A full-fledged console Astro Bot platformer is something we’ve all been hoping to see for a while now, thanks to how much the mascot impressed with the likes of Astro Bot Rescue Mission and Astro’s Playroom. Soon, that’s exactly what we’ll be getting with the upcoming Astro Bot, which has looked incredibly promising since the moment we first laid eyes on it upon its announcement earlier this year. Ahead of its imminent release, here we’ll be going all the key details that you should know about Astro Bot.
SETUP
Astro Bot is going to be the eponymous mascot’s first full console game, but what exactly has set him off on his journey this time? The upcoming platformer will see Astro and his fellow bots in trouble when the PS5 mothership crashes and malfunctions, sending bots careening through multiple different galaxies. Afterward, it falls to Astro to travel the galaxies aboard his trusty DualSense-shaped Dual Speeder to find and rescue the other bots.
LEVELS AND GALAXIES
One of the most pertinent questions that can be asked about any platformer is- how many levels is it going to have? Team Asobi and Sony have confirmed that Astro Bot is going to be quite a sizeable platformer, offering over 80 levels for players to complete across six different galaxies. You can expect plenty of environmental diversity as well, based on all the footage that we’ve seen of the game.
ENEMIES
Variety is looking like it’s going to be the name of the game in Astro Bot, and that is seemingly going to apply to its roster of enemies as well. We don’t know how many total enemy types to expect in the game, but we have seen plenty of familiar ones from past titles that will be making a return. On top of that, it’s also confirmed that the game will feature over 70 entirely new enemy types.
BOSSES
In addition to the many regular enemies that you’ll find throughout the galaxies, Astro will, of course, lock horns with plenty of big bad bosses as well. The total number of bosses is yet to be concerned, but from familiar foes like a giant gorilla and equally large octopus to intimidating newcomers like a towering snake, we’ve seen glimpses of some exciting boss fights already.
OVER 300 BOTS TO RESCUE
With more than 80 levels to tackle, how many bots will Astro be rescuing as he journeys across different galaxies? Well, quite a few, as it turns out. Team Asobi and Sony have confirmed that Astro Bot will feature over 300 bots to rescue, with regular story levels featuring over a dozen bots each on average. Of those 300 bots, about half are going to be VIP bots. Speaking of which…
PLAYSTATION ICONS
Astro’s Playroom delighted with its bevy of PlayStation easter eggs and cameos, and Astro Bot will be doubling down on that. 150 of the bots in the game are VIP bots, which means they’ll be characters from a number of different PlayStation IP over the years (or bot versions of them, at least). In addition, you can even expect levels themed after PlayStation games and franchise.
DIFFICULTY OPTIONS
3D platformers of Astro Bot’s ilk tend to target audiences across all age groups, which means the game will cast a wide net with its approach to difficulty. In a nutshell, different levels will fall under different difficulty categorizations. Most of the levels in the main story will be either easy or normal, but you can expect plenty of optional platforming challenges and gauntlets that will fall under the hard difficulty.
DUALSENSE
Astro’s Playroom is still the best advertisement for the DualSense and its capabilities, and Team Asobi has said that it’s looking to keep that going with Astro Bot. That means we can look forward to even better implementation of the controller’s haptic feedback and adaptive triggers, in addition to plenty of new features, such as a plethora of new accessibility options.
OVERHAULED ENGINE
Astro Bot isn’t going to have to live up to the sort of expectations with its visuals that the likes of God of War or Horizon do, but it’s still looking incredibly charming and vibrant. As per Team Asobi, a lot of that is down to an engine overhaul. Speaking about the same with YouTuber Julien Chièze, director Nicolas Doucet said, “I don’t know if it’s necessarily easy to see. You’d have to see side by side, but we have a total overhaul of the team’s engine, which means that Astro Bot can be a lot prettier, and have a lot more physics and things than there were compared to Astro’s Playroom.”
NO VR SUPPORT PLANNED
Given how excellent Astro Bot Rescue Mission was as a PS VR killer app, it’s no surprise that many are hoping to see more Astro content in the virtual reality space- though Astro Bot isn’t going to be it. According to Nicolas Doucet, the game doesn’t have VR support and was never meant to, right from day one. Speaking with Push Square about the same, he said, “When we talk about VR versus non-VR, for a game like Astro, if you were to make a VR version, it has to be fully designed for that medium,” he added. “And if it’s not a VR version, it has to be fully designed for that medium. Certain games can afford to be hybrid, like first-person games, because there’s a closer similarity. But in our case, the design philosophy for both are very, very different. So, you know, it was a decision to expand on the world of Astro’s Playroom and bring Astro to the big stage. So from the beginning, that was really our focus.”
AN OPEN WORLD STRUCTURE WAS CONSIDERED
The level-based structure is what we see most often in platformers, whether 2D or 3D, and though that’s what Astro Bot will stick with as well, if things had gone differently, it may have been an open world game. Speaking in an interview with EDGE magazine, Nicolas Doucet revealed that an open world approach was initially considered for Astro Bot, but Team Asobi ended up going for a level-based structure since, in his words, “that was the one that gave us the most control over the game’s variety.”
FILE SIZE
When Astro Bot arrives on September 6, you’ll need a decent chunk of free storage space on your PlayStation 5 console. As spotted on the back of the game’s physical boxes, Astro Bot will require 66 GB of free storage. In comparison, Astro Bot Rescue Mission’s size was about 8 GB, while Astro’s Playroom clocked in at 11 GB.
LENGTH
Developer Team Asobi has described Astro Bot as a really big game – certainly the biggest that we’ve ever seen for the Astro series, pretty much by default – but exactly how long can we expect it to be? According to the developer, Astro Bot is going to be roughly 12-15 hours long, which sounds like a great length for a 3D platformer. In comparison, Astro Bot Rescue Mission was about 8-10 hours long.
DLC
Astro Bot is going to be a packed adventure even on day one, by the look of things, but Team Asobi intends to keep adding to it after launch. It’s been confirmed that soon after launch, Astro Bot will receive new DLC. What will that DLC be? How much of it can we expect? That much remains to be seen, but looking at how post-launch content was handled for Astro’s Playroom, we can probably at least expect new bots to rescue (some of whom may very well be VIP bots).
PRICE
Sony adopted the $70 pricing model for its big, flagship releases at the advent of the PS5 generation, but even though Astro Bot is looking like its most exciting release this year, the company is going to sell it at a relatively lower price. When it launches on September 6, Astro Bot’s standard edition will be priced at $60.