THE KING OF 3D PLATFORMERS
Recently, I’ve found myself thinking a lot about the past—comparing the games of my childhood to those of today. I always arrive at the same conclusion: in 2025, games are better than ever (at least outside the AAA space) and continue to improve, yet I had more fun playing them as a kid. Astro Bot rekindles that feeling. And it’s not because of nostalgia for the genre—having grown up long before 3D platformers were even a thing, I’ve never been a huge fan—but something more elusive.
It’s about immediacy. Picking up a controller and instinctively knowing what to press, with precise and instant feedback. Looking at the screen and immediately understanding what to do. It’s the joy of simple mechanics, of not knowing what’s coming next, of being constantly surprised by each level’s twists and inventive gimmicks. It’s about interacting with everything and laughing at the outcome.
It’s also about being straightforward and respecting the player’s time. There’s no grinding for gear, currencies, or character levels. All your abilities are available from the start, and every collectible can be obtained the moment you spot it. No microtransactions. No DLC. Just pure, unfiltered joy. It feels as if the level designers were given nothing more than a loose theme—candy, jungle, construction site, haunted castle—and free rein to go wild, trusting that skilled programmers would make every outrageous idea work. The enthusiasm is contagious.
The best way to experience Astro Bot is to go in blind, so I’ll keep the setup brief. Its clearest inspiration is the 3D Mario games, especially Super Mario Galaxy. The game opens with a short cinematic: Astro and his crew cruise the galaxy aboard their PS5-shaped spaceship when a massive green alien appears, rips the console apart, steals its CPU, and vanishes. The ship crashes on a desert planet, scattering its parts and crew across the universe. Astro’s mission is to travel from planet to planet, recover the components, and rescue his lost friends.
Astro Bot could only exist on the PS5. Not only is the console itself woven into the narrative, but the game makes masterful use of the DualSense controller. Haptic feedback simulates trickling rain on your fingertips, adaptive triggers convey the tension of drawing a bowstring, and blowing into the microphone (screaming works too) activates in-game fans. The gyroscope is used for steering during landings and more. These features never feel gimmicky—they make you feel physically connected to the world.
Another delight is the abundance of PlayStation-specific cameos: adorable bot versions of characters like Solid Snake, Ico, Dante, and Parappa the Rapper. You need to rescue a certain number to unlock each world’s boss, and the more you find, the more secrets and optional content open up. They’re never explicitly named, turning identification itself into a playful meta-game.
At the end of each world, a character-specific level awaits, starring one of PlayStation’s heavy hitters (I won’t spoil which). Each introduces a mechanic inspired by that character. If the game has a weakness, it’s here: a few of these levels feel constrained by the original character’s more traditional mechanics, briefly reducing Astro Bot to something more ordinary. One of them, however—based on a particularly unconventional game—is absolutely brilliant.
That minor nitpick aside, Astro Bot is the closest I’ve come to a perfect game. Every level is impeccably balanced in scope and challenge, and the way they evolve is astonishing. Typically, you’re given a level-specific ability right at the start—boxing gloves, a time-slowing clock, a shrinking device—and Team ASOBI’s creativity in building puzzles and platforming challenges around them is nothing short of jaw-dropping. In this regard, it even dethrones Super Mario Galaxy.
Despite the sheer number of stages, the game never feels repetitive. Levels often transform midway into something entirely unexpected. In one moment, I was crossing a bridge toward the goal when a massive fish leapt up and swallowed me whole. I had to escape from its stomach, navigating rising acid levels, smashing teeth, and clawing my way back out. Some stages end with mini-boss fights, and each world culminates in a grand showdown.
The controls are frictionless and intuitive, using as few buttons as possible: one for jumping, one for punching, one for special abilities. Holding the punch unleashes a devastating spin attack. Enemies come in many variations, all with clear, readable patterns. Some can be punched outright, others require dodging first, and a few demand gliding over them while soaking them with a Super Mario Sunshine-inspired jetstream. The camera deserves special praise too—it’s invisible in the best possible way, seamlessly shifting between free movement and fixed perspectives.
It almost feels wrong to spoil how generous the game is with secrets. Hidden warp holes lead to entire bonus galaxies, with levels as detailed and inventive as the main ones. Exploring the galaxy map may reveal brutally difficult challenge courses: retro-styled pixel trials, urban arenas balanced on crumbling platforms, or the infamous PlayStation face-button gauntlets. These are long, punishing, and checkpoint-free. They pushed me to my limits—I must have died close to a hundred times on the hardest ones—but the eventual triumph was euphoric. Rescuing yet another bot was trivial compared to the sense of accomplishment.
The surprises never stop. I laughed out loud while trying to enlarge Astro in a cramped space, watching him bonk his head on the ceiling and shrink back down. Every tune invites you to hum along. Every model begs to be touched. No detail feels like mere decoration, no ledge unworthy of exploration—because it might lead to more game.
Experiences like this are rare today, where the sheer novelty of playing takes center stage. There’s almost no text to read; instead, the game communicates through a universal visual language of gestures, icons, and expressive little screen-faces. Astro Bot is a lavish, almost excessive celebration of play—a feast for the eyes and for your controller-wielding hands. It is, without hesitation, the best 3D platformer I’ve ever played.
My only concern is a troubling one: will I ever enjoy another, or has Astro Bot ruined the genre for me?
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