-Aku going on other than as a medium for jacking?
A: Actually Aku-Aku also transforms into some of the various vehicles Crash can use in the transition/bonus levels.
Q: Any GBA to GBA connectivity? Multiplayer of any kind?
A: There is no multi-player or connectivity.
Q: Will be there different unlockables?
A: The player will be able to unlock many features by collecting Mojo from defeated Titans. The majority of the unlockables will be in the form of new abilities and increased stats for Crash and the Titans under your control. Be sure to collect as many Gems as possible also, because you never know when you will run into a Vending Machine where you can purchase insta-jackable Titans.
We also have a feature that is unique to the GBA: each area has a special Tiki arena that is unlockable only after you defeat the mini-boss of that island. These arenas provide the player with short bursts of concentrated mayhem and madness where the player can practice their combat skills with wave after wave of harder enemies up to and including the recently defeated boss. This gives the player an opportunity to familiarize themselves with controlling the tougher Titans and of course the bosses – which are jackable too!
