Story
Deep in the heart of Hyperspace, the evil Uka Uka grumbles on how Cortex's latest scheme of shrinking the Earth failed miserably. He is joined by Dr. N. Tropy, who has always been loyal to him, and "a great asset to the cause of evil". As such, he chooses Tropy to aid him in dominating the World and more. Tropy is honoured by his master's decision and already has plans on how to succeed. He looks into the future and sees himself captured by the bandicoots who always foil Uka Uka's plans. The solution Tropy comes up with is to pass the bandicoots onto their side. He knows the perfect person for the job- N. Trance, master of hypnosis. He is introduced to Uka Uka, and their scheme begins...

Outside Crash's house, Coco and Crunch are suddenly abducted by a bright light. Aku Aku comes to Crash and puts him aware of the situation. Not long after, Crash reaches a warp portal that nearly abducts him as well, were it not for Aku Aku's power.

On the other end of the portal, where the baddies are watching, a bandicoot who resembles Crash arrives and joins Coco and Crunch. Mistaking him for Crash, Tropy tells N. Trance to hypnotize them all, which he does.

In a different end of Hyperspace, Aku Aku discusses with Crash how they are going to save Coco and Crunch. They notice a floating island, home to warp pads leading to various locations around planet Earth. In order to open their way through, they'll need to gather Crystals from those locations. What Crash doesn't know is that Coco, Crunch and the mysterious bandicoot have all been hypnotized, and are now awaiting his arrival to defeat him.

Characters: Crash Bandicoot/Coco Bandicoot/Crunch Bandicoot/Fake Crash/Aku Aku/Uka Uka/Dr. N. Tropy/N-Trance
Extra Characters (multiplayer): Cortex/Dingodile/Tiny Tiger/N. Gin/Mega-Mix

Generalities
N-Tranced follows closely on its predecessor, XS. Crash's second handheld game is slightly bigger and more varied, but not all that different. The graphics are identical and the music continues being recycled from PS1 games, much like the sprites.

Although gameplay is a tad more varied now, it can get repetitive much faster. The level distribution falls a bit monotonous as you play the 3 same scenery sets over and over (Arabia, Egypt and Volcano). Those are all on-foot levels, which play just like XS, but there are 3 other different kinds of gameplay, which will now be described.

The first one is the most annoying thing since The Wrath of Cortex's sub- the Atlasphere. This is the glass ball you sometimes controlled in The Wrath of Cortex, but it is substantially more frustrating in N-Tranced. It's easy to run against an obstacle that destroys the Atlasphere, as they are common and sometimes hard to notice (Nitro Crates especially). This isn't too bad if you slow down, but don't forget that there are Time Trials to be completed. It's also a boring task to break all the Crates in these levels. You should just be able to break loose at great speed. On top of it all, these levels are very bland-looking, despite the real 3D model the characters have. In 1P mode, you control Crunch in the Atlasphere levels, except for the first one, where you control Crash. There is no difference between the both of them.

Another different set puts Crash wakeboarding away from a shark. These levels control just like the Polar segments in XS. Just move left, right, jump, accelerate and so on.

Finally, we have the space levels. Again, these come directly from XS with a new face. Instead of flying around with the Jet-Pack, you'll play as Coco, who flies away from a big fireball. The rest is essentially the same.

Few innovations have been made to Crash's on-foot gameplay. You get 2 all-new Super Powers: a Super Slide and a Rocket Jump. You still get the old Death Tornado and the Crash Dash, but the Double Jump and the Super Belly Flop are available from the start. The rest is the same you've already seen countless times before.

There's also multiplayer support now. If you can't get enough of those lovely Atlaspheres, you can challenge a friend for battling with them. Otherwise, you can always challenge your friend for a race through an on-foot level.