Crash Team Rumble Review

After a few hours of unlocking characters and abilities, Crash Team Rumble turns into a good game. Out of the box, Crash Team Rumble suffers from a lack of viable characters and useful skills, which is a problem your opponents won’t have. Certainly, it is not the only brawler on the market that locks some characters behind the effort, but it does seem rather extreme to lock most of the characters out upfront. That said, if you are willing to put in the effort you will find the experience rewarding… eventually.

Crash Team Rumble is an arena brawler which borrows ideas from several other popular games and mashes them up into an entertaining package. Like Nintendo’s Splatoon the objective of Crash Team Rumble isn’t primarily to beat up the opposing team. Instead, you are tasked with collecting fruit and bringing them back to your team’s base, and everything else spirals out from there. Crash Team Rumble has many other tasks you can do that will either help your team or hinder your opponents. For instance, there are pads that activate on the field and if you turn all of them to your team’s color then you receive bonuses.

You can also lay traps at your opponent’s base to make things harder, or simply just go up and hit them a lot and try to defeat them. There are character classes for each of the different tasks, but you aren’t strictly locked into that role, and you will want to assist in as many different ways as possible. As with many good objective-based team games, you can find a role that suits you and stick with it. On the other hand, sometimes you will get teammates who just want a good brawl and will ignore the objectives completely, though that is hardly unique to Crash Team Rumble.

As good as the team and role balance is, the game does suffer in several ways. Most notably, there is a distinct hierarchy to the characters, and some are just objectively better than others. The difference is big enough that you may very well be locked out of your favorite character since doing so would put your team at a disadvantage. With such a small starting roster, this is particularly egregious. It also means you need to spend a lot of effort unlocking characters early in the game so you aren’t a hindrance. Your powers, which are not tied to a specific character, have the same problem. Some are distinctly better than others, and you will have to spend time unlocking the best ones.

One of Crash Team Rumble‘s biggest strengths is its map designs. The arenas are compact without feeling crowded, feature many different ways to get around, and give everything a sense of urgency. There is very little time wasted trying to get back into the action because the action is basically everywhere. Even if you do find yourself somehow alone on part of a map, there is always something for you to do that can give your team an advantage in some way or another. A lot of thought and planning went into these maps, and I hope future maps will be given the same amount of attention.

The game itself plays smoothly and with few issues. The only problem I had in this regard was that the characters feel a bit like they’re skating rather than running at times, but aside from that everything feels tight. Each character feels unique in how they play and control, and any given player should be able to find a few different characters they can switch between and enjoy. The music and sounds come straight from the Crash games you already love, so there shouldn’t be any issues there. I will admit I did find the music distracting at times, though, and turned it down to the lowest audible volume eventually. That’s not the fault of the music but rather indicates how much concentration I needed to put into the game at times.

Crash Team Rumble Review Final Thoughts:

Crash Team Rumble takes some effort to get to where it is a good game, but those willing to do so will find something they can play for a long time. The bigger question is how the long-term support for the game will go. Will the community stay vibrant, or will it fall off? I didn’t have any trouble finding games in matchmaking but am concerned it may be at risk of falling off due to all the other video games we’re getting later this year. Some of this will also depend on Activision’s continued support for the game. Will we get more map packs and characters? Or will it remain as it is now?

The game does feature a seasonal battle pass, which does at least indicate that Activision likely plans to put weight behind the game, but we will have to wait and see what happens. Personally, I wouldn’t let that be much of a factor, though. Even if we only get a year’s worth of activity out of the game, I would consider it to be worth it. This is a solid team-based PvP game that distinguishes itself with its unique mashup of play styles. Just realize up-front that it will take some effort to get to the real meat of the game.