Anything Axial RTR is mostly plastic break down over and over type of stuff.
They are awesome, once you sink another couple hundred in to them. They would push one right to that budget limit, and still not be a true crawler. Most of that stuff is scale and trail, or rock racer-rish. (I'm not a Ax fan)
Definitely not a new crawler guy friendly experience.
The Night Crawler is good. It is sloooow, because as mentioned it is about the climb. It isn't a rock racer, so someone expecting that kind of excitement might be disappointed. But when I think crawlers it is exactly what I imagine.
There is a little crawler that is smaller and more suited to indoor and small back yard stuff, the Slick Rock by Vaterra. It is a 1/18 scale and strictly a crawler. I have heard pretty decent reports on it. ($200 -ish)
There are other options that would be even better for around the same $, but it requires buying a platform and upgrading before you even start running. Seems too involved for a new guy.