If you’re at all familiar with my writing, you’ll likely know that I missed out on the original Croc: Legend of the Gobbos. Growing up, my brother and I usually opted to have Nintendo consoles over all else, and the extent to which I experienced the PlayStation was through my cousins, who only owned a ripped copy of Grand Theft Auto, and my uncle, who only owned Medievil and the PlayStation Demo Disc containing Metal Gear Solid.
But Croc was a fairly iconic character back in the day, and a lot of PlayStation owners site him alongside Crash Bandicoot or Spyro The Dragon. So I was pretty excited to see this lesser-known PSX icon get a full-fledged glow-up for modern consoles, and I’ve got to say, Croc: Legend of the Gobbos has given me everything I could possibly want from one of these classic remasters.
If you missed it back in 1997, the story is pretty simple. A baby Crocodile lands in the valley of a race of small, furry creatures called Gobbos, who raise him as one of their own—teaching him to run, jump and fight. However, disaster strikes one day as the terrible Baron Dante and his band of villains known as the Dantinis invade Gobbo Valley and trap all of the Gobbos in boxes or cages across the land. It’s up to Croc to save his adoptive family and stop Baron Dante once and for all!
It’s a simple, lighthearted plot that basically followed the lead of almost every other action-platformer of the time. It doesn’t have any big plot turns or devastating reveals; it’s just a little crocodile saving his little friends, and that’s all it needs to be. But the real draw of a game like Croc: Legend of the Gobbos is the gameplay, and I’ve got to say, what an unbelievable improvement. While it is a pretty faithful recreation of the PlayStation original, little quality-of-life improvements make it much more satisfying to experience for the modern day.
One of the major criticisms of the original Croc: Legend of the Gobbos was how the character was controlled. Despite being a 3D platformer with some pretty tight jumps, Croc was given tank controls—so left and right would turn him and forward and back would move him. But those controls have been completely revamped to work as proper analog control improved even further by a fully articulated camera.
This makes running and jumping through each level an absolute joy and really incentivizes going for some of the more difficult Gobbos or Coloured Gems hidden throughout the level. Furthermore, since Croc: Legend of the Gobbos had somewhat floaty physics for Ground Pounding boxes or recovering from ledges, and while this is still present in the remastered, it’s been tightened up a bit alongside the improved controls that no pitfall feels particularly unearned.
“But the real draw of a game like Croc: Legend of the Gobbos is the gameplay, and I’ve got to say, what an unbelievable improvement.”
Although, if there’s one thing I really wish they improved for the remake of Croc: Legend of the Gobbos, it’s how the little guy attacks. Aside from his Ground Pound, Croc can whip enemies with his tail, however, the hitbox for this attack is really small and hard to read at times, especially with boss fights. This can lead to a lot of unfair hits, which doesn’t square well with Croc’s health system being similar to Sonic the Hedgehog—the little crystals he collects in levels, which fall out of him upon taking a hit.
Granted, with the improved controls, it is easier to grab some crystals after getting hit, but even something small, like the addition of a motion effect or a small indicator, to know where the hitbox is on Croc’s attack to make it a little more readable. Also, speaking of readability, something players might not know is each level of Croc: Legend of the Gobbos has six Gobbos to collect, however, the game doesn’t give players any indication of that fact.
I guess the idea is to incentivize players to return to previous levels to find them all, but there’s no outright indication that that’s even a thing you need to do. Every level will show you how many Gobbos you found within the level, but giving players a number out of six would’ve made things much more clear.
Finally, my last little complaint is how you can’t remap the controls for this game either. For the most part, they’re pretty standard—A is Jump as it should be, but for some reason, X is Attack, B is a full 180-degree Flip, and Y does absolutely nothing. Naturally, it would be intuitive—or at least more comfortable—if B was attack. And given the improved controls, a button dedicated to a full 180 turn-around feels perfunctory, so why you can’t remap the controls is beyond me. Come on, Croc: Legend of the Gobbos, it’s 2025!
Visually, Croc: Legend of the Gobbos goes a long way to improve the graphics of the original—recreating all the characters and environments in smoother, much more modern textures enhanced by a modern lighting engine. Since the game already had a clean, cartoony look, this added layer of polish really adds a lot to the game, however, if players are feeling nostalgic, they can choose to turn on the classic textures alongside a CTR or VGA screen filter.
“Visually, Croc: Legend of the Gobbos goes a long way to improve the graphics of the original…”
Honestly, I found that the classic textures, rendered in HD, really gave the game a charming look—like a game emulating the PSX style but in an enhanced modern way. Adding to this is the way Croc: Legend of the Gobbos runs in a clean 60fps—both on and off the dock if you’re playing on Switch. And while the original Croc: Legend of the Gobbos had a really dynamic soundtrack—creating a bunch of different themes for the overworld and caves, and changing them to suit the environment of each world—the audio sounds a lot cleaner in the remaster.
And since this is a classic remaster, Croc: Legend of the Gobbos contains a suite of extras to really celebrate this game and its history. Things like old commercials, magazine appearances, concept art and early design documents can be viewed from the game’s archive really demonstrating the love and legacy left by this little lizard.
I honestly didn’t expect to fall in love with Croc: Legend of the Gobbos, but this classic game is faithfully recreated and properly enhanced to suit modern gaming sensibilities. It certainly proved to me why he was so beloved back in the day. It’s a true classic that utilizes simple and fun level design with responsive controls—now, anyway—and keeps you wanting to play more. Hopefully, this will open the door to a modern remake of Buck Bumble.
