Crash Nitro Kart (PlayStation 2, GameCube, Xbox)

This page details pre-release information and/or media for Crash Nitro Kart (PlayStation 2, GameCube, Xbox).

To do: Add all the concept art that was released on Ferrago, notably including concepts for Velo, racetracks, and karts. web.archive.org/web/20031117121033/http://www.ferrago.com/image/1444/70

Concept Art#

Characters#

N. Gin#

This is very early concept art created by Duke Mighten from when the game was originally going to be developed by Traveller's Tales Oxford Studios.

Nina Cortex#

More concept art from the TT Oxford era of the game's development shows Nina Cortex, a character who was cut from the final game. After development was passed to Vicarious Visions, Nina's introduction was pushed to Twinsanity (which, ironically, was beaten by Purple's earlier release).

Slash Bandicoot#

This is the final piece of concept art released from the TT Oxford era of the game's development. Absolutely nothing is known about Slash Bandicoot outside of this image, whether he was some sort of skin for Crash or if he was a unique character.

Emperor Velo#

Emperor Velo's design went through several iterations during the game's development. According to Charles, Vicarious Visions gave him a lot of freedom to work on the character's design. The only reference was his name and his role. Charles put down everything that came to mind and experimented with different versions and styles until a direction was established.

The following sketches are dated around September 2002.

Vehicles#

Environments#

Earliest Screens#

Screenshots of the earliest build to be featured in official screenshots. Several differences and oddities can be found.

General Differences#

• The overall lighting is much darker.
• The strings TIME and LAP are missing from the HUD.
• The character icons are smaller and are low-res.
• Pura is never controlled by the CPU in the final game.
• The speedometer has a very different design. It also seems to go below zero and above the top speed.
• The exaust pipes are all golden and look different from any used in the final game. Smoke also doesn't come out of them.
• The anti-gravity knobs don't emit electricity.

Tiny Temple#

• The corkscrew has a stone texture instead of the final game's metallic one.

Early Alpha#

The second earliest known build of the game.

General Differences#

• There is no music.
• The start banner is missing.
• The anti-gravity knobs are emitting smoke instead of electricity.
• The skid marks look different.
• The CPU can re-use the same character as the player.
• Turbo pads are static.
• Zem's icon is very different.
• The item roulette sound effect is different.
• The lap completion sound effect was later used for the unlock messages.
• Cortex's model is smaller and his head is bigger.
• The Ice Mine icon is just a text written Freezing mine with a blue font.
• The Wumpa pickup sound effect is different.
• The player can receive 8 Wumpa fruits at once. In the final game, the max Wumpa per crate is 4.
• Dingodile, Polar, and Pura can be seen all racing in the same track. In the final game, no more than 2 CPU characters from the same team are allowed in races.
  • Again, Pura is never controlled by the CPU in the final game.
• The Power Shield's icon is blue despite the player only having 8 Wumpa fruits, instead of 10.
  • The icon is also the exact same one used in Crash Team Racing, meaning that some icons from that game were possibly used here as placeholders during development.
  • When used, the Power Shield looks slightly different and apparently harmless (or the Shield's hitbox hasn't been properly implemented yet).
• CPU racers can be seen using the Power Shield, something that never happens in the final game.
• The multiplayer HUD resembles the Crash Team Racing design.
• The graphics are corrupted in 2P Meteor Gorge, as noticed in the background, Tiny's icon inside the item slot for player 1, and a corrupted icon for player 2.
• Screenshots display 0 in the lap counter.

Meteor Gorge#

• The track has a completely different design in this build.

Thunder Struck#

• The waterfall on the right isn't present in the final game.
• There is no rainstorm motif on the track.

Mid-Speedometer Build#

Only some screenshots of this build can be found, all of them present from the back of the 128-bit cover of the game. They show an exclusive design of the speedometer that can't be seen in any other pre-release media of the game.

• There is an unused horizontal version of the speedometer here. The box art screenshots are the only ones to feature it.
• For some reason, there are only 2 character icons on the left, with the other 2 slots empty. So possibly, there was only one CPU racer on the race.

• Each player's screen has a different color at the edges.
• The HUD position in 4P multiplayer has a very similar layout to the Crash Team Racing one.
• The character icons, lap counter, item icons, Wumpa counter and the positions are larger.
• Cortex's model is smaller and his head is bigger.
• Crash has a different jumping animation.
• The karts are emitting smoke, which was disabled in the final game for multiplayer.

Development Gallery#

Images from a pre-release version of the game can be found at Andrey Trusov's portfolio, the level artist of the game. It's hard to say when these shots were taken, but the build looks fairly closer to the demo builds era. The most notable differences are the lack of shading, lap counter set to 0/0 and the early team frenzy feature.

• The crates are placed at the beginning of the level, rather than before the tunnel section.
• The lap counter says 0/0, which is impossible.

• The Voodoo Doll item is present.
• That Wumpa crate was removed from that location in the final game.

• Electron Avenue's look is completely different.
• The minimap doesn't match the players' positions.

Xbox Preview#

Several publications received preview copies of the game for Xbox. This is the earliest public build featuring debug coordinates in the top-left of the screen. While the build is mostly complete at this point, it features a multitude of differences.

General Differences#

• Single Race is called Arcade here.
• There is no warp pad teleport sound effect.
• The start banner uses the full name instead of the game's initials.
• The Team Frenzy meter fills up very quickly, and discharges whenever the player gets too far away from the teammate, even if it was already full before.
  • There is no colored circle surrounding the kart when the meter is full. The meter itself also won't shine once it's full, nor will it flash when Frenzy is active.
  • The teammate icon is flipped horizontally.
    • It is also present in 2P splitscreen.
  • In multiplayer, the teammate is linked to the CPU. In the final game, both players will be a team instead.
  • The "TEAM" text is always onscreen. In the final game, the text changes according to the meter status.
• The powerslide bar has the colors inverted, going from red to green.
• The item roulette gives an item too early.
• A hang time meter pops up every time the kart is lifted from the ground.
• The boost counter is placed on the right corner of the screen and appears from the right.
• A blue trail appears behind the players' kart in the anti-gravity sections instead of skid marks.
• Aku Aku's invincibility music is different.
• There is no final lap jingle.
• The scrapped Voodoo Doll item is obtainable, acting just like the Team Frenzy in the final game.
• The falling animation is different: the players falls way quickly, Aku Aku takes a while to appear, then Aku Aku's sound effect plays and the invincibility theme starts playing. After Crash respawns, Aku Aku quickly disappears before the player touches the ground.
• The karts are emitting smoke in multiplayer, which was disabled in the final game.
• Level previews are different.
• The early Static Orb icon is used.
• CPU racers can drop TNT crates, which is impossible in the final game.

Inferno Island#

• It uses Tiny Temple's theme as placeholder.

Jungle Boogie#

• It uses Tiny Temple's theme as placeholder.

Tiny Temple#

• The players spawn further ahead of the finish line.
• There are some graphical glitches with the grass shading in the background.
• The ! crate is floating.
• When the player is hit by the shock hazards, the shock color is yellow, the kart doesn't spin, and the screen doesn't flash.

Barin Ruins#

• The ! crate is floating.
• There is a removed Wumpa crate.

Out of Time#

• There is a removed X crate.
• The Wumpa crate has no Wumpa fruit when hit.

Thunder Struck#

• It uses Out of Time's theme as placeholder.
• Some Wumpa crates are in a different position.

Krunk#

• Cortex and Krunk spawn much further ahead of the finish line.
• The HUD doesn't display the player's position number.
• The lap counter doesn't have the LAP string.
• The lap times for each lap are disabled in the boss race.
• The minimap is larger and positioned higher on the HUD.
• Krunk doesn't seem to have any animations.
• The Spiky Fruit has a very different model.
• Krunk doesn't have voice clips.
• The boss kart uses a black color and a different engine sound, which is the same one used during anti-gravity sections.
• Krunk's icon on the minimap is also black.
• There are no X crates in the boss race.

Screenshots#

• Crash is standing further away from the camera.
• Coco's laptop is pink.
• There is a blue outline in the menu layout.

• Team Cortex was originally called Team Evil.

• The prizes order are different in the HUD. The trophy has a different design and gems are untextured.
• Krunk's text is misplaced. Also in the final game, the boss race is called Terra's Championship.
• The speedometer is present in the Adventure areas. It was disabled in the final game.

• Teknee uses a futuristic building design for its icon. It was later changed to an Atom.

• Adventure mode's startpoint would be originally in Velo's Citadel, as opposed to Terra in the final game.
• The camera position here is very similar to the mask's cutscene hints in Crash Team Racing.

• Velo's Vault unlock requirement is 3 keys instead of 4.
• The number of keys needed is shown in the locked portal.

• There is an extra ramp at the left side of the level, which was removed in the final game.

• The game uses the font letter instead of a proper button icon as placeholder.
• The red position numbers are in the right corner of the icons. In the final game, they are in the middle.
• Notice how the player has 42 points, which is an impossible score to achieve in the final game, as each race gives 9 points for the first place.

Late Pre-Release Build#

A later build was featured in some press images as well. This time, the Team Frenzy feature seems to be finalized, although the teammate's icon is still mirrored, and the text does not change according to the meter status.

General Differences#

• The "x" sign is missing from the Wumpa counter.
• A CPU racer can be seen using an Uka Uka mask in Meteor Gorge, which is impossible in the final game.
• Team Cortex's meter also uses Team Bandicoot's blue color instead of red.
• The boost counter is placed on the right corner of the screen and appears from the right, overlapping the team gauge.
• The "TEAM" text is always onscreen. In the final game, the text changes according to the meter status.
• In multiplayer, exhaust pipe smokes are enabled in player one's screen.
  • The HUD layout is different.
  • In battle mode, the HUD is not mirrored in player two and four screens.
    • The color stripes around the player screens is not set up properly.

Meteor Gorge#

• There is a row of four Wumpa crates in the downhill.

Deep Sea Driving#

• A X crate is present at the beginning of the track.
• A row of two crates is present at the end of the anti-gravity tube section.

Visual Development for CNK#

A document containing sketches and early designs was released at the end of 2003. Some early screenshots of the game were used to showcase how the artworks looked in-game.

• Hyper Spaceway's minimap is present here. It was disabled in-race in the final game due to not working properly.
• Debug coordinates are present.
• The character icons are placed very close to the timer.
• The lap times for each lap are disabled in the boss race.
• The HUD doesn't display the player's position number.
• There are a lot of TNTs in the track, so it's likely that was one of the Velo's traps in this build. The bosses never throw TNTs in the final game.
• There are two crates instead of three in the final game.
• The fire hazards are missing.

Trailer 2#

Watch on YouTube

A near-final version of the game was used on this trailer. The Ice Mine and Static Orb already use their final design and icons, however there is a white square around the mine model when the player throws it at 0:15. The boost counter is now placed higher, but still appears in the right corner, similar to how it was in Crash Team Racing.

Interestingly, the player instantly loses Wumpas while falling off the track at 0:38. This seems to have been added later into the development and then quickly removed, since the older builds didn't have this feature.