Prerelease:Crash Twinsanity (PlayStation 2, Xbox)/GameHut Videos

This is a sub-page of Prerelease:Crash Twinsanity (PlayStation 2, Xbox).

A few early builds of Crash Twinsanity were shown on the programmer Jon Burton's GameHut YouTube channel.

December 4th, 2003 Build

This video is the earliest form of gameplay seen of the game, showing a build dated December 4th 2003 - Version 8.016. It was shown off by Jon Burton of Traveller's Tales in a GameHut video.

General Differences

• The HUD is made of debug font text.
• There are many placeholder sounds and music, some coming from Crash Bandicoot: The Wrath of Cortex, or earlier Crash games.
• The pause menu includes debug features and additional settings not seen in the final game.
• The camera is unlocked all the time.
• Crash makes the classic death noise upon dying.
• The life pickup visual is Aku Aku at this point.
• Picking up Aku Aku doesn't cause him to appear beside Crash.
• The game stutters after crossing chunks.
• There aren't any invisible walls.
• Picking up Wumpa and lives doesn't make the HUD show up.

N. Sanity Island

• The game starts at Crash's hut as opposed to the beach area.
• Many puzzles, collectibles and crates are not present.
• Instead of multiple worm jumps, a ramp leads to the area near the boss arena.
• The ramp leading to the farm is exactly the same as in the demo.
• There is no second small island off the coast.
• The beach area extends along the coast to the area blocked by rocks later in development.
• The extended area features Wumpa tree nut puzzles not seen in the final game.
• The Wumpa tree nut is green as opposed to brown.
• The nut also has a max distance it can travel before respawning unlike in the final game.
• After a simple puzzle the area ends in a dead end.
• Enemies, bird clumps and seagulls are all present in this extended area.

Jungle Bungle

• The second camera angle during the first cutscene is different.
• The first fallen tree has crates on top of it. This layout is done later on in the final game.
• After the turn there is a skunk enemy instead of a double jump tutorial.
• The parrot has a blue-ish texture as opposed to a red-ish one.
• The crates in this area are placed differently.
• There is no extra section on the left side.
• There are no shielded tribesman in the area, just a piranha plant instead.
• The cave is shorter and the loading zone is closer to the cave entrance.
• The mushrooms don't emit particles.
• Grass at the end of the cave section is solid, requiring a jump to progress.
• There are crates behind the piranha plant.
• The path splits in two after the turn, with a piranha plant guarding it.
• On the left side there's a hole leading into a cave area.
• The left path was supposed to lead to the Bug Run at some point, though it's been confirmed to be empty in the build.
• The worm jump tutorial has 4 additional angles in place of a moving camera.
• At the top area, spikes guard the pit instead of a harmless lake.
• The detonator puzzle is replaced with another TNT puzzle.
• The checkpoint is closer to the cutscene than usual.
• The piranha plant is also after the swinging log rather than before.
• In this build, CoCortex has trouble getting into position to get hit by the swinging log due to a solid object.
• There are locked crates on the right side of the area.
• The turtle guards the area as oppposed to the skunk.
• The build crashes in the boss area, without the boss arena being there.

February 24th, 2004 Build

Also shown off by Jon Burton in a video.

General Differences

• The HUD is made of Crash Nitro Kart's font, which indicates being close to the early gameplay build.
• In this build, debug features and cutscene skipping are available.
• The life pickup visual is Aku Aku at this point.
• The camera is unlocked everywhere except for the Walrus Chase and N.Gin boss fight.
• Hitting wooden bounce crates changes their visual to the iron bounce crate.

The Bug Run

• The path splits at the worm tutorial cutscene area and to the left is a hole leading to the Bug Run.
• The transition into the Bug Run's chunk is indicated by the level geometry disappearing around Crash.
• The Bug Run section contains no objects, only scenery.
• After the chase area, the section continues into a cave area and then loops back around to a different hole in the vicinity of the worm tutorial cutscene.

High Seas Hi-Jinks

• The opening area of the level includes more scenery like fences, additional water hazards and a wall on the left blocking the view of N.Gin's ship.
• Shark enemies are seen jumping back and forward over the path into the ship.
• The penguin inside the ice uses correct textures and its early coloring.
• The exits behind the starting area look much wider and bigger than in the final game.
• Entering the ship requires using a TNT barrel, which explodes after a short while.
• The entrance is also guarded by a Rhino Pirate with a sword, who takes 2 hits to defeat, as well as a shark.
• The first chunk includes slippery oil which, much like ice in the final game, needs to be maneuvered around.
• The second chunk has rats, a scrapped Pirate Duck enemy, and cargo platforms which can be lifted by spinning Boiler Room Doom's blue valves.
• Pirate Duck's attack consists of him lighting the fuse of a nearby cannon, which shoots a bomb forward from it.
• Getting near the Pirate Duck alerts it, and it can be then defeated in one hit.
• Exiting the room requires the use of another TNT barrel.
• The third area of the level contains the same N.Gin cutscene as final (albeit with no sounds and a different launcher).
• In the middle path, rockets that spew toxic gas pop up as you progress.
• The Rhino Pirate Barrel Thrower here takes 2 hits to defeat.
• The way to the fourth chunk is blocked by Nitro crates.
• In the fourth area the platforms to walk on are thinner.
• The fifth area mainly contains rats, bounce crates and rockets.
• In the sixth area, the floor opens much like in the third chunk.
• In addition, much like in the third area, there's a Rhino Pirate Barrel Thrower here, unlike in the final game.
• There are Rope Swinging Rhino Pirates here that affect multiple paths.
• On both sides of the area there are separate "bonus" chunks which contain rooms full of crates.
• Entering the next chunk starts the Rusty Walrus chase.
  • Rusty Walrus has trouble following the path.
  • Many of the crates lying around on the sides have Nitro crates in front of them.
  • The first blocking wall is triggered before you even get to it.
  • The second part of the chase is shorter, but the wall at the end works.
• After the chase, some explosions are shown and you enter a cutscene where Crash jumps on bounce crates.
• You land on the ship's deck where the cutscene from early on in the level plays again.
  • This boss fight has you spin rockets away and back at N.Gin instead of getting him down from his crow's nest.
  • The camera is locked in place during this fight.
  • After N.Gin is hit once a cutscene plays where a big rocket hits the ship, the game fades out, and then Crash flies out of the ship onto an ice floe using the slide jump animation.
• The N.Tropy boss intro is not finished, so it's mostly a T-posed cutscene.
  • After N.Brio bounces around, he tilts the platform and spawns multiple Rigid TNT Crates that fall down towards him.
  • The objective there is to either activate a TNT and make it explode at the right time next to Brio, or angle a TNT towards his mouth so that he eats one.
  • The camera does not lock on to the boss.
  • The ice floe that N.Tropy is standing on can tilt, but not fall down.
  • After two hits N.Tropy is defeated and a cutscene plays that softlocks the game.

March 9th, 2004 Build

Starts at 2:17:50. Another build shown off by Jon Burton in a livestream, dated March 9th, 2004 Build - Version 8.071. The compile date comes from debugging information present on the game's main menu.

General Differences

• The HUD is still in a very primitive state - tallies for extra lives and Wumpa Fruit are represented through text ("WUMPA: #" and "LIVES: #").
• A huge number of sound effects are missing. Only sounds for the bare essentials (jumping, spinning, breaking crates, TNT crates, Nitro crates, Checkpoint crates, collecting Wumpa Fruit, and a few incremental environment sounds) seem to be present here.
• Voice files aren't implemented at all here. This extends to cutscenes as well, as animations for the characters' mouth flaps and context-relevant movements are also missing.
• Gems are completely absent.
• The Game Over screen is again represented through the Crash font on a black background.

Main Menu

• The title screen and opening cinematic are not present in this build, as upon booting up, one will immediately be greeted by a placeholder boot menu using the game's older font with a black background.
• An options menu is accessible both here and through the pause screen. In addition to general sound and display features, it also contains a plethora of debugging actions including God Mode, infinite lives, moon jumping, and a free camera display using Controller 2.
• Options exist for starting a new game or loading save data, both of which cause the game to lock up upon selection.
• Upon choosing Level Select, the player is greeted with a choice of eight levels to choose from.

Cavern (Entrance)

This level starts out immediately following the battle against Mecha Bandicoot, where Cortex throws a tantrum before attacking Crash, leading into Cavern Catastrophe's first RollerBrawl segment.

• This level uses a remix of the Crash Bandicoot: Warped theme which isn't used anywhere else in the series. The track appears to have been composed by John McGann, as it can be found on his Soundcloud account (CaptainJMac) as "Crash Twinsanity - Mecha Bandicoot Fight (2004)", indicating that it was meant to be the Mecha Bandicoot boss fight theme.
• The camera angles in the opening cutscene differ slightly from the final game - mainly in that the wrecked Mecha Bandicoot is nowhere to be seen, and it shows Cortex actually diving towards Crash. The final game removes the shot of Cortex diving, resulting in a rather jarring transition into the level.
  • The camera focuses on the Checkpoint crate after Cortex dives into Crash, resulting in a glitch where the camera briefly goes out of bounds before properly focusing on the RollerBrawl segment. This would be properly fixed in the final game, as the camera angle would be changed to focus on the hole itself in this segment.
• The dust effect seen during RollerBrawl is noticeably thinner.
• The wooden ramps seen in the circular caverns are missing in this build.
• The pipe obstacles which leak green gas are not present in this build.
• The lanterns seen in the aforementioned circular caverns use more primitive models.
• A different skull-and-crossbones ornament can be seen in the circular caverns, which appears to be made of a rubbery material and would feature a comical Cortex-shaped dent upon crashing through it. This would later be replaced by the same small wooden blockade used later in the level.
• The set of crystals which need to be hit in sequence feature a small accompanying cloud of circular light particles as opposed to more natural looking sparkles. Additionally, the first of these crystals is colored a translucent dark purple, as opposed to the bright red seen in the final version.
• The stalactites and decorative green crystals are missing from where the stage's second Checkpoint is located.
• One of the paths in the second Checkpoint is blocked off by a pipe leaking slime - it is unknown whether this path was actually blocked off by it, or if this was purely for decoration. While the pipe is still burst in the same way in the final game, no slime leaks onto the path.
• The third Checkpoint crate unusually has two blank crates placed behind it, which were later removed.

Cavern (Antfight)

Leading on directly from the previous level, this is an earlier version of the segment in Cavern Catatrophe where the Ants invade via drill.

• The background shot seen in the opening cutscene shows a completely different object layout.
  • The camera angles in the first few seconds of this cutscene are also noticeably different, as Cortex lands nowhere near the Power Crystal, forcing it to zoom out to accommodate both Cortex and the Crystal in the same shot. They are much closer together in the final version, allowing a more cinematic and coherent zoom in.
  • As another consequence of Cortex landing further away from the Crystal, he has to run up to it to grab it in this build, an action he doesn't do in the final game.
  • Cortex stays in his idle animation upon grabbing the Crystal, lacking any of his characteristic animations used in the cutscene during the final game.
• Only normal Ants seem to exist at this point. Lancer Ants, which use blades made of electricity and are by far the most common variant seen in the final game, aren't present at all here.
• A different effect is used when Ants are defeated - they appear to disintegrate into blue light, rather than falling to the ground and "poof"ing out like most enemies in the final game do.
• The cutscene immediately following the Ant invasion appears to be in a very primitive state, lacking the camera angles, dialogue, mouth flaps, and many of the comedic animations.
• Gameplay for Crash and Cortex being tied together via Crystal is noticeably unfinished - Crash does not hold onto the Crystal at all in this build, as Cortex latches onto the Crystal himself with all of his own unique animations implemented.
  • This results in various graphical glitches, such as the Crystal falling to the ground any time Crash spins, as well as Cortex grabbing onto thin air because Crash lacks an animation for moving while holding onto the Crystal at this point.
• An entire section of the level is missing here - namely, the section where Crash must throw Cortex over the ledge to activate switches to progress further. As a consequence, the switches themselves, as well as the platform layout with green-tinted wood, are not present here. Instead, the Checkpoint crate and corresponding spinning lift platform right after this part of the level are placed directly next to the initial lift platform you ascend, which leads into the circular platform and RollerBrawl segment seen in the final game.
• The cutscene which plays after the short RollerBrawl segment is missing in this build.
• Two tall stacks of boxes are present on either side of the platform following the RollerBrawl segment which aren't in the final game.