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Proto:Crash Team Racing/August 14th, 1999 build

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This is a sub-page of Proto:Crash Team Racing.

Hiddenpalace.org logo.png  This prototype is documented on Hidden Palace.

The August 14th, 1999 prototype of Crash Team Racing is a preview version of the game dated over a month before the final NTSC-U release version. It was released on May 1st, 2021.

Sub-Pages

SoundIcon.png
Unused Audio
Unused voice clips/dialogues and music present within the files.

General Differences

Startup and Menus

  • There are no startup screens. Instead, the game immediately boots to the main menu.
  • The checkered flag background is set up slightly to the left. A black gap is visible in the top right corner of the screen.
  • The animated title screen sequence makes no sound effects, and Crash's model has bigger pupils and his eyes have a darker tone.
    • Crash does not blink while in the idle pose.
    • The trademark symbol next to the game's logo is missing.
  • No sound effects play in the menus (aside from the Enter Your Name screen when creating a save profile).
  • Menu screens pop up instantly when switching around, rather than having a proper transition.
  • Only X and Square buttons are used to confirm and go back, respectively. In the final game, Circle and Triangle are also mapped for such actions.
  • The green outline around the menu borders has a stronger shade.
    • The outline around the level thumbnails also lacks transparency.
  • Cup tournaments in Arcade and Vs. modes did not exist at this time.
  • Two, three and four-player options are always available, regardless of whether the controllers are plugged in or not.
  • The autodemos and the intro cutscene are absent, so nothing will play when you are idle in the main menu.
  • Cheat codes weren't implemented yet, so holding L1 and R1 does not lock the inputs. Thus, it is impossible to unlock certain characters such as Penta Penguin without hacking. Consequently, the secret demo for Spyro 2: Ripto's Rage! is not present either.
  • There is no unlockable Scrapbook menu option. The TEST.STR video file is also entirely missing from the game.
  • No "Loading..." text appears during the loading screens.

Adventure

CTR-Aug14 CharSelectAdventure.png
  • The New/Load sub-menu is positioned higher.
  • The character select screen is just a basic list containing the eight starter characters instead of a fully-animated 3D garage.
  • Character names are written in a shortened form:
    • Crash instead of Crash Bandicoot
    • Cortex instead of Dr. Neo Cortex
    • Tiny instead of Tiny Tiger
    • Coco instead of Coco Bandicoot
    • Ngin instead of N. Gin
    • Dingo instead of Dingodile
  • The Enter Your Name screen is the only part of the menus that actually has sound effects. Still, it lacks proper sounds for entering or deleting a character (even though these are already present in the sound banks).
  • The background box of the character icons in the save files lack transparency.

Character Select

  • The character select screen is defaulted to the four-player setup featuring four display slots, regardless of how many human players are in the game.
  • There are no rotating character models. Instead, character names are simply displayed in the center of the blank squares when selected.
  • Icons do not turn black after choosing a character. Rather, the colored outlines will stop flashing.
Aug 14 Final
CTR-Aug14 SelectCharacter.png CTR-Final SelectCharacter4P.png
  • Most of the character icons are now starting to get closer to their final counterparts, but there are still some noticeable differences:
    • Crash has more detailed pupils, his shading is mostly missing, his teeth and nose are peachy, and part of his body is drawn.
    • Tiny Tiger is based on his boss portrait from Cortex Strikes Back, although the muzzle color has been changed to yellow to match his in-game appearance.
    • Coco uses a very similar version of her warp room portrait from Warped.
    • Polar has a chubby face with a cyan skin and blue eyes, nose and mouth. His final icon has been replaced by his Japanese icon, which was based on an official artwork.
    • Pinstripe retains the same pose, although his face has been redrawn and he has pink ears.
    • N. Tropy's headgear textures were simplified, and his eyebrows were altered.
    • Papu Papu's facial textures were redrawn, his mask cloth is lighter, his hair is black and his blue collar is present.
    • Penta Penguin's mouth was redrawn and part of his body shows a black scarf.
  • Most character names are abbreviated.
    • Crash instead of Crash Bandicoot
    • Cortex instead of Dr. Neo Cortex
    • Tiny instead of Tiny Tiger
    • Coco instead of Coco Bandicoot
    • Ngin instead of N. Gin
    • Dingo instead of Dingodile
    • NTropy instead of Dr. N. Tropy
    • Penguin instead of Penta Penguin
  • The small font is used for both character names and the "Select Character" title string. This string is also always onscreen, unlike in the final game where it is removed from the four-player screen once all characters are unlocked.
  • Penta Penguin and Fake Crash have swapped places.

Level Select

  • There are no track preview videos.
  • Thumbnails were taken from earlier revisions of the levels, causing many of them to have differences no longer present at this point in development.
  • Slide Coliseum was originally an unlockable track along with Turbo Track.
  • In Time Trial, the ghost select screen will be available only if there is an existing ghost data for the selected track.
    • The "Insert any memory card with ghost data in memory card slot 1" bottom text is missing.
Racetracks
Aug 14 Final Notes
CTR-AugProtos CrashCoveThumbnail.png CTR-Final CrashCoveThumbnail.png The checkered line pattern is smaller and thiner.
CTR-AugProtos RoosTubesThumbnail.png CTR-Final RoosTubesThumbnail.png
  • It features an unique arc-shaped banner for the level.
  • The checkered line pattern is smaller and thiner.
  • The glass ceiling has different structures.
CTR-AugProtos TigerTempleThumbnail.png CTR-Final TigerTempleThumbnail.png
  • The checkered line pattern is smaller and thiner.
  • The vegetation is darker and the dirt textures are grey.
CTR-AugProtos CocoParkThumbnail.png CTR-Final CocoParkThumbnail.png The hill right after the start line has "COCO" written with flowers.
CTR-AugProtos MysteryCavesThumbnail.png CTR-Final MysteryCavesThumbnail.png
  • The fence next to the start line uses an incorrect texture.
  • The tiki head statue lacks glowing eyes.
CTR-AugProtos BlizzardBluffThumbnail.png CTR-Final BlizzardBluffThumbnail.png The checkered line pattern is smaller and thiner.
CTR-AugProtos SewerSpeedwayThumbnail.png CTR-Final SewerSpeedwayThumbnail.png The checkered line texture doesn't cover the offroad sides.
CTR-AugProtos DingoCanyonThumbnail.png CTR-Final DingoCanyonThumbnail.png The checkered line pattern is smaller and thiner.
CTR-AugProtos PapusPyramidThumbnail.png CTR-Final PapusPyramidThumbnail.png
CTR-AugProtos DragonMinesThumbnail.png CTR-Final DragonMinesThumbnail.png The checkered line texture doesn't cover the offroad side.
CTR-AugProtos PolarPassThumbnail.png CTR-Final PolarPassThumbnail.png
  • There are four single Wumpa fruits that were replaced by Wumpa crates.
  • The wall on the left after the finish line is more open and features a snowy offroad.
CTR-AugProtos CortexCastleThumbnail.png CTR-Final CortexCastleThumbnail.png
CTR-AugProtos TinyArenaThumbnail.png CTR-Final TinyArenaThumbnail.png
CTR-AugProtos HotAirSkywayThumbnail.png CTR-Final HotAirSkywayThumbnail.png
CTR-AugProtos NGinLabsThumbnail.png CTR-Final NGinLabsThumbnail.png
  • The checkered line seems to be missing.
  • Some extra directional arrows are present in the left side.
CTR-AugProtos OxideStationThumbnail.png CTR-Final OxideStationThumbnail.png The level's textures are heavily unfinished.
CTR-AugProtos SlideColiseumThumbnail.png CTR-Final SlideColiseumThumbnail.png The stadium texture on the top is greenish and the wall textures on the right are less detailed.
CTR-AugProtos TurboTrackThumbnail.png CTR-Final TurboTrackThumbnail.png
  • The stadium model lacks walls reaching the level's ground.
  • The asphault road is larger, lacking the grassy offroad.
Arenas
  • Parking Lot, Lab Basement, and The North Bowl are already available from the start.
    • On the other hand, Skull Rock was originally an unlockable arena.
Aug 14 Final
CTR-AugProtos SkullRockThumbnail.png CTR-Final SkullRockThumbnail.png
CTR-AugProtos RampageRuinsThumbnail.png CTR-Final RampageRuinsThumbnail.png
CTR-AugProtos RockyRoadThumbnail.png CTR-Final RockyRoadThumbnail.png
CTR-AugProtos NitroCourtThumbnail.png CTR-Final NitroCourtThumbnail.png
CTR-AugProtos ParkingLotThumbnail.png CTR-Final ParkingLotThumbnail.png
CTR-AugProtos TheNorthBowlThumbnail.png CTR-Final TheNorthBowlThumbnail.png
CTR-AugProtos LabBasementThumbnail.png CTR-Final LabBasementThumbnail.png
  • Arena thumbnails don't seem to feature any notable differences other than the camera angle.

Setup Battle

Aug 14 Final
CTR-Aug14 SetupBattle.png CTR-Final SetupBattle.png
  • The "Type:" and "Length:" strings were moved further down in the final game.
  • Warning messages use the small font.

High Score

Aug 14 Final
CTR-Aug14 HighScore.png CTR-Final HighScore.png
  • The small font is used for the character names.
  • Drop shadows are much larger.
  • Directional arrows next to the track names are missing.
  • Only the eight starter characters are shown in the default rankings. In the final game, Ripper Roo, Papu Papu, Komodo Joe, Pinstripe, and N. Tropy are also present.
  • Default scores are set to 3:00:00, whereas in the final NTSC-U release it is 9:59:00.
  • Best Lap Time names use the standard font color, rather than the character's unique color.
    • The top character in the Best Track Time rankings is also featured in the default Best Lap Time scores.
  • There is no sub-menu featuring selectable Time Trial and Relic Race options. Instead, pressing Up/Down will switch between Time Trial (referred to as "Standard Mode" here) and Relic Race.
  • Best Lap Time scores are also present in the Relic Race screen. These were removed in the final game since there is no lap score in this mode.
  • The default character names share the same string array used in the character select screens. In the final game, a separate array of characters names was made for this menu, featuring proper name abbreviations for the rankings.
  • Slide Coliseum and Turbo Track score screens are accessible even if the tracks are not unlocked.
  • Pressing X will return to the main menu.
  • Komodo Joe's color is blue, which is the same as Crash's. It was later changed to mustard.

Gameplay

  • At this point in development, voice clips were not implemented into the gameplay yet, so the characters are completely silent throughout the game.
  • The start banner is slightly different - the yellow and black checkered pattern is thinner in the edges. This design can still be seen in the final game in the track preview videos for Coco Park, Blizzard Bluff, Sewer Speedway, Dingo Canyon, Dragon Mines, Polar Pass, Tiny Arena, and Slide Coliseum.
    • The flip side lacks the green edges and has a hole where the inverted 'R' is drawn.
  • Pressing Triangle to skip the race intro will also switch between minimap and speedometer.
  • Navigating the menu options makes no sound effect.
  • There is no checkered flag transition when a level is replayed, so the map will reload instantly.
  • The weapon fire function is also mapped to the R2 button, in addition to the Circle button. Therefore, there is no backward view.
Aug 14 Final
CTR-Aug14 StartLights.png CTR-Final StartLights 2.png
  • The traffic lights are smaller and less detailed.
  • The lap counter is separated by a hyphen instead of a slash.
  • Lap times are recorded once the lap is completed, whereas in the final game the time of the current lap is displayed in real time.
  • There is no chime sound effect after crossing the finish line on each lap.
  • Aku Aku's mouth is closed.
  • Uka Uka's eyes lacks a red contour around the edges.
Aug 14 Final
  • The "Final Lap!" notice is absent, and the jingle is very different.
  • The victory fanfare is always used, regardless of the player's position at the end of the race.
    • The level music does not continue after the fanfare ends.
  • The X button symbol has a golden color due to the orange gradient mistakenly applied to it.
  • The game does not take a monochrome screenshot when paused.
    • You can switch between the minimap and speedometer while the game is paused.
    • The FX slider does not play the humming sound effect while the player is in a hub world.
    • In the Voice slider, developers' voice impressions can be heard for Crash, Cortex and Coco used as a placeholder. Tiny Tiger, N. Gin, Ripper Roo and Pinstripe already have their own voices present, but Tiny's has a different pitch. N. Tropy only has one voice implemented in the menu, which is also never heard in the final game. All other characters are simply silent.
    • The Controller option lacks the "Vibration" text.
    • Selecting the "Quit" option will make you immediately exit the level. In the final, the game will offer the player an extra prompt with "Yes" and "No" options to ensure the option hadn't been selected accidentally.
  • If you pause the game and select "Restart" while the race intro fanfare is playing, the level will restart without the fanfare.
  • Super Turbo Pads allow the player to maintain maximum speed throughout the race, similar to the Blue Fire mechanic in Crash Team Racing Nitro-Fueled. This happens because you don't lose your accumulated turbos when getting any kind of boost. A piece of code that limits this action was added in the final game.
  • When backtracking 25% or more of the track in a single jump after already completing more than 50% of the track, the game simply does not count as a valid region and resets your position when you fall off the track. In the final game, the mask will immediately rescue you upon touching the ground instead.
  • No controller messages are displayed when a controller is unplugged.
  • The game does not yet support alternative controllers, such as the Racing Wheel and Namco's JogCon controller. As such, the respective controller setup menus are missing.
  • The checkered flag transition is buggy:
    • You are able to pause the game while the checkered flag is still uncovering the screen.
    • When you restart the level, the menu confirmation sound effect will play once the level resumes.
    • Restarting or exiting the level while the traffic lights are onscreen will make them disappear.
    • Restarting or exiting the level while collecting Wumpa fruits will make them still count.
    • After a race is over and you leave the game, everything will freeze while the checkered flag covers the screen.

Race

  • There are no exhaust fumes coming out of CPU karts.
    • The same applies to the players on each other's screen.
Aug 14 Final
Normal
Juiced Up
  • A different sound effect is heard when a power-up is obtained or the player is juiced up.
  • Bumping into a TNT while spinning out or squashed won't instantly blow it up in the player's head.
  • The Warp Orb AI is broken in this build and has a tendency to get stuck in many sections of the tracks.
  • CPU racers aren't affected by crushing hazards, such as rolling barrels, boulders, and minecarts.
  • Getting blasted while being squashed will result in the kart flipping in the squashed state. In the final game, the character immediately unsquashes once the kart starts to flip.
Aug 14 Final
CTR-Aug14 RaceResults.png CTR-Final RaceResults.png
  • The position numbers after finishing an Arcade race are colored red.
    • The menu placement is further down the screen.
    • The character icons in the race results appear very quickly after the second race onwards.
    • During the icons transitions, pressing a button to skip the HUD animation before they all appear will cause the remaining icons to pop up on the screen one by one.

Time Trial

  • Since there is no voice acting in this build, N. Tropy's end-of-race quotes are consequently absent, even though they are already present in the files.
  • Some textures lack transparency in the ghost forms of a few characters:
    • Tiny Tiger's spikes.
    • Polar's ears.
    • Papu Papu's top hair.
    • Komodo Joe's paws.
    • Fake Crash's eyebrows and eyes.
    • N. Tropy's skinny beards and silver fork.
    • N. Oxide's eyebrows.
  • All tracks have a default time requirement of 3:00:00 to open the Speed Champion's ghost. In the final, each track has an appropriate time required.
  • Beating ghosts won't add any gold/platinum stars next to the track names.
  • Skipping the race intro while the checkered flag is still uncovering the screen will break the pace and cause the ghosts to start moving before the green light. The sooner the player skips it, the sooner they will move.
  • Results screens pop up instantly, rather than having a smooth transition.
    • The Total Time screen doesn't have a transition between menus.
    • End-of-race messages lack an exclamation mark - notably, the British English text in the PAL version removes it as well.
    • The confirm button on the Enter Your Name screen reads "Save" instead of "Save High Score".
      • The menu can be also skipped using the Square button.
    • Character names in the Best Times ranking use the small font as well, such as the High Score menu.
      • The position numbers are also colored red.
  • Pressing X repeatedly while the ranking and total time score boxes are transitioning off the screen will keep them repeating the transition cycle.
  • The ghost save screen reads "Choose a slot to save to" instead of "Choose a memory card slot to save to".
    • Attempting to save a ghost without a memory card will display an error message asking to press X to continue without saving. However, the button is not programmed to do anything, thus the player is forced to use Square to return instead.
  • When you leave the track, the timer will reappear onscreen for a brief second while the checkered flag appears to cover the screen.
  • N. Tropy cannot be unlocked without hacking since the game was not yet programmed to make him available after beating his ghosts.
    • Beating the Speed Champion ghosts will not provide any reward either.
  • Mystery Caves, N. Gin Labs, Hot Air Skyway, and Turbo Track crash in this mode due to attempting to allocate over 2 MB of RAM.
Speed Champion Ghosts

In this build, N. Tropy now takes the role of the second ghost tier. Instead, the first ghost tier is now the "Speed Champions" - mentioned by N. Tropy in one of his unused Time Trial quotes - which would be the characters of their own home tracks. These ghosts were eventually replaced by N. Oxide's ghosts, though he became the second tier instead. It's worth noting that the N. Tropy's migration to the second tier was not quite complete at this point, as only his ghost skin was moved - the game still thinks you are facing him in the first tier, as the messages displayed at the end of the race still read "N. Tropy Opened" and "You Beat N. Tropy", respectively. Additionally, the ghost dots on the minimap are light-blue, the color of N. Tropy's kart. This change was eventually undone in the final game, and he became the first ghost tier again.

The Speed Champions of each track are:

Level Character
Crash Cove Crash Bandicoot
Roo's Tubes Ripper Roo
Tiger Temple Pura
Coco Park Coco Bandicoot
Mystery Caves Fake Crash
Blizzard Bluff Penta Penguin
Sewer Speedway Dr. N. Tropy
Dingo Canyon Dingodile
Papu's Pyramid Papu Papu
Dragon Mines Komodo Joe
Polar Pass Polar
Cortex Castle Dr. Neo Cortex
Tiny Arena Tiny Tiger
Hot Air Skyway Pinstripe
N. Gin Labs N. Gin
Oxide Station N. Oxide
Slide Coliseum Crash Bandicoot
Turbo Track Crash Bandicoot
  • N. Oxide's ghost runs out of bounds in Oxide Station. Therefore, it's impossible to beat him on this track by normal means.
  • It's near impossible to unlock Tiny's ghost in Tiny Arena due to the low time requirement.
  • There is no difference when comparing the Speed Champion ghosts and N. Tropy's ghosts, as they all feature the same inputs.

Multiplayer

  • The start banner has waving animations in 3+ players mode. In the final game, they were disabled.
  • When the first player crosses the finish line, the victory fanfare will not play until the race is officially over for everyone.
  • The race intro jingle is enabled during the countdown in the Battle mode.
  • Losing all lives in Life Limit Mode turns the player into a tombstone. This object remains on the track during the entire battle, but it could disturb other players since you can crash against it. This feature was disabled in the final game.
  • Killing a player while they are invisible will make them reappear even after the death.
  • There is no limit to how many Tracking Missiles can be onscreen at once, which can have an impact on FPS. In the final game, there is a restriction in Vs. mode to prevent too many rockets from being onscreen by setting that only 2 players out of 4 can receive Triple Missiles at the same time, while if the weapon roulette RNG wants to give more players the Triple Missiles, it gets changed to a single missile intead.
  • The end of race comments used for Battle and Vs. has some strings changed, some missing, and others removed altogether. Most of the changed comments have been shortened to fit the screen, as the final game uses the standard large font, whereas the prototype uses the small font for both comments and "You Hit/Hit You" strings.
    • The strings are also stored somewhere else, rather than along with the rest of the game text in the en.lng file.
Aug 14 Final
Changed Comments ASLEEP AT THE WHEEL ASLEEP AT WHEEL
BEST BEAKER THROWS BEAKER ACE
BRONZE MEDAL BLUES BLACK N' BLUE
CAME AND CONQUERED! CONQUERED ALL!
COME BACK KID COMEBACK KID
CONTROLLER PLUGGED IN? BUTTON PROBLEMS?
KING OF THE RING! RING KING!
LAST TOON STANDING! LAST STANDING!
LEADER OF THE SMACK KING OF THE PACK
LICENSE TO SQUEAL! JUST SQUEAL!
MASTER OF DISASTER! DISASTER MASTER!
NOTHING BUT NOTHING NOTHING DOING
SILVER MEDAL WHO? SILVER MEDAL
SINGING IN THE PAIN HARD KNOCKS
SKUNKED! TOASTED!
SOMEBODY STOP ME! SPEED DEMON!
SQUASHED LIKE A BUG SQUASHED BUG!
THE COMEBACK KID! COMEBACK KID!
THE TURKEY'S DONE STUFFED TURKEY
WINNER BY A NOSE! WINNER!
Removed Comments ZIPPO N/A
Missing Comments N/A EASY MONEY!
SMACK MAN
  • The winning character stops moving and freezes in place during the transition to the Versus Standings screen.
    • The camera will continue moving around the track depending on the level.

Characters

  • Komodo Joe's minimap dot is blue - which is the same as Crash's - instead of mustard.
  • Oxide's windshield frame is silver colored. In the final game, it was changed to black.
    • Regular kart wheels can be seen under the hovercraft.

Weapons

  • Activating another Invincibility Mask power-up while the current one is almost going away will make them reappear without the trail effect.
  • The Red Beaker can inflict six different effects to the player by default:
      • Randomize item roulette (if holding an item) / Cannot pick up weapons from crates (if holding no items)
      • Slippery wheels
      • Unable to hop
      • Wobble kart
      • Wobble kart when hopping
      • Drain Wumpa fruits (removed effect)
    • In the final game, only three status effects can affect the player under normal circumstances: if no items are being hold, the victim may have the wobble kart or wobble kart when hopping effects applied randomly. But if an item is being hold, the victim will always have their item roulette randomized. The remaining effects can only be chosen if the victim hits another Red Beaker while the effect of the current one is still active.
  • Colliding with an opponent with the Power Shield won't flash the screen.
  • Super Engine works in a different way: rather than providing a constant turbo boost for a short period of time, it makes your kart permanently faster for the rest of the round. Each time the power-up is used, your top speed will increase slightly - you can upgrade it up to five times if you are not juiced up, otherwise you can get up to three times.
    • It also makes a sound when activated - which is still present in the final game, but unused.
    • The sound of the kart's engine becomes higher pitched as it is upgraded.

Memory Card Notices

  • There is no background box surrounding the warning messages screens.
Aug 14 Final
...DATA ON CARD IS OUT OF DATE... ...DATA ON MEMORY CARD IS OUT OF DATE...
WRITING TO CARD...
DO NOT REMOVE THE CARD!
SAVING TO MEMORY CARD...
DO NOT REMOVE
THE MEMORY CARD!
DELETING GAME SLOT...
DO NOT REMOVE
THE MEMORY CARD!
WARNING:
There is no card in slot 1.
Please insert a card.

Press X to continue
without saving.
WARNING:
THERE IS NO MEMORY CARD
IN MEMORY CARD SLOT 1.
PLEASE INSERT A MEMORY CARD.

PRESS ✕ TO CONTINUE
WITHOUT SAVING.
WARNING:
There is no card in slot 1.
Please insert a card.
WARNING:
THERE IS NO MEMORY CARD
IN MEMORY CARD SLOT 1.
PLEASE INSERT A MEMORY CARD.
UNFORMATTED
The card in slot 1
is unformatted
Press X to format.
WARNING:
THE MEMORY CARD IN
MEMORY CARD SLOT 1
IS UNFORMATTED
PRESS ◯ TO FORMAT.
OR △ TO RETURN.
WARNING:
The card in slot 1 is full.
Please insert a card that
is not full or use the playstation
memory manager to delete some
data on this card.
WARNING:
THE MEMORY CARD IN
MEMORY CARD SLOT 1 IS FULL.
PLEASE INSERT A MEMORY CARD THAT
HAS AT LEAST 2 BLOCKS FREE OR
USE THE CONSOLE'S INTERNAL
MEMORY CARD MANAGER TO DELETE
SOME BLOCKS ON THIS MEMORY CARD.
ERROR:
Something is wrong with
the card in slot 1.
Please insert another card
or use the playstation
memory manager to delete
the data on the card.
ERROR:
AN ERROR HAS OCCURED WHILE READING
THE MEMORY CARD.

PRESS ✕ TO CONTINUE
PRESS △ TO RETURN.
NO DATA
THERE IS NO CTR DATA
ON THIS CARD.

PLEASE INSERT ANOTHER CARD.
NO DATA
THERE IS NO CTR DATA
ON THIS MEMORY CARD.

PLEASE INSERT ANOTHER MEMORY CARD.
  • All warning instances call the memory card as just "card".
  • There is no proper message for when you delete a save slot. Instead, the generic "Writing to card" message is used.
  • Most of the text is written with lowercase letters, while in the final game all letters are capitalized. This does not affect how the text is displayed in-game, though.
  • In order to format the memory card, you have to press X instead of Circle.
  • The format and read error messages do not inform you about using Triangle to go back - which in this case, you have to press Square.
  • Messages use the letter X to represent the button instead of the actual icon.

Adventure Mode

  • The start point is located in Gem Stone Valley, meaning that the player was originally going to be able to navigate between areas in order to collect trophies, aiming for a more open exploration.
    • The player can initially access both N. Sanity Beach and The Lost Ruins areas, each one with two available tracks from the start (Crash Cove, Roo's Tubes, Coco Park, and Tiger Temple).
      • If the player starts in N. Sanity Beach, 4 trophies are required to unlock Sewer Speedway, however you can only get 3 in this area, forcing the player to access The Lost Ruins to continue progressing.
      • If the player starts in The Lost Ruins, 3 trophies are required to unlock Dingo Canyon, however you can only get 2 in this area, forcing the player to access N. Sanity Beach.
  • There are no cutscenes throughout the game.
  • Aku Aku's animations are recycled from the previous games where he gives hints to the player when he is freed in the Japanese releases.
    • The wooden mask textures are darker.
    • His teeth are not drawn properly.
    • He does not swing up and down while speaking.
  • When Aku Aku is showing up, a blury effect appears onscreen.
    • The smoke that appears when he shows up or goes away is multicolored.
  • Uka Uka is not present at this point. Instead, Aku Aku will also guide the player whenever an evil character is selected, although the pause menu will read "Uka Uka Hints" instead.
  • The minimap lacks a few details, such as the Load-Save Screen and the blinking waves from active warp pads and boss stars.
  • You can immediately access the side challenges of the race tracks after earning the trophy for them. In the final game, boss keys will be required once the trophy has been earned, which will only open the side challenges once the current area's boss has been defeated.
  • Aku Aku explains the "Hang Time Hint" after the second race, and the "TNT Hint" after the third one. The order was switched in the final game.
    • The CTR Challenge and Relic Race hints are also not explained throughout the game, despite these already existing in the files.
    • The "Using a Warp Pad" and "Map Information" are missing from the hints menu section.
  • The bottom notice that appears while Aku Aku is speaking is absent.
  • Spinning out on the World Maps will crash the game.
  • The Gem Stone Valley emblem has a trail of fire on the rocket.
Aug 14 Sep 3 Final
CTR-Aug14 WarpVortex.png CTR-Sep3 CheckeredVortex.png CTR-Final WarpVortex.png
  • Some warp pads are surrounded by a checkered pattern. This pattern was later updated in the September 3rd, 1999 build before being completely scrapped. According to Rob Titus, former Naughty Dog developer, this was removed because it didn't look so well.
    • Track pads that feature checkered patterns are Crash Cove, Sewer Speedway, Coco Park, Dingo Canyon, Dragon Mines, Blizzard Bluff (Polar Pass in the final), and Tiny Arena.
  • Warp pads have a straight shape with a bunch of sparkles coming out of it.
    • The sound effect when the player is close to it is absent.
    • No sound effect is made when the player enters the vortex either.
    • The floor has a lighter tone of blue.
    • Entering in mid-air will cause the characters to perform the big air jump animation.
    • The prizes floating inside do not shrink as the player moves away.
  • The checkered flag transition after entering a vortex or boss garage will freeze the screen.
  • Items floating above inactive warp pads flash black.
Aug 14 Final
CTR-Aug14 WarpParticles.png CTR-Final WarpParticles.png
  • Warping particles emit a blue smoke that emerges out of the vortex. The final game changed it to a shining light.
  • The blue CTR Token has a cyan tone, just like its gem counterpart.
  • The music will turn off when accessing the Load-Save Screen.
    • There is no scanlines sound effect.
    • The file save title reads "Choose a slot to save to" instead of "Choose a memory card slot to save to".
    • The cursor does not automatically highlight the Exit option when returning to the main screen.
  • The controls are unlocked during the item inventory animation. The inventory also automatically adds up the earned prize after the race, rather than increasing the value after the prize goes to the HUD.
    • Similar to the other prizes, boss keys are also added to the key counter after a boss race. This was likely removed as a result of being deemed redundant, as the bosses congratulate you themselves in an in-game cutscene in the final game.
  • Percentage values are mostly different:
Aug 14 Final
Trophy 1% 2%
CTR Token 1% 1%
Relic 2% 2%
Bonus Round 2% 1%
Gem 2% 1%
Boss Key 2% 1%
N. Oxide's Challenge 1% 2%
N. Oxide's Final Challenge N/A 1%
All Gold/Platinum Relics 0% 1%
  • The map has flickering issues when pausing the game at certain spots.
  • No sound effect is made for opening and closing a boss garage.
  • There is also no proper sound effects when opening a new door.
  • Pinstripe's garage uses his full name.
  • You get up to 5 keys due to N. Oxide's Challenge giving you another key, rather than just displaying a unique star graphic in your inventory. This turns out to be meaningless, since there are no doors or boss garages left that require more than 4 keys.
  • Pressing Square in the Choose Race Type sub-menu will always load Trophy Race, regardless of the highlighted option. In the final game, this button has no effect.
    • After completing the game, whenever you enter a warp pad, the Trophy Race will remain highlighted by default, whereas in the final game the Relic Race is highlighted.
  • The maximum completion percentage you can achieve is 94%. Getting all the Gold or Platinum relics won't increase the percentage by 1%, and there is no N. Oxide rematch after collecting all 18 relics (although the title string and the code to detect if he was beaten twice are already present).
    • Hot Air Skyway normally crashes in Relic Race mode due to attempting to allocate over 2MB of RAM.
  • It is impossible to unlock Skull Rock, Slide Coliseum and Turbo Track without hacking, as the game wasn't programmed to make them available after collecting the level prizes.
  • Starting or loading an Adventure profile after having accessed it once will cause the minimap and the powerslide bar to disappear. This can be fixed by pausing and unpausing the game, or after Aku Aku goes away.
  • If you load a 0% save, quit before Aku Aku appears to greet you, then re-enter the save file, the player will be softlocked by not being able to pause the game, access the Load-Save Screen, and Aku Aku will no longer show up.
    • Alternatively, re-entering a more complete save file may have different side effects. If the player has enough keys to open a door and does so while this glitch is triggered, the low poly version of Aku Aku will show up during the door cutscene to greet you. While this is happening, you will be able to control the character while Aku Aku is talking, and you will be able to pause the game again after Aku Aku goes away. Entering a new area while Aku Aku is present will despawn him.
  • Adventure mode doesn't save the unlocked characters once you've beaten the Gem Cups. You will need to either save a Relic Race or Time Trial score while either of them is unlocked in order to keep them permanently available, otherwise you will need to replay the Gem Cups every time the game is booted in order to unlock them.
    • However, if you saved the Adventure data with the Gem Cups already beaten, but didn't save a high score, you won't be able to unlock the characters again unless you clear the entire save data and start over.
  • There is no credits sequence at this stage, so beating N. Oxide will simply return to the World Map instead.
  • It is impossible to unlock Skull Rock, Slide Coliseum and Turbo Track without hacking, as the game wasn't programmed to make them available after collecting the level prizes.
    • Therefore, the unlock requirement for Skull Rock is unknown.
  • The game will crash if you go out of bounds in the World Maps.
  • Loading a save file in N. Sanity Beach, The Lost Ruins, and Glacier Park can spawn the player at different placements every time the file is loaded. In the final game, the spawn point is always fixed in one spot.

Progression

The number of trophies required to unlock the racetracks throughout the game was vastly different due to the unrestricted exploration across the hubs. This setup allowed the player to collect trophies without following a specific order, where you could even unlock other areas earlier and collect enough trophies to defeat the boss before even beating the previous hubs.

Area Level Aug 14 Requirements Final Requirements
N. Sanity Beach Crash Cove - -
Roo's Tubes - -
Mystery Caves 1 Trophy 1 Trophy
Sewer Speedway 4 Trophies 3 Trophies
Skull Rock 1 Key 1 Key
The Lost Ruins Coco Park - 1 Key + 4 Trophies
Tiger Temple - 1 Key + 4 Trophies
Papu's Pyramid 7 Trophies 1 Key + 6 Trophies
Dingo Canyon 3 Trophies 1 Key + 7 Trophies
Rampage Ruins 2 Keys 2 Keys
Glacier Park Blizzard Bluff 1 Key + 5 Trophies 2 Keys + 8 Trophies
Dragon Mines 1 Key + 7 Trophies 2 Keys + 9 Trophies
Polar Pass 1 Key + 9 Trophies 2 Keys + 10 Trophies
Tiny Arena 1 Key + 11 Trophies 2 Keys + 11 Trophies
Rocky Road 3 Keys 3 Keys
Citadel City N. Gin Labs 2 Keys + 14 Trophies 3 Keys + 12 Trophies
Cortex Castle 2 Keys + 10 Trophies 3 Keys + 12 Trophies
Hot Air Skyway 2 Keys + 12 Trophies 3 Keys + 14 Trophies
Oxide Station 2 Keys + 14 Trophies 3 Keys + 15 Trophies
Nitro Court 4 Keys 4 Keys
Gem Stone Valley Slide Coliseum 10 Relics 1 Key + 10 Relics
Turbo Track 15 Relics 1 Key + 5 Gems
  • Glacier Park requires 1 key to open, instead of 2.
  • Citadel City requires 2 keys to open, instead of 3.
  • The requirement to unlock Turbo Track is 15 relics, instead of 5 gems.

Inventory Menu

Aug 14 Final
CTR-Aug14 AdventurePauseMenu.png CTR-Final AdventurePauseMenu.png
  • The "PAUSED" text is present here.
  • Pressing Up while hovering over the Resume option will take you to the Quit option, rather than Options.
  • The menu box and the gems are bigger in the final game. Level names also use the small font instead of the default one.
  • Gems are placed one after the other, instead of being in a zigzag.
  • Uncollected relics, tokens, and gems models are displayed in the "default" non-shaded forms.
  • It doesn't change automatically according to the current area you are.
  • The directional arrows next to the titles are missing.
  • There is no transition between screens.
  • CTR Tokens are still called "CTR Coins" here, despite "token" already being referenced in-game by Aku Aku.
  • Switching too quickly between the hints can freeze Aku Aku's expressions.
  • The highlighted Aku Aku hint option will be memorized even after you leave Adventure mode and re-enter it again.
  • Bonus Round arenas have wrong token slots assigned in the menu. Earning the purple token in Nitro Court will erroneously fill the Rocky Road slot, which fills the Rampage Ruins slot, which fills the Skull Rock slot, which fills nothing. That causes the Nitro Court slot to always be empty.
  • When beating a boss, the earned key will be added in the wrong key slots: defeating Ripper Roo will add the key to N. Oxide's key slot, Papu Papu will add to Ripper Roo's, Komodo Joe will add to Papu Papu's, Pinstripe will add to Komodo Joe's, and Nitros Oxide will add to Pinstripe's.

World Maps

In the area transition segments, there is no back-face culling, so you can see the other sides of walls.

Gem Stone Valley

  • The rocky scenery on the right side of Oxide's Spaceship is taller.
  • The concrete fence around Oxide's Spaceship area is further away.
  • The sky background behind Oxide's Spaceship has clouds like the rest of the map. These were removed in the final game.
  • Oxide's Spaceship is less detailed around the boss garage area.
  • There are no invisible walls around the concrete fences of the boss garage entrance. Therefore, it's possible to go out of bounds by jumping with enough speed.
Aug 14 Final
CTR-Aug14 GemCupsDoor.png CTR-Final GemCupsDoor.png
  • There is no door for the Gem Cups area.
Aug 14 Final
CTR-Aug14 TheLostRuinsEntrance.png CTR Removed Sign Final.png
  • The entrance for The Lost Ruins was completely reworked.
Aug 14 Final
384px CTR-Final OxideGarage.png
  • The ship textures inside Oxide's garage are missing.
  • The floor textures have a beige-ish color inside the garage area.
  • N. Sanity Beach emblem is represented by a 3D model of a Sun in a silver frame, rather than a drawning of palmtree with a Sun.

N. Sanity Beach

  • Sewer Speedway's decoration pipes have a dark tone.
Aug 14 Final
CTR-Aug14 NSanityBeachDoor.png CTR-Final NSanityBeachDoor.png
  • There is no door linking Gem Stone Valley to N. Sanity Beach.
  • A tiki head statue was removed from the sea background next to the Crash Cove warp pad.
Aug 14 Final
CTR-Aug14 ExtraBridge.png CTR-Final ExtraBridge.png
  • There is an additional extension on the dock leading to Roo's Tubes. This remained on the map in the final game.
  • There are two palmtrees instead of one next to the level's dock.

The Lost Ruins

  • Some grass textures over the stone walls are missing.
  • A direction sign pointing to Papu's Pyramid is missing.
  • The shadow under the trees are missing.
  • It's possible to go out of bounds by jumping with enough speed on the right side of the scenery, located in the right ramp, next to the load/save monitor.

Glacier Park

  • Polar Pass and Blizzard Bluff warp pads are swapped.
  • The color of the Dragon Mines warp pad is red instead of blue.
  • The podium scene and the player spawn are both facing in the opposite direction of the boss garage.

Citadel City

  • Pinstripe's garage uses his full name.
  • The chandeliers in the Cortex Castle area have different textures.
Aug 14 Final
CTR-Aug14 CitadelCityNitroCourt.png CTR-Final CitadelCityNitroCourt.png
  • Floor textures are used to cover the area around the Nitro Court warp pad.
    • The ceiling above the warp pad was removed in the final game.
  • There is no invisible wall over the concrete fences of the N. Gin Labs area and the spiral ramp, making it possible to get out of bounds by jumping with enough speed.

Podium

  • There are no grunts or sound effects during the podium celebration.
  • Defeat poses are just a copy of the first frame of the victory animations. Cortex and N. Oxide are the only characters to feature a unique defeat pose at this point (although Oxide's one isn't even animated properly).
  • There are no victory fanfares. Instead, the current area theme plays all the time.
  • Ami does the wagging finger animation instead of the hand-waving one.
  • Megumi lacks her umbrella.
  • Liz's color scheme is purple and white, instead of purple and green.
  • Cortex uses his model from the previous game. His facial textures lacks shading and are way less detailed, his hair is brown instead of dark blue, and the "N" on his head is larger.
    • Cortex doesn't whine in his defeat pose. He'll just shake his head instead.
  • N. Gin's model is unfinished.
  • Dingodile's paws are red.
  • N. Tropy isn't holding his gigant tuning fork.
  • Penta Penguin lacks a podium model for victory or defeat poses.
  • N. Oxide's defeat pose animation wasn't even started at this point. His legs also clip through the floor.

Boss Challenges

  • There is no boss race theme.
  • The player and the boss start at 2nd and 3rd positions, respectively. That was probably a design choice that didn't work properly, as the character icons start at the wrong positions, and the race results adds two more P1 icons to the rankings.
    • Replaying a boss race won't show extra icons in the race results.
  • Bosses do not drop their arsenal of infinite weapons. Instead, they just act as a regular opponent and use random items.
  • Invincibility Mask, Warp Orb and N. Tropy Clock power-ups are available by default during the boss races. In the final game, these weapons will only appear as part of the dynamic difficulty adjustment system, as when the player starts losing the race multiple times.
  • After beating Ripper Roo, the player will spawn in front of his garage, rather than warping in front of Gem Stone Valley's entrance.
  • After beating Pinstripe, the player will spawn in front of his garage, rather than warping in front of N. Oxide's garage.
  • N. Oxide doesn't start before the green light.
    • Attacking him using any weapons will bounce him up and down like a regular opponent. In the final game, he will always spin around in circles when hit by most types of weapons - with the exception of Power Shields and Invincibility Masks.

CTR Challenge

  • Picking up a letter shares the same "slurp" sound effect when collecting a Wumpa fruit.
Aug 14 Final
CTR-Aug14 TokenAwarded.png CTR-Final TokenAwarded.png
  • The token message is shown along with the race results.
  • When pressing X to continue, the letters and the token will reappear onscreen for a brief second while the checkered flag appears to cover the screen.

Relic Race

Blank.png
Time Crates Locations
Some crates are placed in very hard locations.
  • Gold and Platinum times are placeholders, usually 5 and 10 seconds less than Sapphire times, respectively.
    • Coco Park and Tiny Arena, however, are still using older relic time placeholders.
  • There is no time crate counter during the race.
  • You cannot save your score if the clock passes 3:00:00, even if subtracting the final time by 10 seconds with a Perfect bonus.
Aug 14 Final
CTR-Aug14-RelicRace.png CTR-Final RelicRace.png
  • Platinum relic has been changed from grey to white.
    • The Platinum font has white shading on the left side of the characters.
  • The relic obtained at the end of the race appears very small in the top right corner next to the relic time requirement, and will enlarge once the time is beaten.
    • There is no sound effect during the time subtraction.
    • "Relic Awarded" and "New High Score" messages lack an exclamation mark - notably, the British English text in the PAL version removes it as well.
    • The time crate counter is slightly offcenter.
  • The results screen displays the same relic time as the in-race HUD, rather than using the actual time of the relic tier you earned, resulting in the requirement being displayed incorrectly onscreen if the tiers are different.
  • The confirm button on the Enter Your Name screen reads "Save" instead of "Save High Score". The menu can be also skipped using the Square button.
  • Regardless of the relic you get, the podium and inventory add up animation always display the Sapphire relic.
  • When pressing X to continue, the relic and total times will reappear onscreen for a brief second while the checkered flag appears to cover the screen.
Level Aug 14 Final Aug 14 Final
Crash Cove 1:12:00
1:07:00
1:02:00
1:17:00
1:05:00
0:52:00
30 boxes 32 boxes
Roo's Tubes 1:10:00
1:05:00
1:00:00
1:15:00
1:05:00
0:55:00
32 boxes 32 boxes
Mystery Caves 1:50:00
1:45:00
1:40:00
1:55:00
1:44:00
1:32:00
40 boxes 40 boxes
Sewer Speedway 1:28:00
1:23:00
1:18:00
1:33:00
1:05:00
0:37:00
65 boxes 65 boxes
Coco Park 2:21:00
2:11:00
1:51:00
1:35:00
1:12:00
0:49:00
40 boxes* 40 boxes
Tiger Temple 1:15:00
1:10:00
1:05:00
1:20:00
1:02:00
0:43:00
52 boxes 52 boxes
Papu's Pyramid 1:24:00
1:19:00
1:14:00
1:34:00
1:09:00
0:42:00
48 boxes 48 boxes
Dingo Canyon 1:20:00
1:15:00
1:10:00
1:25:00
1:09:00
0:53:00
38 boxes 38 boxes
Blizzard Bluff 1:25:00
1:20:00
1:15:00
1:30:00
1:08:00
0:43:00
36 boxes* 40 boxes
Dragon Mines 1:23:00
1:18:00
1:13:00
1:28:00
1:11:00
0:54:00
39 boxes 39 boxes
Polar Pass 2:55:00
2:50:00
2:45:00
3:00:00
2:33:00
2:05:00
38 boxes 38 boxes
Tiny Arena 2:20:00
2:10:00
1:50:00
3:45:00
3:22:00
2:58:00
57 boxes 60 boxes
N. Gin Labs 2:10:00
2:05:00
2:00:00
2:15:00
1:34:00
0:53:00
70 boxes 70 boxes
Cortex Castle 2:30:00
2:25:00
2:20:00
2:35:00
2:04:00
1:32:00
62 boxes 62 boxes
Hot Air Skyway 3:00:00
2:55:00
2:50:00
3:05:00
2:34:00
2:02:00
60 boxes 56 boxes
Oxide Station 3:12:00
3:07:00
3:02:00
3:17:00
2:56:00
2:34:00
47 boxes* 49 boxes
Slide Coliseum 1:50:00
1:45:00
1:40:00
1:55:00
1:45:00
1:40:00
45 boxes 45 boxes
Turbo Track 1:40:00
1:35:00
1:30:00
1:45:00
1:32:00
1:19:00
52 boxes* 52 boxes
  • In Coco Park, the box counter says there are 40 boxes on the track, however only 38 are possible to collect due to two misplaced invisible crate pointers at the beginning of the track that can be triggered when passing through - which will break two existing time crates further behind.
  • In Blizzard Bluff, the box counter says there are 36 boxes on the track, however only 34 are possible to collect. Two time crates are misplaced under the floor before the hut.
  • In Oxide Station, the box counter says there are 47 boxes on the track, however only 45 are possible to collect. Two time crates are misplaced under the floor in the first ramp section, which is a leftover of an earlier level layout that originally featured a split-path leading to four tubes.
  • In Turbo Track, the box counter says there are 52 boxes on the track, however only 51 are possible to collect. A time crate is misplaced under the floor in the final set of time crates.

Bonus Round

  • The race intro jingle is enabled during the countdown.
  • The kart doesn't brake instantly after the challenge ends.
  • The time limits are different in some arenas.
Time limit Aug 14 Final
Skull Rock 1:15:00 1:23:00
Rocky Road 1:15:00 1:20:00
  • In Rocky Road, there are two regular boxes inside two specific Nitro crates in the bottom edges, so using a Bowling Bomb to explode it, you can receive free crystals ranging from 5 to 8, acting just like Wumpa crates.

Gem Cups

  • The position number suffix and total time will reappear onscreen for a brief second while the checkered flag appears to cover the screen.
  • The podium shows the winners of the final race, instead of the total cup standings. This means that if you lose the final race but still win on score, the character who won that race will appear in first place on the podium instead, but you will still earn the gem.
  • Leaving a cup before finishing it and then re-entering the same cup or another one will keep the points accumulated.
  • Leaving a cup while the race intro is present will make the track name change to a different string for a brief second. The result will vary depending on the cup.
    • Red Gem Cup - Slide Coliseum
    • Green Gem Cup - Paused
    • Blue Gem Cup - Blank string
    • Yellow Gem Cup - Paused
    • Purple Gem Cup - Paused
  • In Purple Gem Cup, the RNG percentage is not set properly, as you can receive Invincibility Masks, Warp Orbs, Triple Bowling Bombs and Tracking Missiles, and Clocks even if in first or second place.
Cup Aug 14 Final
Red Gem Cup Crash Cove
Mystery Caves
Blizzard Bluff
Papu's Pyramid
Crash Cove
Mystery Caves
Papu's Pyramid
Blizzard Bluff
Blue Gem Cup Tiger Temple
Sewer Speedway
Dragon Mines
N. Gin Labs
Sewer Speedway
Tiger Temple
Dragon Mines
N. Gin Labs
  • The track order is based on the old trophy requirements order, which also applies to the level select menu order. In the final game, it's based on the area order.

Track Differences

Crash Cove

Aug 14 Final
CTR-Aug14 CrashCoveGround.png CTR-Final CrashCoveGround.png

There is a low relief around the first set of crates area. It's also noticeable since the second crate is lower compared to the others.

Roo's Tubes

Aug 14 Final
CTR-Aug5 RoosTubesMushrooms.png CTR-Final RoosTubesMushrooms.png

These two mushrooms on the left side of the skeleton arch were removed in the final game.

Mistery Caves

  • The turbo pad in the downhill decent leading to the split-path is missing in the 3+ players version of the track.

Sewer Speedway

  • There are no boost flags on the ground at the edge of the pit after the turbo pads.
  • The giant pipeline on the right side of the scenery lacks collision.
  • The track has rendering issues in Time Trial and Relic Race modes.

Coco Park

  • The pond has no ground floor collision in 3+ player mode, causing the player to fall straight into the void.
  • In 3+ player mode, there is an odd bug where a grass tile near the stadium floats over another player's screen if that object is rendered on a different screen. The P1 shows on P2's screen, P2 shows on P3's screen, and P3 shows on P4's screen.

Tiger Temple

  • The temple door cannot be opened by running into with an Invincibility Mask or by throwing Beakers.
  • The right chunk of a temple's wall texture in the scenery at the start of the level is missing in the final game, but is present in the prototype.

Dragon Mines

  • There are no Wumpa crates at all, making it impossible to juice up weapons on this track.
CTR-Aug5 DragonMinesMinecart.png
  • The first two minecarts that roll on the rail above the start of the level move upside down. This glitch happens every time the track is loaded for the first time.

Polar Pass

Aug 14 Final
CTR-Aug5 PolarPassSign.png CTR-Final PolarPassSign.png
  • The three yellow signs in the walls are missing.
Aug 14 Final
CTR-Aug5 PolarPassTurboPads.png CTR-Final PolarPassTurboPads.png
  • The third iceberg at the end of the horseshoe-shaped section is a smaller one containing one turbo pad instead of a bigger variant with two turbo pads.
  • The track has rendering issues in Time Trial and Relic Race modes.
  • Leaving the track or retrying it after completing all laps in Time Trial mode will crash the game.

Tiny Arena

Aug 14 Final
CTR-Aug5 TinyArenaTurboPads.png CTR-Final TinyArenaTurboPads.png

A trio of turbo pads is missing at the end of the track.

Cortex Castle

Signposts don't have collision.

N. Gin Labs

Aug 14 Final
CTR-Aug5 N.GinLabsGizmos.png CTR Final N.Gin Labs Gizmos.png
  • Yellow laboratory structures in the scenery before the barrel section are not present in the final game, although they can still be seen in the track preview video.
  • There are three directional arrows in the bridge instead of two.
  • In 3+ player mode, the track's textures are messed up, possibly because certain mipmap levels for certain textures are not written, or overwritten.

Hot Air Skyway

Aug 14 Final
CTR-Aug14 HotAirBanner.png CTR Final HotAirBanner.png
  • The start banner is placed at the wrong position.
  • A Wumpa crate is missing in the first curve at the beginning of the level. Instead, there are two single Wumpa fruits on each side of the road.
  • There are Wumpa fruits spread around the spiral section.
  • If you fall down during the big jump, the fall lasts a lot longer until you hit the out of bounds boundary and the mask comes to rescue you.
  • There is a row of four Wumpa fruits after the Wumpa crate is located.
  • There are two more Wumpa fruits afterwards, on each side of the road before the straight section.

Oxide Station

  • There are no cinematic camera angles programmed, so the camera will simply rotate around the character after the race is over.
Aug 14 Final
CTR-Aug5 OxideStation2.png CTR-Final OxideStation2.png
  • The brown domed roof is missing at the entrance leading to the S-curve tunnel.
Aug 14 Final
CTR-Aug5 OxideStation3.png CTR-Final OxideStation3.png
  • An invisible floor was added under the first ramp, preventing the player from falling to the bottom of the scenery.
  • Occasionally, the turbo pad may not give enough speed, causing the player to not be able to reach the platform and fall off the track.
    • Sometimes CPU racers are also unable to successfully reach the other side.
Aug 14 Final
CTR-Aug5 OxideStation.png CTR-Final OxideStation.png
  • The tunnel leading to the big fall is entirely covered in turbo pads.
  • The AI paths used in Time Trial and Relic Race modes when the player turns into a CPU after the race ends do not work properly:
    • The CPU is not able to gain enough speed to cross over the first ramp, causing the character to go out of bounds, before teleporting back to the track after falling for a few seconds.
      • However, if the CPU takes the left path, the character will instead go too far to the left side of the ramp each time they pass, causing the character to miss the turbo pad and get stuck in a loop forever.
    • If the CPU takes the middle path, the character will start respawning indefinitely upon reaching the sharp right turn after the large drop down.

Slide Coliseum

  • There is a big screen object suspended in mid-air in the middle of the track.
  • One of the AI paths is not set properly, causing some of them to go towards the wall and keep going out of bounds forever before the penultimate left curve.
CTR-Aug14 SlideColiseumGlitch.png
  • The lap counter checkpoint is misplaced, causing it to trigger slightly before crossing the finish line.

Turbo Track

  • Turbo pads are static, lacking the scroll animation.
CTR-Aug14 TurboTrackMisplacedCrate.png
  • The first Wumpa crate is misplaced in mid-air.
  • There are no cinematic camera angles programmed, so the camera will simply rotate around the character after the race is over.
    • In Time Trial and Relic Race modes, the game crashes when crossing the finish line due to a thread being given an invalid pointer.

Arena Differences

  • All arenas use Lab Basement's theme as a placeholder.
  • There are no AI paths programmed in any of the arenas, thus the player always stops moving after the battle is over. In the final NTSC-U version, only Nitro Court has no paths.

Nitro Court

? crates behind player 1 and player 2's spawn positions are duplicated. Hitting it automatically breaks both crates, but throwing a Bowling Bomb or Tracking Missile at them will break just one instead.

Soundtrack Differences

The following themes have a cut extension at the end of the track. These segments were present in the original pre-console versions.

Level Aug 14 Final
Mystery Caves
Tiger Temple
Polar Pass
Tiny Arena
Hot Air Skyway
Oxide Station

Unused Content

Unused Text

CONTROLLER 1 IS UNPLUGGED!
CONTROLLER 2 IS UNPLUGGED!
CONTROLLER 3 IS UNPLUGGED!
CONTROLLER 4 IS UNPLUGGED!
PLEASE INSERT A CONTROLLER

As there are no controller messages when a controller is unplugged, they went unused in this build. The numeration is also different, as in the final game the controllers are called 1A, 1B, 1C and 1D when plugged into the multitap.

UNLIMITED MODE

A High Score menu title related to a scrapped mode.

N.OXIDE'S FINAL CHALLENGE

Even though there was no Final Challenge at this point, the title string was already present - albeit missing a space on N. Oxide's name.

CTR CHALLENGE
Collect the letters C, T, and R on each track and come in first place to win a CTR Token.  Beware, some letters are hard to find!
RELIC RACE
Get the lowest time you can by racing fast and breaking time crates.  Each time crate you break will freeze the clock.  If you achieve a low enough time, you will be awarded a relic.

These Adventure mode strings are stored along with other hint texts, but aren't used along with their audio counterparts. Both are used in the final game. The texts are also using lowercase letters, while in the final game all letters are capitalized. This doesn't affect how the strings are displayed in-game, though.

Early Japanese Translation

A primitive Japanese localization is present in the files. It contains only a few translated strings related to race HUD, pause menu, and controller port messages, which are leftovers strings used in the old Japanese demo version.

Original Aug 14 Final
PAUSED ポ-ズ Same as final
RESTART やりなおす もういちど はじめる
RESUME もどる Same as final
QUIT やめる タイトルがめんに もどる
TIME タイム Same as final
Timing Out - Exiting Demo いっていじかん
そうさがないので
ゲ-ムをおわります
いっていじかん にゅうりょくがないので
デモに もどります
LAP ラップ Same as final
ST ばん Same as final
ND ばん Same as final
RD ばん Same as final
TH ばん Same as final
WRONG WAY! ぎゃくそう むきが はんたいだよ!
FINISHED! ゴ-ル! Same as final
CONTROLLER 1 IS UNPLUGGED!
CONTROLLER 2 IS UNPLUGGED!
CONTROLLER 3 IS UNPLUGGED!
CONTROLLER 4 IS UNPLUGGED!
1Pコントロ-ラが ぬけているよ
コントロ-ラ2が ぬけているよ
コントロ-ラ3が ぬけているよ
コントロ-ラ4が ぬけているよ
コントロ-ラ1が ぬけています
コントロ-ラ2が ぬけています
コントロ-ラ1-Aが ぬけています
コントロ-ラ1-Bが ぬけています
コントロ-ラ1-Cが ぬけています
コントロ-ラ1-Dが ぬけています
PLEASE INSERT A CONTROLLER コントロ-ラをつないでね コントロ-ラを つなげてください

Unused Coco's Head

Coco Park features a hidden head model of Coco Bandicoot floating in the sky next to the finish line. It cannot normally be seen due to a thread that makes it invisible, but it can be drawn again by replacing the third array set 8F 00 00 08 to 0F 00 00 00.

It is unclear what was the purpose behind this, although it is speculated that it may have been intended to appear exclusively in the Japanese version, as it can be seen briefly in a Japanese pre-release trailer. The model itself still exists in the final game, although the head is not placed in the sky anymore.

Early Intro Cutscene

Even though there are no cutscenes through this build, unused data for a primitive version of the intro cutscene exists and reveals a plenty of changes. The tracks and sceneries are mostly unfinished:

  • The initial scene in Coco Park lacks the alien speakers from Oxide, and the three racers running around. The road stripes are missing, and the turbo pad is still present.
  • The Oxide's spaceship initial scene features a different camera angle which flyes over his spaceship. In the inside the ship scene, Oxide is missing.
  • Coco's scene features a different camera angle. The scenery lacks Pura and many details, like vegetation, trees, and the jungle background.
  • A very long unique road using Dingo Canyon's assets can be seen where the actual level would take place in the final game.
  • Tiny and his kart are absent, and his scenery is completely empty, lacking details like vines, dumbbells, his trident and crates.
  • Another unique road using Coco Park's assets can be seen where Polar Pass would take place in the final game.
  • Polar is misplaced on his kart, and the scene features a different camera angle. The scenery lacks some details like icicles, more crystal clusters, ice reflection and Penta Penguin's easter egg.
  • Dingodile lacks animations, and his scenery is completely empty and smaller, with a simpler shading, lacking the rail, minecart, lamps and gas tanks.
  • There is no Hot Air Skyway scene, it shows a black screen instead.
  • Cortex's scene lacks himself, and the scenery is completely empty except for the different ray gun model and the kart.
  • There is no Sewer Speedway scene.
  • Crash's scene is mostly the same, except for the rendering issues.

Oddities

Internal Track Names

Internal names for Coco Park and Tiny Arena are called coco1 and arena2, respectively. Oddly, these names were eventually reverted back to asphalt1 and asphalt2, which sound less accurate to the themes of the tracks, especially for Tiny Arena.

Game Version

The memory card header contains a version number, which is set to 10.

Save Information

The information stored on a memory card when saving the game differs in this version compared to the final release.

  • The hand icon is a sample memory card icon from an Psy-Q library.
  • The title of the ghost replay data contains an additional period before the track's name.
  • Character names share the same string array used in the character select screens. In the final game, the separate array of characters names for High Score is also used for the ghost data, featuring proper name abbreviations.
Info Aug 14 Final
Save icon CTR-Aug5 SaveIcon.gif CTR-Final SaveIcon.png CTR-Final SaveIconGhostData.png
Title CTR Saved Games and Scores CTR:Saved Games and Scores
Product Code SCUS-12345 SCUS-94426

Dongle's Internal Name

This build is dongle protected with the use of a memory card dongle, so attempting to run it via normal means won't boot the game. It seems this dongle was made specifically for E3 demo but was later reused in subsequent builds.

E3 dongle Copyright 1999 Naughty Dog, Inc.