First Look: Crash Bandicoot Nitro Kart 3D

Something tells me we're in for a lot of racing games on the iPod touch/iPhone. . .

How long does it take to load the game, or resume after a phone call?

Why does it seem like none of the iPhone games are good at occasional play.

@Steven, Did you actually play this game or is your "first look" review simply based on what you've read/seen in user reviews and screenshots?

I ask because you don't use the accelerometer for acceleration and braking. The "gas" is full on at all times unless you touch/hold the bottom of the screen, which acts as a brake and then reverse.

@Mat: While I haven't tried MotoRacer, I do have both Crash and Cro Mag. They both have their pros and cons. Crash feels more fun to me. It is easier to steer than Cro Mag (maybe because the the accelerometer is only used for steering) so to me, that makes it more fun. I also think Crash has a more polished feel to it than Cro Mag. On the other hand, there are some issues that I hope will be addressed with an update. At times, the frame-rate drops below an acceptable level (I'd guess 10 or less fps). Also, there are certain areas on the touchscreen that are used for different functions. Tapping high on the screen is used for jumping. Tap/holding on the bottom of the screen is used for braking/going in reverse. Tapping in the on-screen weapon box (usually located in the upper right corner of the screen) is used to activate that weapon. For the most part, these work well, but there have been many times I have been unable to jump when I needed to. I can only guess this was either because I didn't tap in the correct area or because the frame-rate dropped so low that my tap didn't register. Either way, it makes it feel inconsistent. I don't know if it's technically plausible, but I would have preferred they used the approach MarioKart for Wii uses for jumping. I think it would be great if you could move the iPhone up quickly to perform a jump.

Cro Mag doesn't have the production value that Crash has, but it does perform well and does have online play. While not as hard as Super Monkey ball to control, the steering is harder to get good at than Crash is. In my opinion, the weapons and tracks aren't as fun in Cro Mag as in Crash.

Hope this helps.

There's also something I've found a little frustration with for ALL iPhone games. I assume this is more a reflection on Apple's SDK than on the developers, but the "standard" for landscape based games is that you have to rotate your iPhone to the left. I understand this because it feels natural. However, when you rotate left, the iPhone's speaker is on the bottom (right) corner, so your hand often blocks this speaker when you're playing - causing the sound to fade in and out when you rotate the phone to steer, etc.

Wow after looking at the screen captures, I didn't realize that there were any 16bit new games being produced.

I haven't played them all, but I downloaded Crash last night. I was watching a baseball game (Go Mets) and playing Crash during the commercials. I gotta admit, I was pleasantly surprised with how good this game is. It really brought back memories of N64 mario cart racing and I'd say it borderline copies it, with everything this game entails. For being a mobile video game, I played it off and on for about 3 hours without losing interest. There's 3 cup modes based on difficulty, so about 12 levels all together. After I played the 12 levels, I opened up "story" mode, which presents different objectives you need to complete while racing. The replay value on this game seems to be very good! All the hype for super monkey ball was just silly as this game blows that out of the water! As far as being a battery drain, I don't know, as I had it plugged into the USB the entire time. Very entertaining game!

this game sounds a lot like mario kart,
which i love!

i just wish it was multi player over wifi or something . .

Has anybody out there played all of the big racing games: Crash, Cro-Mag, Moto Racer, etc. If you were only going to get one which would it be?