Astro Bot should feel cynical, a by-the-numbers 3D platformer designed to tap into the nostalgia people have for the now 30-year-old PlayStation – the Deadpool & Wolverine of the video game world. A cash-in, lifting the ideas of other games and throwing some iconic decoration on top, like a bog standard Victoria Sponge with yellow Minion icing fondant slapped over it. Enjoy this cake an extra amount because you bloody love Minions, don’t you, Timmy! Gorge yourself on the things you love and then spoil it all on social media!
And yet, Astro Bot absolutely isn’t any of those things. It’s a colourful, joyful leap through the past and present of PlayStation, and it exudes the kind of love for the medium that is usually only experienced in the best from Nintendo or, dare I say it, Sega during its blue skies peak.
As a modern 3D platformer, the absolute basics here are just as you’d expect and as tight as Nathan Drake’s eyelids in a sandstorm. Jump and punch through levels, but also jet hover (with added death to anything beneath the hover blast), spin, and use whichever power-ups offered that the level is designed around. Astro Bot is most similar to, if you are desperate for a comparison, Mario Odyssey, rather than the more action-oriented Ratchet & Clank: Rift Apart – although it has its moments. You might struggle to convince someone developer Team Asobi has created a pure platformer given the array of gadgets on show, but it’s about as close as we’re likely to get these days.