Crash Bandicoot

Crash Bandicoot (クラッシュ・バンディクー Kurasshu Bandikuu) is the main protagonist of the namesake series. Originally planned to be named Willie the Wombat, he is an Eastern Barred Bandicoot living life on N. Sanity Island, who was captured and given intelligence by Dr. Neo Cortex. Throughout the series, Cortex is Crash's usual arch-enemy and is always defeated by Crash in order to keep peace around the island. Crash is often accompanied by his ally, Aku Aku, the secondary protagonist. In the earlier games, he tended to say "Whoa!" whenever he got killed. In the later games, he spoke gibberish with a very basic knowledge of the language spoken in the game.

Crash Bandicoot
He is first seen in Doctor Neo Cortex's and Doctor Nitrus Brio's lab. (later, Cortex tells Crash that Brio forced him in his evil plan). He was created by them with the Evolvo-Ray, but when the two doctors put Crash under the Cortex Vortex (despite Brio's warnings that the machine was not ready), it failed to turn Crash evil as Crash proved to be immune to it. Cortex gives chase after Crash trying to recapture him, only to find Crash running out a window and falling into the sea. Even though Cortex failed, he knows Crash will come back, as the bandicoot had a girlfriend named Tawna Bandicoot, who was also evolved. Crash goes on a huge adventure to save his love and put a stop to Cortex's plans. Not long after Crash sets off he comes across a witch doctor mask, Aku Aku, who watches over him and protects him from various perils. On Crash's adventure he confronts bosses who are determined to keep Crash from getting through: the obese tribe chief Papu Papu (who surprisingly is not affiliated with Cortex and simply fought Crash for waking him from his slumber) in his hut, the insane kangaroo, Ripper Roo at the top of a creek, the muscle bound Koala Kong in a mine shaft, Cortex's bodyguard Pinstripe Potoroo in his office in the Cortex Power refinery, Doctor Nitrus Brio in his own potions room and finally the mad scientist, Doctor Neo Cortex himself, on his hoverboard, who is faced on his airship. Crash spins, redirecting Cortex's laser blasts back at his hover board and falling to his apparent doom while Crash and Tawna are seen together at last. The couple takes the airship and they fly into the sunset. In the alternate (Non-Canon) ending, instead of confronting Cortex, Crash uses all the gems to get to the balcony where Tawna and the same kind of bird as in Slippery Climb (except friendly) are there. The three ride off into the night as the epilogue rolls, stating each boss Crash defeated has changed for the better and Cortex hasn't been heard of for a while, but it hints a sequel by stating "However, evil geniuses are harder to squash than cockroaches...".

Crash Bandicoot 2: Cortex Strikes Back
A year later, Crash is relaxing in the woods with his little sister Coco Bandicoot, who wakes him from his nap and asks him to find a new laptop battery for her. However, he is soon abducted and to his surprise, by Doctor Cortex to a Warp Room, who claims to have changed his ways, as he states that he feels a written invitation would have been turned down. Cortex asks Crash to gather the twenty-five Crystals to stop a deadly 'Planetary Alignment'. Meanwhile, Nitrus Brio, angry at Cortex for replacing him with Doctor N. Gin, asks Crash to gather the forty-two Gems instead to destroy Cortex's space station and warns Crash that he will use strong forces to stop him from gathering crystals. As Crash couldn't collect everything on his own, he got his pet polar bear Polar to help him with a few of the collectables. Coco also hacks into Cortex's communications and is suspicious of Cortex's true plans. Every 5 crystals Crash collects grants him access the platform to take him to the room above. However, Crash must defeat a boss to enter. Collecting five gives him a rematch with Ripper Roo, ten has him face off against the Komodo Brothers, fifteen allows him to outsmart Tiny Tiger (all three working for N. Brio) and twenty enables him to confront N. Gin. (Who Cortex initially wants Crash to give his current amount of crystals to.) When Crash collects all twenty-five crystals, Cortex reveals his true intention, which is to use the planetary alignment for world domination with his new and improved Cortex Vortex. Crash gives chase to Cortex by jet pack in space. Cortex has to out-fly Crash by placing obstacles to slow him down, and passing a blue barrier to activate his force field, so it'll be impossible for Crash to stop him. However, Crash, being faster, dodges all obstacles in his way and spins Cortex three times, destroying his jetpack and sending him flying into deep space. Crash returns home where he's relaxing on the beach with Coco who informs him that Cortex is still a threat as his Space Station, the Cortex Vortex, is still operational, meaning he was not done yet. Crash finally gathers all 42 gems, which Brio uses to build a powerful laser to destroy the Cortex Vortex, and Crash activates the laser. Along with Brio and Coco, he watches the station explode to pieces. In this game, Crash along with jump and spin can also perform a belly flop, crawl, slide and high jump and spin jump.

Crash Bandicoot 3: Warped
The remains of the Cortex Vortex hurdles into Earth's atmosphere and destroys the prison holding a great evil. Meanwhile Crash, Aku Aku, Polar and Coco are relaxing until Aku Aku hears evil laughter booming, revealing that to be Uka Uka, his evil twin brother. Seeing that he's free, Aku Aku takes Crash and Coco to use Doctor Nefarious Tropy's Time Twister (While Polar looks after the house.), to gather the powerful Crystals (before Cortex does so) which are scattered across time. 4 of the 5 chambers are locked so the duo head for the remaining one chamber. Coco used her pet tiger Pura to get a few collectables. Crash and Coco gather 5 crystals and Crash outsmarts Tiny Tiger yet again and earns the super belly flop power-up, 10 crystals sent Crash to beat Dingodile and earn the Double Jump power-up, 15 crystals allowed Crash to knockout Tropy and earn the Death Tornado Spin power-up and 20 crystals got Coco (with Pura's help halfway) to shoot down N. Gin and earn the Fruit Bazooka power-up for Crash. After collecting all 25 crystals Crash and Aku Aku do battle against Cortex and Uka Uka. Crash and Aku Aku come out on top and Crash earns the Crash Dash power-up. However, they're not done yet as Cortex and Uka Uka still have the 42 gems scattered. Crash and Aku Aku then have a rematch with Cortex and Uka Uka, now with all 42 gems, and defeat them for good as the Time-Twister Machine, unable to hold itself together, implodes on itself trapping the evil duo plus Dr N. Tropy as prisoners of time. While Crash, Coco and their respective pets relax round the fire, Aku Aku congratulates them for having saved the world once more. In this game Crash receives power ups to enhance his abilities after defeating a boss and can revisit any level once the crystal is collected to enter time trial mode to earn Relics.

Appearance
Crash generally appears as an orange humanoid-bandicoot with a black nose, thick eyebrows, green eyes and reddish-brown hair on his head, styled into a typical Mohawk. Crash's main attire consists of a pair of blue denim jeans (which gained metal plates on the knees in Twinsanity), pink boxers with red hearts on them, and a pair of silver (red in Tag Team Racing onwards) Chuck Taylor All-stars Converses, though he can don other attires when needed, such as scuba diving gear, a biker's jacket, and numerous others. Crash can also be seen with fingerless gloves almost always except for Crash of the Titans, Nitro Kart 3D, Mind Over Mutant and Mutant Island. In Crash of the Titans (except for GBA and Mobile), he had no gloves to reveal black tribal tattoos on his hands, which were replaced with cinnamon watermarked tattoos in Mind Over Mutant. The tattoos do not appear in Nitro Kart 3D and Mutant Island which resembles him without tattoos and gloves makes him go bare hands. His head is significantly smaller in Crash Tag Team Racing.

Personality
Naughty Dog once referenced the development of Crash as a character both "goofy yet heroic", and being able to portray it well. Originally however, he took the role of a silent protagonist and thus expressed little of his personality or opinions (a trait developer Jason Rubin later claimed to regret), though in more recent games he has played a larger role.

Crash's personality is hard to pinpoint, sometimes varying from game to game. Throughout the series, he has always been shown to be willing to help and is very attentive to others. But overall, he has a rather wacky, cartoonish personality, in simple terms, he is a tornado. His demented behavior was in fact extended to actual sadism/masochism in Crash Tag Team Racing, in which he took pleasure in torturing innocent animals, park drones, and even himself (it should be noted that the game is criticized for its over-caricaturisation or even complete change in character personalities). Despite this however, Crash is usually kindhearted and laid back. He is not known for his anger, even towards his greatest enemies he rarely maintains a great deal of contempt. Threatening his little sister seems to be among very few ways of setting off his aggression. Beware his appetite however, he is very protective of his Wumpa Fruit.

Crash is a very emotional character who is quick to laugh and quick to cry. While he has a danger-loving, fearless nature and loves a good fight, he prefers relaxing in the sun and rarely seeks out trouble deliberately. To the ire of Crunch and the amusement of Coco, in the Radical games, Crash is prone to impolite personal habits such as belching or scratching his posterior. Crash is also easily distracted, as seen in Twinsanity when he has to catch Cortex. He is also fairly oblivious to his surroundings but this could be because of his literacy, though he's easily distracted by a falling Wumpa Fruit. As shown in Crash Tag Team Racing, Crash seems to be somewhat impulsive, demonstrated in Die-o-Ramas, Crash spins a tree making it fall and crush him, standing on railings with gears behind him, and spinning dangerous equipment.

Crash's intelligence level is something of a question, since he is illiterate and Aku even made a comment that brain damage was "not much of a danger to Crash". However, this may have been a tease, especially since he is shown to be smart enough to prevent Cortex's attempts at ditching him in Twinsanity and has been able to outsmart various bosses far more powerful than himself in the past. Things he does that seem dumb could best be attributed to his obvious immaturity and impulsive nature. His illiteracy is probably just because he sees no reason to speak English, especially since Aku can understand him anyway. His sense of right and wrong is also intact, he helps out those in need and though Cortex has numerously tried to destroy him, Crash did not object to teaming up with him.

Abilities
Over the series Crash develops several powers, and is one of the only (being the first) characters to possess them, the other/second being Coco who shares two abilities with him.

Crash has been shown to possess several abilities pertaining to physical prowess and endurance. Crash also has a couple of other abilities and skills. Crash can also pull off several specific techniques and maneuvers with his physical capabilities and gain power ups for the remainder of that adventure. They are:
 * Enhanced Strength- Crash has displayed significant physical strength, able to cause considerable damage to Titans and other large creatures, such as Tiny. He also was able to pick up Crunch and slam him on the ground over and over, with little effort.
 * Enhanced Agility- Crash is also very agile, able to jump more than his own body height into the air with a standard jump, as well as pull off a double jump with similar vertical lift.
 * Enhanced Stamina- Crash also possesses exceptional stamina and resiliency, able to run and fight steadily for long periods of time (evidenced by the fact that many of his games' plots take place in a small span of time), and also take massive blows from Titans and the like, then just get back up and resume fighting with the same vigor and liveliness as before. The latter is also evidenced by the fact that he can spin at high speed for almost a solid minute before he gets dizzy, and still only stay dizzy for a brief moment.
 * Enhanced Speed- Crash can run quite fast, as evidenced by his Crash Dash ability.
 * Enhanced Reflexes- Crash has improved reaction speed as he was able to dodge enemy attacks and projectiles.
 * Enhanced Durability- Crash is able to take a large amount of damage and still continue fighting.
 * Contortionist- Crash is quite limber, able to twist and crouch his body into all sorts of positions. This is perhaps helped by the fact that he is now a teenager.
 * Cyclone Spinning- Perhaps best known is Crash's trade-mark ability to spin himself at high speed, dealing centrifugal force-augmented blows to opponents and even allowing himself to float slowly to the ground. The Spin Move can also deflect projectiles.
 * Expert Combatant- Crash is no novice when it comes to fighting, possessing considerable skill in hand-to-hand combat and an ability to use weapons, such his Fruit Bazooka and operating any sort of vehicle, with ease.
 * Combat Specialist- In Mind Over Mutant, Aku Aku described Crash to be a swift fighter, able to use his speed to his advantage against larger foes.
 * Wall Crawling- Crash is a superb climber, able to hang from ledges and traverse them with great speed, and also to scale sheer surfaces with only minor handholds. On a related note, Crash seems to have a strong grip, evidenced by his hanging on to Mutants while they are running and fighting and the fact that he ripped off Crunch's N-V, which was designed not to come off
 * Titan Jacking- Crash's newest skill is to jack stunned enemies with the help of Aku Aku and use them against other enemies as seen in the only games Crash: Mutant Island, Crash of the Titans and Mind Over Mutant.
 * Natural Abilities- Since he's a bandicoot, Crash's natural instincts, such as digging, can be used to help him from time to time.
 * Mind Control Immunity- Crash has shown to be immune to mind control as the Cortex Vortex failed to turn him evil in Crash Bandicoot.
 * Super Belly Flop
 * Double Jump
 * Death Tornado
 * Bazooka (Super Power)
 * Crash Dash (Super Power)
 * Tip Toe
 * Super Slide
 * Rocket Jump

Other Traits
In the Radical Entertainment games, Crash has an extremely limited vocabulary, preferring to speak in unintelligible gibberish; and can say words like Nina, Pancakes, and Wumpa. In the Naughty Dog games, the few English words he is capable of speaking include 'Whoa!' Uh-oh and Boo-yah. It is implied in Crash Twinsanity that he is a chronic carrier of fleas (but because it was stated by Cortex, it might be just a provocation). He also loves Wumpa fruit as it is the main collectible in most games.

Role in the Series
To be determined...