Characters of Crash Bandicoot - Antagonists - Doctor Nefarious Tropy

Doctor Nefarious Tropy is a henchman of Uka Uka and the self-proclaimed master of time. He was created by Naughty Dog as a time-traveling boss that would fit in a time-traveling plot. Charles Zembillas drew the first sketches of Tropy (and the doodle he created as Naughty Dog was describing the character to him) on January 22, 1998. Tropy's wearable time-traveling device was conceptualized early on in the character's design evolution and initially appeared as a belt-like contraption that featured a digital read out displaying the year Tropy intended to travel to. At one point in its aesthetic development, Tropy's time machine was covered in clock gears and mechanisms, including a cuckoo clock on the machine's lower-right area; Zembillas assumed that the details could be created as a texture in Adobe Photoshop and placed over the modeled character's polygon structure. Furthermore, the pistons on the back of the machine were connected to each other through joint-like bearings. These details were ultimately omitted for being too complex for the original PlayStation console to handle. The exhaust pipes and pistons were retained due to their reflection of Tropy's unhealthy obsession with time. Tropy is voiced by Michael Ensign in all his speaking appearances excluding Crash Bandicoot: The Wrath of Cortex, in which he is voiced by Corey Burton. He is voiced by Masaru Ikeda in the Japanese versions of Crash Bandicoot 3: Warped, Crash Team Racing and Crash Bandicoot: The Wrath of Cortex and by Haruo Satō in the Japanese versions of Crash Nitro Kart and Crash Twinsanity. His name is abbreviated as N. Tropy, which is a play on "entropy", a comment on his clock like form, and such is usually mentioned or unlocked from the time challenge awards inside games (Relic Races and Time Trials)

Doctor Nefarious Tropy is introduced by Uka Uka in Crash Bandicoot 3: Warped as the creator of the Time-Twisting Machine, a device that will aid Neo Cortex in his quest to gather the Crystals in their original places in time. He later acts as the third boss of the game, battling Crash with his gigantic tuning fork. When Cortex is defeated, the Time-Twisting Machine implodes on itself, trapping Cortex, Uka Uka and Tropy in a time prison, where they are transformed into infants. Tropy appears in Crash Team Racing as the player's opponent during the Time Trial races and later as an unlockable playable character. The game's epilogue states that Tropy resumed his time machine hobby after the events of the game, and was last seen entering an ancient rainforest. N. Tropy has a minor appearance in Crash Bandicoot: The Wrath of Cortex, in which he is an attendee of Uka Uka's convention and an occasional enemy in the game, attempting to hinder Crash's progress. He is the main antagonist of Crash Bandicoot 2: N-Tranced, in which he kidnaps Crunch, Coco and Fake Crash and hypnotizes them into working for him. He is later defeated by Crash and is forced to take a group picture with the Bandicoots. Tropy is an unlockable character in Crash Nitro Kart, where he races under Neo Cortex's team. Tropy appears again in Crash Twinsanity, where he works with Doctor Nitrus Brio in order to learn the whereabouts of the treasure of the Evil Twins. When interrogating Crash proves fruitless, the duo attack him, sending him back to Cortex's Iceberg Lab. They eventually reach the treasure trove of the Evil Twins, but are chased out by Spyro the Dragon. Tropy also has a cameo appearance in the "Silhouette Quiz" minigame in Crash Boom Bang!