2024 Game of the Year Baby (According to Geoff’s Awards)
I was jealous that the PS5 owners get to have Astro Bot mainly because I’m pretty sure that it won’t come to PC. It’s just too Playstation, it’s a celebration of everything Playstation in fact. The most fun I had playing this game was guessing the Playstation characters being portrayed by the little bots.
You play as Astro whose PS5 ship crashes due to space bully Nebulax, his crew is scattered across the galaxies. The game has six galaxies and 60 planets to explore. Each galaxy has a boss that has stolen one of the pieces of your PS5. After defeating the boss and acquiring the ship part you will play a level based on one important Playstation franchise, such as Uncharted and Ape Escape.
There is a hub planet where you rebuild your PS5 and where your crew hangs out. You can use your bot friends to help you get around the hub, some areas are closed off until you get a certain number of bots. Other than bots you can also collect puzzle pieces throughout the levels. When brought back to the hub you can use the pieces to create buildings that can be used for fun bonuses like being able to change Astros outfit. One of the buildings is a Gatcha room where, using the coins you collect, you can acquire items for your bots to use as props. When a bot crew member gets their special item you can punch them and they will perform special animations.
The gameplay consists of Astro using a specific ability acquired in the level to solve puzzles while platforming. An example of this is the Frog Gloves that allow you to punch enemies from a distance and swing on sticky areas of the map. When redoing a level you can choose to pay coins to have a little bluebird follow you around to help you find any collectibles you may have missed. Post game there is still a lot to do. You unlock challenge stages and play the free DLCs. The DLCs include speedrun levels, time attack modes and a whole Christmas level.
Astro Bot killed it during the award season so is it worth it? It’s a little pricey and it is a Playstation exclusive but it is an extremely fun and challenging platformer. I’m so happy that platformer games are in the spotlight again since I have such a soft spot for them. I would love for more mascot platformers to come from Astro Bots’ success. It is worth it but maybe get it on sale.
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