Posted 25th April 2007 10:10 by Mark Turner
PlanesWalker: Hello to everyone and welcome to another interview brought to you by me. Today I have Chocobo, He’s in 1st place for three Crash Bandicoot games, let’s see what he has to say.
PlanesWalker: Ok. First, tell us a bit about yourself, like how old you are, where you live and what you like doing, also what kinds of games you play, what other hobbies you have, things you enjoy doing, etc.
Chocobo: Ok, instead of blabbering about myself, here is a brief history of my gaming life (yes, it is a brief one). So, I have been playing games since I was in year 3 (equivalent to grade 3). The first (real) game console I own was Sega Genesis and the first ever game I played was Operation Code Vapor Trail - an import Japanese plane-shoot'em up game which only a handful of people would know. The gameplay is just like Raiden Trad. During my infant gaming era, it was very difficult to pass Level 2 on this game. Well, now I can finish the game in under 1 hour with no problem. Anyway, soon enough, I got many other games for Genesis, and I like most of them. Being a collector, I never want to trade or sell my old games. Instead I wanted more, like getting SNES and other older consoles such as NES and GameBoy. I love classics in these consoles. At this time, I like quick pace games such as Sonic series and plane-shoot'em up games, but I think I could get along with any games really.
Ok, fast forward to the fifth generation consoles, which consists of N64, PSX and Saturn. As I always did, I jumped into the fifth gen consoles bandwagon a little bit too late (being a laggard), just when the sixth generation was already on the horizon. Well, that's because by that time, everything should be really cheap. I think I got my PSX on December of 1998 or 1999, can't remember, and I got the other fifth gen consoles after PS2, Xbox and Gamecube has come out. The first time I played PSX, it felt so different - with memory card and all. My first game on PSX was Tomb Raider 3 - I don't really like the game and have not finished it even now. Anyway, my second game was Crash Bandicoot 3: Warped. I love that game so much but to complete it 100% was pretty hard. After around 5 years, I finally finished Crash 3 satisfactorily (beaten 27 Developer Times out of 30!). In this fifth gen era, I started to play RPG games and I like them so much. Now I only need to play the old RPG classics on older consoles because I didn't really into RPG before this time.
Anyway, by 2006, I have become an internet addict and finally got my PS2, NGC and GBA - haven't got Xbox yet - this means I don't expect to get DS, PSP, PS3, Wii and Xbox 360 anytime soon. Nowadays, i only have a little time to play, so I started to play games that have many short levels and can go into those levels whenever I want, like racing and fighting games, such as Burnout series and SSBM. I am not any good at them because I think I need to be persistent to become highly skilled in those games. However, I found Crash Bandicoot games to be really easy to pick up and I can just play a few levels and leave with better records. Probably that's because I played Crash 3 too much throughout my fifth gen era, so I have become really familiar with the game style.
I also play few random puzzle games from older consoles. I like computer. I like to think and give an impression to people that I know a lot about computer, but shhh... I actually don't. And if you like computers, you will also like the internet. Onto the real life, I LOVE the beach - well, being an Aussie at heart, beach is my natural love. My beloved hobby is to plan - I know that doesn't really make much sense - but I plan a lot, be it a short term, quite short term, medium term, long term, very long term or any sort of plan involving anything. I also plan to have a new hobby, oh ok, this is what we usually called dream so I don't think I am going to go into that. I like to be surprised, but not by a really lame surprise. I enjoy doing things near deadline. I enjoy watching sport and news. I enjoy watching mainly football (called soccer in Aussie - go the Socceroos!), tennis and golf... and somehow cricket, since Aussies Team is good at it, but I think cricket is pretty boring. Anyway, my best sport is chess and table tennis but still I am pretty terrible at those. Oh ya, have I told you, I am also a collector - I collect all sort of things - whatever I think is worthy of collection. Finally, study comes last, but I always came first in my class anyway, because the last shall be first. (Matthew 19:30) Wink
Well, my birthday is on this week, so don't forget to send me a cyber-present... smiley
PlanesWalker: Ouch, don’t let Webko know that your not a fan of cricket. So, how long did it take you to become this good at Crash Bandicoot games, and how come your skill level isn't as high in Warped as the rest?
Chocobo: Well, as I have said above, I have familiarized myself with Crash Bandicoot games ever since I got my PSX back in December 1998 or 1999. In 8 years from that time up to now, I have finished many Crash Bandicoot games - fully completed Crash Bandicoot 1, 2, 3, CTR, Wrath of Cortex, XS and N-Tranced. Crash Bash is too hard - I got up to around 150% out of 200% - CNK is just so bad I would not want to finish that for the time being and I haven't got the newer Crash Bandicoot games. I always finished the game as a bare minimum first before I went back and collect everything.
Now let's talk about TWoC first. So like I always do, I have finished the game as a bare minimum the first time I got the game. Then I tried to get everything in TWoC. However, on my first few attempts, I found the time trial in TWoC to be really difficult compared to Warped. So I did the best I could do at the time and stopped playing this game for a while because I found no motivation to finish it off.
Anyway, one day around late December 2006, I found out that Cyberscore has added Crash Bandicoot: TWoC to its game list. I looked at my list of times and compared them to others' in the charts. Well, I got some first place. I submitted my first place times and at that time, only one of my competitor took action to beat my records. That person was no other than my interviewer, PlanesWalker. During the end of 2006 and start of 2007, I went out a lot so I really didn't have much time to play, but I still managed to improve some of my records because like I said, Crash Bandicoot games are really easy to pick up for me.
Around this time, few more competitors came along and beat many of my records. So, once things have settled down for me, I launched my revenge on everyone and they did trying to counter. I saw this to be quite interesting and entertaining, so I made a Crash Bandicoot achievement series thread to chat about this.
From my Crash Warped's experiences, I know that I never like doing time trial in running levels so I let my competitors fight over running levels such as Arctic Antics and Cortex Vortex. Meanwhile, I improved my records on plane and atlasphere levels. Well, soon enough, two competitors (Fethy and Slazzy) started playing this game competitively and shared with me a lot of great videos. During this time, I learned to like running levels. I finally got 106% completion and ready to challenge my competitors.
Anyway, it took me 2 months with constant competition before I somewhat become this good in this game compared to average players. What I mean by constant competition is there is always someone who beat my time after I set them, so I would be encouraged to try to beat them back. Without this competition, I will just stop whenever I believe I have the best time known to man. And without this competition, I would not write my very first FAQ/guide to be published online! Now I plan to put "writing FAQ" as my hobby if I have more time sometimes in the future.
As we all know, the competition has to end somehow since it is almost impossible to get any lower than the best in most levels without spending too much precious time. Interestingly, when the competitions for TWoC almost ended, Crash Bandicoot 2: N-Tranced was added to Cyberscore. Like I have always done, I have finished the game long time ago, so I only need to practice more in time trial in order to compete. I already know from another forum that Vegg1 has a lot of great records in this game, so I got motivated to beat Vegg1's records. Well, I managed to become pretty darn good in N-Tranced in less than a month. This may be because I have learned to love Crash Bandicoot game style through playing TWoC extensively the last few months. I know NT is mainly 2D and TWoC is 3D but the game style is similar, like the knowledge of different types of jumps that I learned while playing TWoC. Moreover, NT is easier than TWoC, with shorter level and Super Slide ability on top of Running Shoes will make you finish a level faster, so you can play the level more often and practice more.
When I still played NT, XS was added to Cyberscore. I immediately submit my respectable XS time trial records. Why respectable? Well, XS's time trial has not been played as extensively as other Crash games (from my observation on other forums), so many of my records are easily the best. However, people then started to beat most of my times. So, I played NT and XS around this time trying to defend my title. I finally got all gold’s for XS and all but one gold for NT. Why was I in a rush? Well, I know when April started kicking in, I would have really limited time to play with exams and assessments due time coming closer.
Now I was happy to see that I still dominate in NT. However, SamirB and ntropydude has beaten many of my records in XS. Well, I will try to beat them back but not now.
About Crash 3: Warped. Well, I was satisfied with my records at that time compared to what I saw online. This was in 2004 to early 2005. I believe I have beaten all developer times except in 3 levels (High Time, Bye Bye Blimps and Rings of Power). CS 2 has the game, and I have submitted my records and improved whenever necessary during the good old CS 2 days.
At that time, only Enigma (previously known as Red Neo B) that consistently beat my records in (guess what?) running levels! Yes, I didn't like running levels at that time. I have my TV Capture Card and so can take screenshots easily. Unfortunately, during a nice day on early 2005, when I played Sphynxinator level, the game just hang (aka freeze). I restarted the game, but to no avail. And the CD was officially dead. I think it was because the CD has been scratched beyond repair due to excessive playing. Well, I have been playing this game for 5 years, so that's to be expected I guess. Luckily, I have captured most of my running levels records and some other levels before that happened because I didn't feel like to improve my record on running levels and levels I was really satisfied with. Unfortunately this means that I don't have proofs for the other levels such as most Coco and motorbikes levels. But more unfortunately, CS 2 collapsed.
Anyway, later on that year (2005 or 2006?), CS 3 was launched. Crash 3 is one of the game that got added. I added my score the first day I was at CS 3 (15 July 2005 or 2006 - this is really confusing... I checked I joined CS on 15 July 2005, but I submitted most of my Crash 3 records on 15 July 2006... same date! Is this coincidental or my mind is going crazy?).
Anyway, I posted my screenshots straight away because I have done so before. And like I said above, I couldn't submit my time for some levels since I would not be able to prove them. I know I have beaten all developer times in these levels I didn't submit for, but I am not quite sure what I really got. Therefore I didn't submit some of my records, and so I only have 21 submissions for Crash Warped, which brings my rank down severely on the main board for this game. Oh well, my average is pretty good for the records I have submitted anyway. Yeah, for your information, I think I have 4 seconds on Hot Coco level, but no one would believe that, so I won't submit that time at the moment until I got the game again sometimes in the future and have time to play it again.
About CTR, I don't plan to play CTR competitively for the time being. Well, I used to play CTR competitively, but didn't realize that I was cheating with Super Turbo Pad on some tracks, so I wouldn't be able to submit my old records and since it is difficult to prove that I don't use the cheat, I think I have to wait until I got a new TV capture card before I will play CTR competitively again. And one more thing, CTR is not like other plat forming Crash Bandicoot games, so I may not be any good in this game.
PlanesWalker: I had fun competing against you back than, unfortunately I got busy with other games, but good times, anyways can you tell us what your likes and dislikes about the Crash Bandicoot games/series were? Also tell us your least favorite to most favorite of the series.
Chocobo: My likes = TIME TRIAL and easy to pick up. Seriously, the time trial challenge in Crash Bandicoot series is like no other - significantly different from normal Speed Run - that's why I love it!
My dislikes = for TWoC - loading times!! In general, the game is usually too short. Sometimes the time trial frustrates me, but that's because it is a human nature to always want to win, so yeah I dislike that specific human nature sometimes.
Nowadays I like Crash games with time trial, so the first two Crash games are going down to the bottom of my list. I know we can do custom time trial or the like for the old games and the first two Crash games are good old classics but I think the replay value for me is kinda nil. I will only order the game in terms of my preference up to and including CNK since I don't own Twinsanity and so on. TWoC has become my favorite, dethroned Crash 3 Warped and CTR which used to share the place as my most favorite Crash Bandicoot games. XS and NT shared the third place because I can't decide which one I like more. CNK is next, then Crash 2, Crash 1 and Crash Bash.
So, it's like this from most favorite to least favorite: TWoC > Warped = CTR > XS = NT > CNK > 2 > 1 > CB.
If there is no time trial in any games, CTR is going to come first and the order from most favorite to least favorite would be like this: CTR > 2 > 3 > 1 > CB > TWoC > CNK > XS = NT.
I know this means TWoC time trial is really appealing to me, well, according to me. If it is not because of the time trial, I wouldn't play XS and NT, because they would just be another 2D platform games for GBA, like many others.
PlanesWalker: I really loved playing Crash Bandicoot 2, that was a fun gamefor me. What is your favorite time trial mode in the games of Crash? Running levels, Plane levels, under water levels, and so on?
At the moment, I actually don't have any particular favorite time trial mode in Crash games. However, like I said before, I never really like all those running levels until just a couple of months ago when I started to like them like any other levels.
If you look at my records, you will see that I am really good at underwater levels. Well, I actually like underwater levels like I do with any other levels. One reason why I usually have better records in underwater levels is because other people just hate these levels. Underwater levels are relatively long and difficult. And also Crash is more difficult to control and moves slower underwater. That's why most people just don't practice underwater levels as much as they practice other levels, while I play all levels just the same. Yeah, that's probably why I usually have better times in underwater levels.
PlanesWalker: Any record that you are very proud of?
Chocobo: I have one that I am really proud of. It is level 12 in Crash Bandicoot 3: Warped, Deep Trouble. Try to beat that if you can. I used to spend a few days, mastering this level and another underwater level in Crash 3 (Level 2: Under Pressure). Surprisingly, it was a good nice few days. I enjoyed practicing these levels. It will be very very difficult to find the right timing again to get sub 53 sec in Level 12. To get sub 58 sec, you need a right strategy and I don't think I have seen anyone gotten below 58 sec yet. Unfortunately it has been a long time (2 to 3 years is long time, right?) since I played that level, so even I can't really remember what I did exactly to get that record. I think it would be almost impossible to beat my Deep Trouble record, and I am very proud of it. One day, someone may be able to beat my Under Pressure record, so I am not as proud with it as with my Deep Trouble record. The other record I am really proud of is Level 7: Rocket Racket in XS, because I believe it is a perfect run - you can't get any lower that that. However, since Miniboss got that record first, well, I don't think I am really proud with that.
PlanesWalker: Will we be seeing you dominate in any other games in the near future?
Chocobo: Not in the near future, but probably in the future. I will play my game collection that has high CS competition dedicatedly, such as SSBM, Wario Ware, Monkey Ball, Katamari, Burnout, MGS, Kururin etc. I can't really play competitively for the time being, but mark my words, once I do, I will also move towards domination in those games. Hopefully.
PlanesWalker: Can’t wait to see you in the Top 100 in the main board than. Any tips? Final Words?
Chocobo: Practice is the key. Just keep on playing the game dedicatedly. Learn the game very VERY well. And you will succeed. Another thing is if someone come along with great records and beating many of old best scores, I would really like the person to share his/her strategies with everyone, either through posting in forums, write a FAQ, pics, videos or compete wirelessly (for newer consoles). I really can't understand why some people want to keep the strategies they used to achieve their great scores private. What's the point, really? You got the scores... big deal, now what? I tell you what, share your awesomeness to the world, and since it is very difficult to travel around the world to find people with the same interest as you, then the only way out is to use the internet - share your strategies, get respect from your fellow competitors in the game you loved (since you have great records on that game, you must really love that game), and I bet you have been helped in one way or another in internet anyway. So don't be stingy ok? Sharing is caring. smiley
PlanesWalker: I completely agree, if it were not for Billmaan, I would not be at the top of Tetris DS, sharing is the best way to become trust worthy, and a part of the community. Thanks for your time Chocobo, it was a pleasure, I will see you in the Melee charts now.
Written By: PlanesWalker