Astro Bot not just for kids. Team Asobi has clearly designed it for players of all skill levels, and that includes kids and beginners, but it’s at its core. Astro Bot designed for video game lovers. It’s a skill-based celebration of everything that makes the format so memorable and fun, and it’s also a great introduction to the language of games. With precise and responsive controls, lovable characters and an interesting variety of mechanics and environments, Astro Bot easily one of the best games Sony has ever produced.
Astro Bot is technically the fifth entry in the Astro universe, although it is the first full-fledged and fully priced installment in the series. It follows Game room (2013 mini-game collection for PS4), Playroom VR (2016 PlayStation VR plug), Astro Bot Rescue Mission (2018 PS VR platform featuring bots only) and Astro’s playroom (2020 DualSense demo preloaded on every PS5). Astro Bot takes ideas from these previous titles and compiles them into a focused 3D platformer with dozens of core worlds, many additional unlockable planets, and a wide variety of satisfying mechanics. In addition, the robot heroes are very cute in any situation. The presence of some characters and settings Astro Bot known from popular video games, it only makes everything sweeter.
Players are on a mission to save all 300 of their robotic friends after an alien hijacks their supercharged PS5 ship and scatters the crew across six dangerous galaxies. Sitting atop a single DualSense, Astro 50 explores the planet and collects other bots with a punch or kick – you know, in a friendly way – and then saves them on the on-screen controller’s touchpad before dropping them all off to safety. At the same time, Astro searches every galaxy for the missing pieces of the PS5 spaceship, which is guarded by a boss.
The hub world, home to the ship and rescued bots, has customization portals for DualSense and Astro, a gatcha machine with items that bring your bots to life, and a safari zone where you can take pictures with the animals you find. There are also small areas for Astro and his friends to solve with additional puzzles. Outside of the hub planet, the game revolves around collecting coins, puzzle pieces, and bots by completing platforming challenges and surviving Koopa-like enemies, but new threats and more challenging environments appear at each turn.
Many of the planets Astro lands on introduce new mechanics, such as springy boxing gloves that look like frog faces, an octopus that inflates Astro like a balloon, a mouse backpack that shrinks him at will, a swimming booster that moves with a penguin, and a stopwatch that freezes time briefly. . The stages are designed around this unique mechanic, and the variety on display is impressive, from an eerie castle filled with toxic-green ghosts and invisible platforms to a space station set in a delightful outer space and an entire planet made of giant, neon. -lit casino props.
Even before he picks up any cool new toys, Astro has a laser-powered hover ability that lets him destroy enemies while jumping over them, plus a standard punch and charge spin move. These three abilities, plus any tools he picks up, are Astro’s entire arsenal. This mechanical focus allowed Team Asobi to perfect each move and then apply them all in a thousand different ways, and the result is a useful and powerful platform. All the sweetness is just an added bonus.
Astro Bot not to punish, but not easy either. Many stages require patience, awareness and a high level of platforming skills, although the resets are generous and failure costs nothing but your time. Completists will have a great time with this – they have so many hidden links and hidden bots to find, most of which are cleverly hidden and easily missed unless you’re actively looking for them. On the flipside, speedrunners should enjoy it Astro Bot also because it offers planets of platforming challenges with incredibly responsive controls.
There are 300 bots to find, and many are drawn from the wider game world. Most of the branded bots originate from outside Sony’s stable, with the big hitters from Capcom, Konami and Sega well represented – a few of which definitely made my partner squeal with excitement, which was charming in itself. Some of the more memorable levels come from popular Sony franchises like God of War, where Astro wields Kratos’ ax across a planet. The Asobi team has really mined Sony’s coffers far beyond the simple Crash Bandicoot weird and wonderful games like callbacks and LocoRoco and Vib tape.
Now let me really gush. Astro Bot it’s beautiful and not just like a cartoon. Its visuals are sharp and vivid with interactive detail, and every pixel seems polished to perfection. But it’s the game’s physics that give it all its energy – when Astro lands on a giant inflatable daisy, the material twists under his tiny feet, buckling in with every step and swing, making the whole scene look completely squished.
When skating across snowy levels, Astro picks up speed and turns on a dime, and DualSense responds with the sounds and vibrations of a sharp blade cutting through thick ice. (Side note: I could happily play an entire ice skating game … as long as it’s not named Astro Glide.) Piles of tactile objects like sprinkles, dice, skulls, and glass stars are scattered around the levels, and running through them is not only ASMR gratifying, but sometimes reveals a new mystery. When the rain hits the Astro’s clear umbrella hat, the sound is perfectly reflected in the DualSense and the handles create the feeling of raindrops. Each stage has appropriate background music, funky or big band or synth-y and always with a catchy hook. Astro Bot‘s sound effects, haptics, graphics and physics are seamlessly aligned, turning every surface into a playground. It’s magical.
On the cute side of things, Astro reacts to his environment with cute animations like shivering in the cold, shivering in fear, and tapping his little metal legs in excitement, and his bot friends are just as expressive. When Astro raises his head to the impenetrable ceiling, he does the cutest little shudder. The bots turn and shake their booty before Astro can DualSense them. At the pause screen, you can release all your collected bots from the digital controller and they fly through the air before landing safely inside the touch pad. Almost everything bots do is charming.
Astro Bot emphasizes the importance of play. this Super Mario Bros. it’s both an introduction to the general mechanics for the new generation of video game fanatics and a significant challenge for seasoned gamers as well. In both cases Astro Bot radiates joy. If next to new titles like this Lego Horizon Adventuressignals a new and less stuffy direction for Sony, then I’m excited to see what the future holds. For now, you can find me working at 100 percent Astro Botcursing and laughing all the way.
Psst: Astro Bot has now joined the hallowed ranks of our beloved PS5 gaming guide. You can view all our options – 21 at the time of writing – at The best PS5 games for 2024.
