Table of contents
- Astro Bot is a nostalgic, high-quality platformer that feels like a love letter to classic PlayStation games while showcasing the PS5's capabilities.
- Explore, collect, and rescue in a galaxy full of surprises and nostalgia, with just the right mix of fun and challenge!
- This game is a nostalgic, well-crafted platformer that will revive even the most cynical gamer.
Astro Bot is a nostalgic, high-quality platformer that feels like a love letter to classic PlayStation games while showcasing the PS5's capabilities.
And we're back with another episode of Before You Buy, the show where we give you some straight-up gameplay and our first impressions of the latest games releasing. As usual, it's me, Jake Baldino, and we've been very busy over here. It's been a very busy week for good games. Astro Bot is really good, and you've probably seen some of the reviews and headlines out there. I agree with the sentiments; this is a really fun game.
This is going to be a pretty short and sweet, simple review because it is straightforward. This is a 100% old-school action mascot platformer type game from the early days of PlayStation 1 and Nintendo 64. It's got all the charm, magic, and everything you're really looking for. Just so you know, I've been playing a review copy, and all this footage is captured on PS5. It's the only place where the game is available right now. This footage is also going to be spoiler-free, which I know is a weird thing to say for such a simple little game, but it's got a lot of hidden surprises and really cool things to discover. I'm going to try to avoid as much of those as possible here because I do think some of the fun of the game is stumbling upon and seeing these weird, wild, crazy things.
Essentially, Astro Bot is a full spin on Astro's Playroom. This was the pack-in free game that came with the PlayStation 5 when it launched in 2020. I told you guys to play this when I did my PS5 Before You Buy, but nobody believed me. That was a shorter but well-made, fun platformer experience revolving around all the classic PlayStation consoles. You were collecting stuff, running, and jumping. Now, this is a full-fledged title with a lot more levels, stuff to do, and more to collect, but with the same philosophies and ideas—just really, really high-quality, high-fidelity platforming and play with a big emphasis on using the DualSense controller and its haptics and rumble feedbacks to their maximum degree. To the point where, yeah, it's going to kill your battery, but this is a very fun, interesting game.
You know, it's part nostalgia bait. You're collecting little bots that often represent classic PlayStation characters. There are tons here, a lot of surprises—not even first-party PlayStation characters but third-party characters and things that were part of PlayStation's heyday. So, it's going for a bit of that nostalgia, and honestly, it's working. On the other hand, it's kind of like an advertisement or a commercial for the PlayStation 5. At first glance, you fly around on a DualSense controller. The end goal of this game is to find all the missing pieces and fix your giant PlayStation 5 mothership. So yes, the cynical side can say this is like a PS5 ad, but the more you play it, the more that nostalgia and the PlayStation-centric stuff melts away. It's always there, yes, celebrating a lot of fond memories I personally had as a young gamer. But along with that, like I said, there is just high-quality, fun, well-designed platforming, engaging enemies, and really fun little abilities you pick up and use for a level and drop and don't see again for quite some time. There's a lot of variety.
Explore, collect, and rescue in a galaxy full of surprises and nostalgia, with just the right mix of fun and challenge!
The way it's structured, I should probably back up, is that you launch from your kind of base planet and you have five different galaxies. From these maps, you can hover to a galaxy, select it, zoom in, and then within that galaxy, there are a bunch of little planets. Each planet is a level. A lot of levels aren't super long, but it's worth noting that all these little galaxies do have a handful or more of them, as well as secret ones to explore to unlock things and get further in the game. To unlock things, progress, and gain access to more of these galaxies, you need to play these levels, complete them, and collect little astrobots. The main objective is finding, collecting, and rescuing all these cute little robot guys. Some of them happen to be wearing costumes from famous PlayStation characters. If you collect a certain amount, you're able to move forward and usually fight the boss of that cluster of planets. There are about 300 of these Bots to collect, and you need 200 to get to the final boss. If you're a completionist, you'll have 300 Bots to go after, but it's not really a grind. Many of them are cleverly hidden, and some are easy to find. The fun lies in discovering one in a convoluted spot, which might also be a reference to one of your favorite old games.
Each level often equips you with a power-up, such as big punchy spring arms, a robot dog jetpack, or the ability to transform into a tiny mouse, which changes the whole level. These abilities bring variety to each level, adding a gimmick to the design. They all feel refreshing and fun, and the game remixes and recycles them effectively. Coupled with the fact that every level feels different or throws a new element or enemy type at you, there's always creativity and something new to see. My only complaint with some of these abilities is the reliance on motion controls, which can be a bit finicky. For example, the monkey climbing backpack requires you to motion move the controller to control the arms, which felt annoying. Thankfully, the game offers options to turn off such features if you prefer.
The game has the right difficulty level; it's not super challenging and is quite forgiving. It will be fun for children or younger siblings, especially since there is never any downtime. The game consistently rewards you, even if you find a dead end or squeeze into a weird area with nothing significant. You're often still rewarded with coins, a crate to break, or a secret. There's always something happening, providing a constant endorphin rush.
This game is a nostalgic, well-crafted platformer that will revive even the most cynical gamer.
I enjoy a challenging platformer once in a while, and while this game overall is definitely on the easier side, I'm glad that they put the work in to introduce some more challenging levels for us sweaty weirdos out there. Structurally, it is a platformer where you're collecting coins, robots, and puzzle pieces. All this stuff you bring back to your Hub Planet, which is the planet that has the crashed PS5 that you're trying to slowly rebuild. This is where you essentially dump all your rescued little robot characters. Here, you get to walk around and see some of the cool classic PlayStation characters you collected. Once you unlock an item for them, you're able to see them do a cool little move. There are just some incredible references here, some really deep cuts that will surprise some older gamers. Along with that, there are a couple of really surprising omissions—some characters and franchises that didn't make the cut in this game, and you really wonder why. From a business sense, there are other ones that make no sense for them to be here, yet somehow they are. So, it's kind of all over the place but still cool.
As you go around this world, you unlock little puzzle pieces that give you more things to do in your little Hub area, like equipping your Astro with special costumes and opening up this Hub world with more of your little bot guys. The more you walk around and explore, you'll find spots where you can call over your buddies. If you have rescued enough of them, they will help unlock a little section for you or unearth a secret for you to get more stuff. Even the Hub world is designed around always giving you something, always entertaining you, always having a little something here and there. The game just manages to be consistently fun and interesting at a steady rate. It is incredibly satisfying, not to mention the fact that it looks really good. There are a lot of cool particle effects and lighting going on here, but it's really just smooth visuals, good performance, and some really incredible music. Astro's Playroom also had this, and essentially they just turned it up to 11 here. There are a lot more themes for all the various levels, and some of these weird little jingles will probably get stuck in your head.
Look, I know I sound like I'm shilling for this one, but it's a simple fun game. If you just look at these games and think they're for kids and you're just not into it, or you were never the demographic for this game, I don't know if this one will win you over. But if you've grown into a cynical gamer over time, the industry's got you down, the discourse has you down, this type of game will revive you. If you grew up playing games like this or you just miss this level of fun factor in a game, I think this game will bring life to even the most cynical gamer. You can't help but smile. Like I said, this is a simple video because it is a simple game. I don't want to really waste too much of your time. It is just a good, straightforward, really well-made platformer that can be thrilling, entertaining, consistently engaging, and creative. It gives you a little bit of nostalgia but alongside that nostalgia, just good clean fun.
It's going to take you probably 10 hours or more to finish it, but if you're a completionist, you could probably squeeze like 15 hours out of this. I know for a full $60, for some people, that's not enough game. I always say everybody's wallet, everybody's time, and everybody's value is different. I would just say whatever your situation is, play it at some point because I think this is a great game. I think you're going to hear about this on some Game of the Year lists. I know when a game gets overwhelming praise across the board, people very quickly usually get skeptical. But with this one, it's very uncomplicated. It's just a platformer, and it's just a damn good one.
That's a Before You Buy. You know how this goes by now: I give you some pros, some cons, and some personal opinion, and now I want to hear yours down in the comments. Do you have any experience with the previous Astro Bot things other than Playroom? I never really cared about this little mascot. It felt like just a silly, like I said before, PlayStation advertisement type thing. But now with this game, I think the tides are changing. If anything, just the developers, Team Asobi, you should definitely keep an eye on them. So let me know what you think about the developer, the team, the game, anything at all regarding Astro Bot or PlayStation. Let us know. Hopefully, this video just helped you out. Maybe seeing the gameplay or hearing my dumb voice informed you in some way. If it did, clicking the like button does help us out. Thank you. Like I said, we've been very busy for you guys, so hopefully, this stuff helps. Thank you very much for watching. We put out videos every single day, so subscribe if you're new. Either way, thanks for watching. We'll see you guys next time.