Better than Super Mario 64? I think so.
Another big complaint from other people by this game is that the gameplay is too linear and flat. This is, again, debatable. Even though this game was meant to be competition for Super Mario 64 (Also released in 1996), it plays nothing like Mario's critically-acclaimed "classic". It plays much more like the older Super Mario Bros. games, since it consists primarily of running, jumping, and collecting resources (Instead of coins, Crash collects Wumpa Fruit), extra lives, and Aku Aku masks (Crash's version of Mushrooms). This game has you grab an awful lot of extra lives throughout the levels, to compensate for the punishing difficulty.
Plus, Crash Bandicoot is also a visual treat for the eyes. There are lush, beautiful, colorful enviroments for almost every level, and the graphics are far superior to anything else from 1996, especially when compared to the ugly and blockish Super Mario 64. The controls are tighter, and less slippery and annoying (Unlike Super Mario 64). If there's any flaw to the control scheme, it's that this game was developed before the remodeling of the Playstation Controller in 1997 that added in two analog joysticks.
If there's any flaw to Crash Bandicoot, it's the underwhelming story. Dr. Neo Cortex, a failed student-turned mad scientist, is sitting in his lab with his far-more-intelligent partner (Who also comes up with all of his ideas), Dr. Nitrous Brio. He's taken several hundred wild animals from Wumpa Island, and he plans to mutate them into strong, willing henchman. Crash Bandicoot, a mutated marsupial, is considered a "failure", and he is removed from the lab.
However, his girlfriend, Tawna (And here's where the story starts to go wrong. How can he have a girlfriend before he was mutated, and why did Cortex say "Prepare the female bandicoot", as if she was about to be mutated from a regular bandicoote, when she already had the features of a grown woman?) is still waiting in the lab, about to be subjected to Cortex's experimentation. So, he wakes up on a distant island, where he somehow meets a talking tiki mask named Uka Uka, and he then helps Crash journey through the islands to rescue Tawna.
So, overall, Crash Bandicoot is an excellent and underrated platformer for the PS1, and, regardless of the difficulty, nobody with a PS1 should go without it. Or, even better, go on PSN and buy it for your PSP or PS3.
Graphics: 9
Gameplay: 8
Story: 6
Difficulty: 9
Replay Value: 9.5 (Getting all of those gems/keys and unlocking every secret pathway/level is not an easy task.)
Overall: 8