Every videogame would be better if it was the cutest thing ever made. Astro Bot understands this. It’s on a one-game mission to turn Sony’s most popular games into the most adorable possible versions of themselves, and it’s basically batting a thousand at that. If 2020’s Astro’s Playroom was a love letter to PlayStation hardware, Astro Bot is the same for its software—a nostalgic platformer that does for Sony’s characters and history what Super Smash Bros. does for Nintendo’s. Whether you feel any particular connection to PlayStation biz or not, Astro Bot will make you care—about Astro Bot, at least.
If you’re new to the scene, here’s what’s going down: Astro Bot is a robot in space. They are the cutest damn robot you ever done seen. They make that little bowling ball from Star Wars look like a gutter full of puke, that’s how cute they are. 300 of their just-as-cute buddies have been captured by a green glob of an alien in a too-small saucer and its goons, and as a heroic kind of bot our friend has to go and rescue them all. And oh, half of those 300 aren’t just bots, but astro bot forms of hotshot Sony favorites, like Kratos and his boy, Nathan Drake, Um Jammer Lammy (you know, the lead character of the PlayStation Connected Universe), The Last Guardian’s cat-dog-dragon, some Sackboys, a whole gaggle of those kooky LocoRoco blobs, etc. (Is Jeanne D’Arc hiding somewhere in this astro galaxy? I dunno, but maybe.) You fly Astro Bot around in a DualSense-shaped spaceship, barnstorming through dozens of planets in a solar system conveniently split up into the equivalent of five platforming worlds, all the while trying to rescue as many bots as you can find. Even if you’re a weird sociopathic nerd who feels no empathy for the cutest kidnapped robots ever, you’ll still want to track ‘em all down, as access to newer and higher levels is tied to how many total bots you’ve freed. In Mario parlance, the bots are stars. And yeah: these bots are all stars, main eventers in any arena in the country, even the ones whose schtick isn’t that they look like a character from a game you played in 1998.
You’re not Astro Bot’s only helper. Across the game your main bot will avail itself of a variety of helpful buddies that are basically single-level power-ups with personality. There’s a robot bulldog—a robodawg, if you will—that clings on to Astro Bot’s back and hurls them head-first into breakable walls like a battering ram. A mechanical chicken is a makeshift rocket jetpack, a two-fisted backpack wallops harder than Smokin’ Joe, and a friendly clock slows down time in one of the more commonly used abilities, When added to Astro Bot’s regular arsenal of jumping, punching, floating, and windmilling about all fists a-flyin’, it results in a diverse set of actions and activities that often switches from one level to the next.
The highlights come after the boss battle in each corner of the solar system. During most levels you’ll rescue somewhere around six or eight bots, a combo of regular joes and ones in PlayStation cosplay. During the ostensible boss battles you’ll usually only encounter one or two—and they’ll all be an obvious reference to one of Sony’s biggest franchises. After beating the boss—which isn’t always a gimme; they get legitimately kind of difficult later in the game—you’ll find yourself in a newly revealed final level for that area, which translates a PlayStation blockbuster into the Astro Bot world. In an Uncharted-themed level you’ll find yourself with a Nerf-style gun, shooting your way through an ancient South American temple with a handful of major setpieces lifted directly from Nathan Drake’s games. After rescuing Kratos you’re transported to the Norse-influenced world of the last two God of War games, complete with an axe that freezes enemies and returns to you at the press of a button, and spectral green ravens that you have to kill as a kind of collectible.
Beyond the game’s overall cuteness, these levels are the best thing in Astro Bot. They continue the company-referencing mandate that the series has become known for, but in a way that presents fun and novel twists on not just Astro Bot’s mechanics but these other PlayStation games, as well. I don’t know if it’s shocking that the best version of God of War can be found in an Astro Bot game, but it’s the truth.
Those constant references to other PlayStation hits—and even third-party games like Resident Evil, Metal Gear Solid, and Persona—are often cool and eye-opening. After the last game’s focus on hardware, this navel-gazing is also potentially turning into a crutch, though. The three Astro Bot games, collectively, are better than almost every other series that they make reference to. If at some point Sony thought a new mascot platformer—a genre not especially in fashion when the first standalone game starring Astro Bot came out in 2018—needed easter eggs to PlayStation systems and games to appeal to a modern audience, the ecstatic response to those platformers should have proven they can stand on their own by now. It’s not like this game is any less enjoyable just because there are little robot versions of Aloy and Gravity Rush’s Kat bopping around, but ultimately Astro Bot is as much about celebrating all these other games as it is celebrating itself. And that’s unnecessary: this adorable little nugget is more than lovable enough to support its own adventure. The spectacular Astro Bot is yet more proof.
Astro Bot was developed by Team Asobi and published by Sony. It’s available for the PlayStation 5.
Senior editor Garrett Martin writes about videogames, comedy, travel, theme parks, wrestling, music, and more. He’s also on Twitter @grmartin.