Review – Croc: Legend of The Gobbos

Booting up my Nintendo Switch to play Croc for the first time since I was a kid playing it on my PlayStation yielded largely the same results as it did in the ’90s. By World 3’s desert, I was dying repeatedly to seemingly endless pits, cursing out the lantern level and still coming to grips with its Tomb Raider-esque movement system. However, this is a testament to Argonaut Studios’ commitment to preservation rather than a complaint. 

While Croc: Legend of The Gobbos isn’t a lengthy or even truly difficult game, its approach to being a 3D collectathon platformer is distinct. The original Croc utilized a combination of tank controls and analog movement in a way that wasn’t really done before or since. For those of you keeping track at home, this is especially notable as Argonaut were the developers that helped Nintendo realize the ability to create 3D games. Thanks to their work on Star Fox and supposedly helping inspire Super Mario 64, Argonaut played a pivotal role in bringing about Nintendo’s mid-’90s evolution. In fact, this remake of Croc includes interviews with Argonaut regarding this very timeline. 

You can take a single look at Croc and tell it’s of its time. It checks all of the boxes for a family-friendly mid-’90s console game. Mascot-driven, 3D corridor-based platforming with collectibles and bosses. In fact, I always felt Croc was right at home on the PlayStation. The island-hopping world map and linear hallways reminded me of Crash Bandicoot while the colorful and fantastical 3D world, backtracking, collecting, surprisingly full sounding music, and exploration brought Spyro the Dragon to mind. Of course, that means Croc is right at home on the Nintendo Switch with not only the two aforementioned series’ being present but all of Croc’s obscure contemporaries like Glover, Rayman, and Bubsy accounted for as well. 

 

 

Croc is a four world affair with incentives to collect everything you see to unlock an additional world. The Gobbos, Croc’s furball chosen family, have been kidnapped by the giant frog(?) Baron Dante and put in cages throughout Croc’s world. In order to rescue the Gobbos, Croc will have to stomp boxes, collect keys to open cages, and make some tricky jumps. Boxes can hold Gobbos or gems, five of which are colored and hidden throughout each level. If you can find and collect all five, you’ll unlock the gem door at the end of the level which contains a puzzle to obtain the final Gobbo you need out of five. Bonus levels you gain access to via some cleverly hidden platforms grant you access to puzzle pieces that unlock the fifth world. This formula holds true throughout all worlds though the level concepts vary.

The grassy area you begin in holds volcanic caves underneath. You’ll slip and slide on ice without any skates. The desert sees you exploring the innards of ancient pyramids. Did I mention there’s a treacherous castle world? And it’s very Dr. Neo Cortex-adjacent? No, these aren’t original concepts but they are executed about as well as one could hope. At the end of each world, you’ll fight a boss and probably laugh. These bosses are not good and possibly some of the worst of any platformer ever. However, this was the standard for the genre. Platformers saw bosses as means to an end. At the very least, the boxing Ladybug you fight in a stylish boxing ring is very memorable. 

 

 

Needless to say, if you don’t like platforming and collecting this game won’t be your jam. Even if you do, this probably won’t be your favorite platformer either. What it is though, is cute, charming, and straightforward. It’s also a fantastic and faithful remake. This is not the Croc you grew up with if you don’t want it to be. Fully analog control with right stick camera control is here and it is a game-changer for this game. The redone graphics and solid frame rate work exceptionally well too. But if you simply want the same game from your childhood, with the press of a button you can revert to the original polygons and control pad tank movement at any time. I have to commend Argonaut for the in-game Crocipedia and museum too. It is some serious fan service, having descriptions and lore for every character and creature. The aforementioned interviews and concept art are some real buried treasure too. 

 

 

Has Croc aged well? Its rudimentary geometry of circular floating platforms and long straights with gaps certainly wouldn’t suggest so, but the game is better than it first appears. I had fun finding all of the collectibles, especially finding the puzzle pieces. I didn’t always love how much the stomp move slows down the pacing through each level, but it is a satisfying animation (that was definitely Yoshi at one point). Taking out enemies with a KER-SPLAT! tail whip still feels good. And I definitely vibed to the funky soundtrack. Hitting a gong at the end of each level remains a unique way to exit a level. These are just some of the positives I took away from revisiting the game after 20-something odd years. What’s more, is that it brought me back to a simpler time when platformers, and tiny single-fanged crocodiles, ruled the world. 

 

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