Crash Bash was one of my favourite multiplayer games when I was growing up. I remember vividly playing it with my family and friends, often in tears because I got pushed off an iceberg or unfairly ganged up on in many of the game's incredibly addictive party modes.
Now you can do just that without the need for a PlayStation 1, and you can jump into servers with friends or strangers, all thanks to this new unofficial browser port of Crash Bash called Crash Bash Online that works pretty damn well, and effortlessly too, requiring no downloads, no installs- just click and play. It also allows you to invite friends to your servers should they have good taste in games, like yourself.
This unofficial browser port lets you play Jungle Bash, Space Bash, Snow Bash, Polar Panic, Tilt Panic, Melt Panic, Pogo Painter, Pogo-a-Gogo, El Pogo Loco, Crashball, Beach Ball and N. Ballism in four-player rooms, with more on the way according to the developer, being the "Crash Bash App". The ARENA PASS is coming: four arenas, joining and watching stay free, and it opens the rest, private battles and no ads.
I do wonder how long this will stay live though, because typically with these unofficial ports you should not be monetising the IP at all, and it seems like there are ads which will be making this developer revenue off the back of copyrighted IP, alongside their plan to create an "Arena Pass" that sounds like it will cost money. So perhaps exploring it while you can for now is a good idea, though I do love seeing this stuff come to fruition; I just prefer them not breaking any copyright laws, for the primary reason I selfishly want them to stay alive.
I did sink about 30 - 45 minutes into the port, and you will have to wait for players to join the lobby and ready up to progress into a game. Though you will find servers with users AFK, meaning it will never go into a game due to the AFK person not readying up, so prepare yourself to have to leave and join a few servers before finding active players.
Once you're in, though, gameplay is pretty simple, with a neat UI that allows you to understand the controls a little more alongside the ability to send comments in the lobby, which I found useful when I was waiting for a player to ready up. The modes are nostalgic, and latency feels okay, alongside the visuals showing no odd artefacts or low framerates, which is the benefit of it being a port and not emulation. As of now, I am not sure if AI has been used to develop this, as I am waiting for the developer to respond to my messages, but i'll update this article should I hear back from them.
You can jump into Crash Bash Online today for free and experience it yourself. Development is quick, and four new maps were updated yesterday, so it's clear that people like what they are seeing and the developer is keeping it as fresh as possible!
