Croc 2 Remastered Review - A Deserved Revival For The Sequel

Published Oct 29, 2026, 8:00 AM EDT Josh Coulson is an editor at TheGamer covering breaking news on everything from colorful platformers to the latest Lego sets. Primarily a news writer since 2018, Josh has covered just about every major game from the past decade. Now an editor, their focus has shifted to being the leading affiliate expert at the site, building relationships between TheGamer and global brands including Mattel, Funko, and The Pokemon Company. The revival of Argonaut Games and the release of the first Croc remaster alongside it has been so successful that a surprise remaster of Croc 2: Kingdom of the Gobbos has followed in its footsteps. Both of the PS1 platformer’s flagship titles have now been given a fresh coat of paint and made playable on modern consoles, and as someone who adored the original Croc, I couldn’t be happier. Even though that first game was where I, and most other Croc fans, fell in love with Argonaut’s mascot, now that I’ve spent some time with its underappreciated sequel, I’m even happier that Kingdom of the Gobbos has been given the remaster treatment than I was about the first game. Croc 2 didn’t get nearly as much attention when it launched, and hasn’t gone down as a cult classic like its predecessor. An unfair fate for a follow-up that takes the pretty basic ideas from the original and builds on them in ways Croc fans will love. Croc 2 Deserved Better Then, So Appreciate It Now It’s immediately clear from Croc 2 that, in the gap between games, the team at Argonaut looked at the platforming landscape and realized Croc needed to up its game. Despite the relatively short gap between the original’s release and Croc 2’s launch, there are so many more ideas and mechanics. From minecart levels to mini collectathons, there are exciting ideas here that the first game could have really benefitted from. Croc 2’s characters and story are far more fleshed out too. It’s no epic adventure, but both Croc and the Gobbos you’re tasked with rescuing have far bigger personalities. That said, if this is going to be your first foray into the world of Croc, don’t go in expecting something on the level of Crash and Spyro. As was the case with the original, Croc 2 is a tier below that era’s industry leaders. While this is a step closer to that gold standard, the step up it took from that first game was still a relatively small one. Croc 2's Remaster Didn't Require Quite As Much Polish Croc 2 doesn’t just have more than its predecessor - it feels better too. The sequel ditched the original’s tank controls, making moving around its levels far smoother. That meant less work for its remaster, although that better feeling has been elevated again with the addition of a camera you control with a right stick. It’s a feature I can’t imagine a 3D platformer without nowadays, and I grew up in an era when right-stick-controlled cameras weren’t an option because most controllers didn’t have a right stick to begin with. The leading reason for remastering most games, however, is to make them look better, and Croc 2’s remaster certainly achieves that. Everything is a lot more polished than in the original, with both the characters and the world in which they reside being more detailed. If you’re nostalgia blind, or just want to see just how much better the remaster looks compared to the original Croc 2, there’s a toggle you can play with at any time that lets you switch between the PS1 version and the remaster’s graphics. You can apply it to specific details too, letting you mix and match things like Croc's character model, his surroundings, and even the draw distance. You can also apply a CRT filter, which effectively comes as standard when remastering or porting a game that launched before the year 2000. It’s Only A Remaster, But I Expected More This is a remaster, not a remake, so Argonaut was under no obligation to do more than make Croc 2 better to look at, and feel slightly better to play. That said, I wish the studio had made a few more quality-of-life improvements. I am by no means suggesting Croc 2 needs a full remake. In fact, I think that would be irresponsible. It’s just little details that chipped away at my patience that I wish had been altered for the remaster. Interactions with Gobbos are the big one. You can interact with every Gobbo in the open areas between levels. That’s great. The trouble is, those interactions happen automatically if you get close to them, even if you’ve already done heard them before. That resulted in a significant chunk of my playthrough being hampered by unwanted repeat conversations with every single Gobbo I dared to come within six feet of. Some of the boss fights could have used a slight rework too. I am not averse to challenging boss fights, even in colorful platformers intended for kids. Bring ‘em on! However, I want that challenge to stem from things like the patterns you need to learn, or the attacks being thrown your way. Creative stuff. In Croc 2, the challenge from its boss fights feels less creative and more awkward. Hitboxes in awkward places, and on occasion, hits not registering at all. Something For The History Buffs Like the first game, the Croc 2 remaster itself really is only the half of it. What made the original Croc rerelease so appealing to fans was the documentary footage included, and that is back for the sequel in a big way. Tons of new interviews with the Argonaut team who worked on the Croc games during their inception and are part of the group reviving it for new audiences and fans who want to go back. There’s a boatload of additional content for those who want to get lost in Croc’s history, specifically focused on its sequel, a lot of which you’ll have never heard before and can't find anywhere else. If you don’t feel nostalgic for Croc, you’re not the target audience for a remaster of its 1999 sequel. If you do hold a candle for the reptilian platforming mascot, however, this remaster is a must-have for so many reasons. Not only because it’s a polished version of the second, and for now final, game in the series, but because it’s a second chance for Argonaut to show that the series was evolving, developing, and going somewhere beyond the better-known original all those years ago. Croc might not be the first name that springs to mind when you think of colorful ‘90s platforming mascots, but the little green guy is very much a part of the conversation. I’m glad that, in an era when game preservation is increasingly prioritized, Croc hasn’t been forgotten. What’s more, if you ever want there to be a new Croc game, finally, after all these years, then these remasters need to sell well to show Argonaut that we Croc fans are still out there, waiting for the trilogy to finally be finished. Released October 29, 2026 ESRB Everyone / Comic Mischief, Mild Fantasy Violence Developer(s) Titanium Studios Publisher(s) Argonaut Games Prequel(s) Croc Legend of the Gobbos Genre(s) Action, Adventure, Platformer, 3D Platformer Pros & Cons Smooths the original sequel?s rough edges. Another chance to show how the sequel built on the original game?s ideas. So much archive content and interviews for hardened Croc fans. Really could have used some more quality of life improvements. May have built on the first game, but still a pretty basic platformer.