But in reality, Team Asobi’s delightful platformer was perfectly placed to take an easy route down the middle to gaming’s top prize. Astro Bot took home four awards — it also won Best Game Direction, Best Action/Adventure Game, and Best Family Game — making it the biggest winner of the night. It is no surprise that a game like Astro Bot could be the big winner of the Game Awards. Astro Bot proves that creativity, fun and well applied technology is what the industry needs right now (and well, we can’t deny the touch of nostalgia or the amazing use of licenses). PlayStation can clean up the sour taste of last year, and perhaps show them that there are other paths to greatness. The Stranded Scout, Nightmare Guardian, Greedy Ape, and Pro Driver Cameo Bots will only be available at the Crash Site once players have unlocked them in Astro’s Playroom.

Up Next: All Puzzle Pieces Locations

Like Stephen has mentioned, this is an endlessly inventive title that joyously plays around with the level design, the mechanics, and the themes of every level. There are enough ideas in Astro Bot to fill a dozen regular games. The power-ups flesh out Astro’s move set which, on its own, is fairly simplistic. However, while his range of moves isn’t particularly deep, they’re executed excellently. Jumping, hovering, punching, and spinning all feels spot on thanks to tight, responsive controls. The true test of any 3D platformer is whether it feels fun to simply move around, and Astro passes handily.

Use it in conjunction with your rocket ability to reach the top of the platform where you fought the slime. Proceed through the level from bot #1, taking the spiral platform, defeating the snake, and continuing your climb. Once you drain the blue hourglass and bust through the ceiling, head over to the right of the new platform, past the circular gray disk with the lever on top.

It also features dozens of characters from first and third party PlayStation games from throughout the decades – although the way they’re handled is one of the game’s few failings. After the disaster of Concord comes the triumph of Sony’s Astro Bot, with a new single-player classic that is one of the best 3D platformers ever made. There is a second set of Tripcaster wires in the clearing with the Tallneck. Irritate some ground-bound enemies into following you, then hop into or behind the square enclosure (yes, there’s enough space for you to stand between the wire and the rock).

Sometimes there’s just basic, fun references to classic characters, in-world jokes using PlayStation hardware including zip lines made from PS1 controller cords and the like. However, at other points, you take on the powers of key guest characters from PlayStation’s past. There is, for instance, a God of War stage – I don’t want to spoil the others, most of which I liked even more, but Kratos has appeared in marketing materials thus far so I felt like the best choice for showing an example. Really, the whole game feels as if it were created to push as much ‘stuff’ as possible. [newline]Objects break, give and collect in huge numbers lending the game world a tremendous amount of life. As you rescue bots, for instance, they gather on the game’s central planet and the engine has zero trouble displaying all of them at once. You can recruit them to help you out and it’s a joy watching them all gather in huge numbers.

Astro Bot Review: Sony’s Still Got It

And one person who’s clearly having fun with Astro Bot is no other than Finn Wolfhard, featured alongside Astro in a fun new video. Brand-new Special Bots to rescue and Time Attack mode with online rankings starting today. Four years ago, Sony introduced the tagline “play has no limits” to advertise the PS5. [newline]Astro Bot is the first PlayStation exclusive since then that truly believes in that mission statement. As I wistfully reflected on that, I was hit by a pang of bittersweet sadness. Most of the colorful mascots I was reuniting with simply don’t exist anymore.

Each star system also has a level that’s specially themed around a popular PlayStation franchise, allowing Astro to make use of unique skills for a short while. Needless to say, Astro Bot keeps you on your toes, and sometimes challenges you to think outside the box in order to solve a problem or find a well-hidden secret. So, at this point, it’s fair to say that Team Asobi nailed the core game feel, the level design and the visuals. It’s a beautiful game that plays like a dream and offers things that manage to feel completely new and fun – and ultimately, as I think about my time playing Astro Bot, I can’t help but feel great about it. 789win and a reminder of what the first three generations of PlayStation embodied. It’s a game that perfectly combines technology, design and creativity into a singular, ultra-polished whole without any filter whatsoever.

The small robot must save fellow bots from danger, totaling 300 bots to rescue throughout the game. In a way, Team Asobi — Sony’s go-to tech demo developer and maker of Astro’s Playroom and the upcoming Astro Bot — has been doing this kind of preparatory work for the last 12 years. From 2012 to 2020, the Tokyo-based outfit made small games, often distributed for free, whose purpose was to demonstrate the interactive potential of Sony’s hardware. The Playroom demonstrated the PlayStation Camera; The Playroom VR and Astro Bot Rescue Mission the PlayStation VR headset; Astro’s Playroom the PS5’s DualSense controller. The team had a talent for unearthing delightful and satisfying interactions from the devices, and they peopled their games with cute little robots who acquired more personality with each installment. It can be tough to critically gauge how ‘good’ a platformer is sometimes.

Not sure I’ll use it, unless I get really stuck trying to find something, but still appreciated. This has been one of the few websites that’s given this game the coverage it deserves. I was suprised how easily some of the collectibles are to miss. The game is very streamline I would have thought no way I am missing this stuff lol. In addition to new levels, Sony as part of its June State of Play announced a new limited-edition Astro Bot DualSense controller, one with a slightly different expression from a previous Astro Bot controller.

Also need to do all the extra stuff that was added to the playroom before starting. Astro Bot is a showcase of a developer working at the top of its game, but most importantly a developer that keeps fun and playfulness at the forefront of everything it does. Finally though I want to highlight the fantastic score, because like its levels, it bounces around genres, delivering consistently catchy head bobbers, on top of slightly remixed versions of iconic Sony soundtracks.