Astro Bot should be Sony’s big wakeup call
Move over Mario, there’s a new mascot in town. Astro Bot released on PS5 this week to near universal praise. And it’s not hard to see why. It’s chock full of the kind of whimsical fun you don’t really see from non-Nintendo publishers. Which puts Sony at a critical crossroads regarding the future of PlayStation exclusives. Especially in the wake of several major failures.
It’s clear from the marketing that Astro Bot was not meant to be as big a deal as it was. Concord was meant to be their big flagship exclusive for 2024. Meanwhile, it was intended to be a more niche title to round out what has overall been a slow year for PlayStation. Then when Concord was unveiled back at what would have been E3, it was met with a collective shrug. Then when it launched, it lasted just 10-days on the market before Sony pulled the plug over low sales. It will likely go down as the single biggest flop in video game history. Meanwhile Stellar Blade and Astro Bot have been picking up heaps of accolades, and strong sales.
Sony Interactive Entertainment under CEO Jim Ryan had bet the farm over live service titles. Like most other Western publishers, they also went big on DEI and the “modern audience”. This may have made sense at the time. Though the actual audience has shown they’re getting burnt out on both. The market for live services has become over-saturated, with most new games shutting down fairly quickly. Though none cost as much to make as Concord did.
PlayStation as a brand is certainly not a stranger to copying other peoples’ homework. What they put out was a cheap Overwatch clone with unappealing hero characters and dull mechanics. Any live service that fails to distinguish itself from the crowd is going to fall flat on its face. Meanwhile, it highlighted just how small the “modern audience” actually is. A lot of noisy people were pushing these games on social media, and called you a bigot for not buying them. But when push comes to shove, they never show up to the party.
Astro Bot meanwhile is a video game in its purist form. It’s a simple, Mario style platformer that’s cute, family friendly, and celebrates PlayStation’s 30 year history. From all the gameplay footage I’ve seen so far, it looks like a ton of fun. No microtransactions or political baggage either. And was made by a small team on a fraction of Concord’s budget. At the time of writing, its currently the highest rated game on Metacritic for 2024. Both critics and gamers agree that Sony finally has a real gem on their hands.
What this shows is Sony isn’t completely FUBAR. At least not yet anyway. They can make games to the same high standards as Nintendo. Now they just need to make more of those. Whether they will is another story.
PlayStation still has six live service games in the pipeline. None of which are particularly promising. Both Fairgame and Marathon look just as hideous as Concord. The rest of their upcoming titles are nothing to be crazy about either.
Nintendo meanwhile has been an absolute juggernaut this generation, putting out modern classic after modern classic. The House of Mario understands the core of what makes a good game. That philosophy has kept them going for over 40 years, after the death of countless competitors. Sony would be wise to adapt this same strategy going forward. Hopefully Astro Bot is just the start of a revival.
