Our favourite moments of magic in Astro Bot
It’s fair to say Astro Bot, Sony’s latest PS5 exclusive, has captured the imagination of the Eurogamer team. It’s a wonderful platformer, full of creativity, fun game design, and plenty of nostalgic cameo bots, described by Christian Donlan as “a wildly generous delight” in our Eurogamer Astro Bot review.
As he put it, “fans of bits and pieces are going to absolutely love Astro Bot” – but which of those bits and pieces are our favourites? It’s not very often we feel this unanimously positive about something, so we thought we’d get together to pick out some of our favourite moments of design magic, be it intriguing concepts or specific levels.
Be aware there are a few small spoilers for Astro Bot below – and half the fun is discovering these moments for yourself – so read on once you’ve finished the adventure and let us know your own favourites in the comments!
The DualSense controller’s clinking trotters
One of the most magnificent things about Astro Bot, in my opinion at least, is the use of the DualSense Controller’s built-in speaker. There’s so much adorable audio being pumped through that little speaker that your ears would still have a lovely time even if you were playing the game with the TV on mute! From the roar of the Dual Speeder’s boosters as you pull on the Sense’s triggers, or the cartoon-esque, magical jingling noise as you fly through clusters of colourful stars, down to the way that different surfaces create different noises as Astro runs across them, the attention to aural detail here is just incredible. Grassy surfaces produce a shuffly rustling noise which gives way to little clanky tippy taps as Astro trots along from lawn to pavement, whilst diving into water rewards you with a nice splashing noise on entry before the sound of bubbles bursts from between your fingers with each underwater breaststroke.
