This is probably one of the easiest reviews I’ll ever write as I could easily say, “9/10, buy it, you won’t be disappointed” and leave it at that. But Astro Bot for the PlayStation 5 deserves so much more than that, so here goes.
You play as the titular Astro Bot, a little robot who crash lands his PlayStation 5 -shaped craft into a planet. Its parts have been stolen by an alien and it’s his job to recover the parts and rescue as many other tiny robots he can find across the many levels, each depicted by a planet in a galaxy revolving around the desert planet you’ve crashed into. And that’s it as far as the story goes here, but who needs a story when the gameplay is this good?
What we have with Astro Bot is kind of a cross between Super Mario Galaxy and Sunshine but with its own gimmicks to help set it apart from its peers. You visit a galaxy that is populated with a set number of planets, each unlocked by beating the previous one. Still, instead of collecting stars or shines, you have to rescue follow bots who are scattered throughout the levels. Some are in plain sight, some are hidden behind a puzzle or some are hidden in plain sight, which might sound odd, but the number of bits I missed, just because I thought they were part of the level’s ambience was staggering.
There are different kinds of bots too. There are generic ones that are there to make up the numbers and 150 of them are special characters from the history of Sony games. Some are instantly recognisable like Solid Snake or Crash Bandicoot and some are a bit more obscure. I was very pleased to see Moss from the PSVR game make an appearance for example. Think of a big PlayStation game and there’s probably a bot in the game somewhere and finding them all and unlocking their interactions was a huge part of the fun for me.
You see the crash site also doubles as a hub world where all the bots you rescue hang out and you unlock various things to go with them. Solid Snake gets a box to hide in, Lara Croft runs away from a T-Rex, that kind of thing. You can also use jigsaw pieces you collect from levels to unlock buildings where you can change Astro Bot’s costume or the colour of your controller spaceship. All the unlocks come through a Gatcha Machine which you play using coins collected throughout the levels.
Each galaxy has a variety of hidden planets as well. These range from simple challenges like defeating enemies, to very tough levels where there are no checkpoints and require almost perfect timing to get through and sometimes, just a bit of luck. It’s levels like these that turn a simple game into something that will appeal to even hardcore gamers because these levels are tough!
And that brings me to level design, which is up there with some of the best in platform game history. Seriously, you can tell that hundreds, if not thousands of hours have gone into crafting each level to perfection. Each platform, enemy or even background item has been placed perfectly for the good of the level. Enemies are in just the right place to be able to cope with on a normal run, but if you were to try and speed run it, you’ll find they’re also in the perfect spot to be just in the way. It’s the kind of thing that you don’t see outside the very best of games.
This in turn leads to the little touches that add up to making Astro Bot such a joyous gaming experience. You know when you fire up a AAA first-party Nintendo game and you know you’re going to get a game full of charm and character because there’s simply no one who does that kind of thing better? Well, Astro Bot is up there with the very best of Nintendo’s efforts. The titular character and everyone you’ll meet is just chock full of the kind of charm and character that up until now, only Nintendo (or N64 era RARE) could pull off.
There’s just so much charm here that it’s impossible to play without a beaming smile the whole time. Even during the more frustrating sections, something will happen and you’ll suddenly find yourself smiling again. Very rarely, if at all did I find myself shouting at the telly because I’d missed a jump, or collided with an enemy I’d misjudged and on the odd time I did, I was soon back to smiling again. Astro Bot has that much charm.
Sonically, it’s also up there, although not all the music is as memorable as the Mario tune. Each world has its own music that usually fits its surroundings. There are a few occasions where the music doesn’t feel quite right, but in general, it’s spot on. A particular favourite of mine is a level where you grow a tree, then work your way to the top, all the time the tree sings to you as you go. Again, a level full of the kind of charm you don’t see outside of Nintendo.
The only negative I can think of is that some of the charm from Astro Bots Playroom is missing. There are no clouds happily singing along to the stage’s music for example and a few levels feel a little short, but there isn’t a lot not to like here. The game length is about right. You can probably rush to the ending in between 8-10 hours, but you’ll be missing the point and also be missing so much more. It’ll take double that time easily if you want to 100% the game. Something I’m going to try and do now.
Astro Bot is available exclusively for the PlayStation 5 now.
Platforms: PlayStation 5
Developers: Team ASOBI
Publishers: Sony Interactive Entertainment
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