- 5 minutes ago
Astro Bot is everything you wanted and more.
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🎥
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00:00Sometimes there's just a video game that you'll glad exists and I think I'm alongside millions of
00:05other people who came off 2020's Astro Bot pack-in game on the PlayStation 5 just yearning for more
00:10of that gameplay, that exquisitely tight platforming, super responsive DualSense haptics
00:14and an overall presentation that was just super inviting and rewarding in equal measure.
00:19Thankfully, developers Team Asobi are now fully able to shine. I like to think because that 2020
00:24game did so well and was so warmly received, it seemed like they were then able to play with the
00:28credit card a little bit and put out a full release. Honestly, this is a playable love letter
00:33to PlayStation history, but not just through the first party lens. There's also a huge amount of
00:37respect paid to third parties as well. Everyone from Resident Evil and Metal Gear Solid characters
00:42to deep cuts like Ark the Lad or Toro Inoue slash the Sony cast. Bloodborne's Hunter even pops up as
00:48well. There are so many and I'm not going to spoil them. It's not like, you know, your mileage is going
00:54to vary in regards to how many of these characters you wouldn't know going in. There are literally
00:57hundreds of them. I think they've said there's like 150 or 180 VIP bot characters that you're
01:02going to be rescuing alongside the 300 characters or bots that you're going to be rescuing in general.
01:07But I like the surprise. I loved all my time finding these various characters, realizing just
01:12how deep those cuts went and just having a giant smile on my face being like, oh my God,
01:16that's Solid Snake. Oh my God, that's Dracula or whatever from Castlevania. Stuff like that is just
01:22awesome. You're seeing Alucard in there or whatever. I think that's one of the biggest reasons to
01:26play this is just a pure celebration of gaming history. Yes, it is through a PlayStation lens,
01:31but thankfully the vast majority of our favorite franchises graced the PlayStation at one time or
01:36another. In regards to levels, you have bite-sized approaches here. Something like a three to eight
01:40minutes per average for a level, which I think is an awesome way to sort of tip the nod to the average
01:44age of gamers being in their phase. I'm pretty sure the average age of all gamers is like 34 right now,
01:50which is interesting because in the likes of Astro Bot and PlayStation history,
01:53tons of us grew up with PlayStation and tons of us now have kids or busy lifestyles, etc. And you
01:58just want to nip in, play a game, have a few minutes with something and leave with a smile on your face.
02:03That's my overall thing with this is that it is very much designed to make sure you're having as
02:07much joy as possible, even in small increments. I think the levels themselves are so expertly
02:12designed that I'm going to get to various reasons why across this review, but I do love that general
02:17approach. It is a 3D platformer style approach, but the general pace here, which is something I'll bring
02:21back in in a minute, the general pace here is just thunderous. They want you to get in there,
02:26to hoover up different characters, to experiment different ways of getting around the levels,
02:30enjoy the power set that you're being given, and just have an immediately positive good time.
02:35Astro's power set is the same as the 2020 game. Hitting jump again gives you a downward boost attack,
02:40you can spin in the air for more distance, or you can hold the standard melee attack for a spin,
02:44and outside of that you get powers on certain levels as well. A rocket jump, some spring-loaded fists,
02:49one where you turn into a sponge and have to weaponize soaking up and releasing water to
02:53douse fires and clean oil slicks. The overarching vibe is just one of inventiveness, and I love,
02:58if you look into Team Asobi's history and Japan Studio's history, the individuals putting this
03:03game together have always been involved in refining things like the DualSense and the way that,
03:08you know, Sony's hardware works, and you can just feel that in every single implementation here
03:12on the gameplay side. The way that the controller rumbles, the different feel of walking over ice,
03:18or glass, or walking through snow, or what it feels like when the breeze kicks up, or the wind
03:23flies past you, or whatever, all of that stuff comes through in the controller, which I feel it
03:26was an early promise for the PlayStation 5, back when we had those technical showcases from Mark
03:31Cerny talking about how, you know, whatever's happening on screen would be represented in the
03:34controller. It's something like a Returnal, or something like an Astro Bot, that actually brings
03:39that stuff to the fore. Across all of this is Sony's branding being front and center, and I'm interested
03:44to see what people think of this, the idea of just steering into your biggest branded elements,
03:48the fact that you do have the triangle, square, circle, and X icons, the button icons, you know,
03:53being different interactable characters. They show up having eyes on them, they bounce all around you,
03:58they represent different levels that you can beam into, and also the fact that Astro is just piloting
04:03alongside all the other bots in the spaceship is literally just the PlayStation 5 itself flying
04:08through the cosmos, and then you pilot a DualSense to go from planet to planet. There's something kind of
04:12cool about this. I think if I was a kid growing up, if I was approaching Astro Bot at the same age
04:17that I played Spyro or Crash or whatever, I think I would fall in love with all of the general approach
04:21here, and I'd be flying my DualSense around the room. For as much as I do think that this is massively
04:26enjoyable as a video game regardless, I just have to imagine the new generation coming up and the amount
04:31of fun they're going to have with this being their first premium 3D platformer. Like I mentioned,
04:36you know, Crash, Spyro, Banjo on the N64 or whatever, these give us very warm memories and phenomenal
04:42experiences when we played them across the 90s, and Astro Bot is laser focused on doing that yet
04:47again, whether that's for someone who already has those memories like One of Us, for example,
04:51or someone younger. The execution here is just so, so spot on. Alongside the array of standard 3D
04:57platforming levels that are more in line with what we had in 2020 are a series of additional levels,
05:02some of them being themed around specific pillar franchises, which I absolutely love, and it's
05:07another thing that I don't want to spoil. I keep seeing Sony and various other outlets doing it on
05:12social media saying, hey, did you know there's an X level in there? I'm only going to mention one of
05:16them. It's one of those things that I think, you know, when you realize, oh my god, in this case,
05:21I'm playing a version of God of War Ragnarok, you know, but as Astro Bot, where they've done an
05:27Astro Bot version of the Leviathan Axe, you're throwing it and recalling it. When you're in a level that is
05:32entirely themed around God of War Ragnarok, that's just such a cool, really, really cool idea. I kind
05:37of hope they do a bit more DLC for the game, maybe flesh out different Sony IP. There's a specific
05:42level in here, and it is the first one you get, so you'll stumble upon it in the first world,
05:46that is just a direct nod to one of the greatest IP that used to be front and center for PlayStation,
05:52you know, overall, and something that I hold near and dear to my heart, which again, I'm not going to
05:56spoil, but hopefully you love it as much as I do. All I'll say is dual analog sticks, and maybe that'll
06:02point you in that direction. Alongside this, if you were begging for a difficulty spike or something to
06:07get stuck into, that proves it's not just for the three-year-olds. There are additional secret
06:12levels that you can trigger by hanging out in some of the galaxy maps long enough, and sometimes
06:16collectibles will appear, sometimes meteors will appear that you can fly into, or certain star
06:21clusters will appear that you can fly through. Various different things, sometimes it's a
06:24collectible that you might need to get in one of the levels to open up a warp zone somewhere else,
06:28but this is where the difficulty starts to go a bit higher. There, as an array of secret levels,
06:32there are some other things like retro throwbacks and things like that, but overall,
06:36if you're looking for that really tight 3D platforming gauntlet energy, that's where this
06:41difficulty is housed. You need to seek it out. If you go for 100% completion, you're going to find
06:46that stuff anyway, but still, it's really, really cool to see Team Asobi do the all-inviting,
06:51everybody come on in, look at all these franchises, have all this fun, and then for those of us who
06:55like tighter 3D platforming, you do get little examples of that as well. Obviously, the game does ramp up
07:01in difficulty across its entire playtime, but we are talking about something for all ages, and we are
07:05talking about something that is going to be played by a lot of kids, so in regards to the more
07:09difficult stuff, like the really tight stuff, those are the things that you're going to have to go out
07:13of your way to find. All of this feeds into base building, which is another cool reason to get out
07:18there and find every last puzzle piece, find every last gold coin, etc., because you're going back to
07:23this home planet, and you're building up the idea of the astrobot populace as they recover from being
07:28attacked by a random alien at the beginning of the game. The overall point, though, is that 2020's
07:33gacha machine returns, so you can unlock accessories and new animations for bots that
07:37you're rescuing. Snake gets a cardboard box, Jack gets Daxter, Spike from Apescape gets some cookies,
07:42etc. Again, I'm not going to spoil every last one of these, because it's just really cool. It's just
07:47cool collecting figures and, you know, different ephemera from PlayStation history, from gaming
07:52history, and one being amazed at just how many different publishers played ball here, you know,
07:59in an industry that is so forever walled off and so forever NDA'd and we're not going to play well
08:04with the competition, etc. It's cool that so many behind-the-scenes conversations must have happened
08:09to bring this much IP together in one place. And as much as I, like many people in the modern day,
08:15are just sick of the brands getting involved in everything, there is a warmth here, there is a charm
08:20here that makes the collectible side of it very enjoyable. And once you have your team of multiple
08:26hundred characters all together, you know, comprising some of your favorites from various
08:30franchises over the years, all pitching in, all doing bespoke animations to help flesh out the
08:34base building side of things, it is a goddamn good feeling. There's just a pace to this whole game that
08:40is non-stop. New levels, new mechanics, a thoroughly inviting presentation, a thumping soundtrack from
08:46Kenny Young, characters that you want to collect, etc. It always feels like one more level, one more boss,
08:52one more secret, it's immaculate. You can even trigger an optional helper robot to point you in
08:57the direction of whatever bots and collectibles you missed, so it's easy to mop up every last drop
09:01of this game. Astro Bot is just about the most perfectly made game on PlayStation 5. It really is
09:07that high bar of premium AAA quality for a platformer, like what we saw with God of War Ragnarok,
09:12The Last of Us 2, Spider-Man 2, etc. for third-person narrative action games. It represents a new era
09:18for PlayStation really coming into its own. Astro has been the most warmly received mascot in years,
09:23and I remember a time when it was the likes of Crash Bandicoot fronting the PlayStation branding
09:28overall. You know, that segued into someone like Sackboy for the PlayStation 3 and Aloy for the PlayStation 4,
09:33and now we have Astro for the PlayStation 5, which in himself connotes decades worth of associations
09:38with PlayStation branding. I do think this also means something for the wider PlayStation feel.
09:43The Jim Ryan era was a cold, cold time, a CEO saying all the wrong things, talking about why
09:49he'd never play classic old games, etc. And since he stepped down and was replaced by Herman Holst and
09:54Hideaki Nishino, you've seen a wealth of PlayStation classics added to PlayStation Plus, like the Time
09:58Splitters Trilogy and the PSP Resistance game. Now, Astro was clearly in development long before
10:03Holst and Nishino took the reins of PlayStation, but this game representing the idea of saving every
10:08last first-party property across the last 30 years and unifying them under one banner of pure
10:13celebration for a series of systems that have come a long, long way is a very good foot to put forward.
10:18And Astro Bot feels like the perfect mix of old meets new, with a gameplay style that's inviting
10:23and rewarding in equal measure. It's exactly what you're expecting going in, with improvements and
10:28new ideas in all the right places. Long live 3D platformers, a staple part of every gamer's diet
10:35growing up, and one that has not been cooked up and served so well in way too damn long. The Crash
10:41Trilogy, the Spyro Trilogy, the Reignited stuff back in 2017 or whatever, that's how long we've had to
10:46wait. Astro Bot is absolutely stellar, five stars across the board, and you should play it right now.
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