Did you like Astro’s Playroom? Definitely yes. Actually, the worst thing I can say about it is that it wasn’t enough – I finished its five levels and the final boss battle in a single evening. But as if in response to my hunger for more of the latest PlayStation mascots, the Asobi development team has opened the floodgates in Astro Bot, a game that looks to be everything I loved about Playroom, but with more.
I played a 45 minute demo of Astro Bot at the Summer Game Fest Play Days over the weekend and what a blast it was! What Astro’s Playroom got right, and what Astro Bot continues to absolutely miss, is that it’s incredibly fun to just run around and be Astro. Everything is fine-tuned to be just right: his movement speed, the height and distance he jumps, the precise way he smashes small crates and blasts enemies with his leg lasers, the density of obstacles in my path, and the precise way each stage follows a linear the way. but branches and loops back on itself to allow room for mystery. Running through a single level in Astro Bot puts my brain cells in a state of flow, where I’m constantly moving and always have a goal in mind, but don’t feel overwhelmed by my options. I love breaking things; I love jumping over things; I love reflecting things.
Where Astro’s Playroom had five main levels loosely themed around PlayStation 5 components, Astro Bot sends our little hero cruising through space atop a giant DualSense controller, hopping from planet to planet in search of his lost robot buddies. I’m told Astro Bot has about 80 levels to visit, all bursting with hidden bots, puzzle pieces, boss battles, goofy power-ups, coins, and little challenges leading to wonderful secrets.
I saw five levels throughout the game. One, a lush area with clear pools, pink flamingos and rolling green hills in the distance, was full of water mechanics. I swam through small reefs of colorful fish, slid down a giant water slide, and popped giant water bubbles to unleash a deluge inside. There, Astro could inflate himself like a small robotic bubble to quickly reach higher areas, a skill especially useful underwater. In another level focused on a construction zone, Astro scattered paint to reveal hidden platforms, sucked up metal objects with giant magnets, and equipped some kind of dog jetpack to zoom in on long distances that his usual hovering wouldn’t normally clear.
The next level centered around a boss fight with a giant octopus wearing boxing gloves. To compensate, I got a pair of my own frog-themed gauntlets that allowed Astro to hit enemies from a distance and swing like a monkey from certain overhangs. Another (wildly minor) criticism I had of Astro’s Playroom was that some of its power-up/vehicle sections frustrated me due to clunky movement mechanics as they tried to showcase the unique qualities of the PS5. Freed from that duty, Astro Bot can better focus on giving me new toys that are purely fun. Quick, solid, alternating punches with R1 and R2 made me feel like Goku was fighting an octopus and sent him packing.
The last two stages I tried were special challenge levels designed to test my platforming skills. One of them tested my ability to avoid fast-spinning enemies on crumbling platforms, while another forced me to perform stretches of complex jumps in limited time slots. I managed to finish both in the allotted time for the demo, though not without some struggle on the first one. From these two stages alone, it’s hard to gauge how high the difficulty of Astro Bot’s platformer will eventually climb. But what I enjoyed most about them was how fast the respawn time and overall brevity of the stages made trying again and again and again so easy and fun. I found myself saying, “One more try,” more than once, to try twice, thrice, ten more times. There was a moment towards the end of the demo where I stopped, looked around and realized that everyone else had already left the room. One more try…and I did it.
And yes, Astro Bot looks like a nostalgia fest. Sure, compared to Playroom, I think Astro Bot seems a little more focused on being an excellent platformer than reveling in PlayStation history. But that’s to the point – levels like the watery/flamingo one don’t need to have Bloodborne references every two tracks for me to be satisfied. Rather, the celebration of Astro Bot on PlayStation lies in the bots I rescue in each level, some of which are dressed as favorites such as Ratchet, Rivet, PaRappa and more. And I have reason to believe that fans of the biggest PlayStation franchises could be well rewarded for completing certain levels. For example, when I defeated an octopus, I rescued a pair of bots dressed as Kratos and Atreus, who then flew off to an icy-looking planet that I didn’t have access to in the demo. If my reading is correct, we may be in for a full-fledged God of War themed level in the full game, and possibly more.
When Team Asobi first started making Astro games, it was easy for me to mentally compare their work to Nintendo’s long history of platforming. Both have similar through lines, especially with how they both create games that feel like tactile, experimental toys, and how they both emphasize playfulness, joy, and surprise. But I’m pretty sure Team Asobi is beyond chasing Nintendo’s pedigree. Built on the foundations of Astro’s Playroom, Astro Bot seemed poised to elevate Astro games into a league of their own, if they weren’t already there. Are you telling me they have 80 levels of what I just played? Sign up to fly with Astro and crew.
Rebekah Valentine is a senior reporter for IGN. Got a story tip? Send it to rvalentine@ign.com.