Astro Bot's Adorable Evolution: From Playroom to PS5 Star

Astro Bot, the charming robotic character, has captured hearts since his first appearance in Playroom VR. Now, eight years later, he's set to take centre stage in his titular PS5 adventure – Astro Bot. We caught up with Team Asobi's studio director Nicolas Doucet to delve into the origins and development of this iconic PlayStation mascot.

From Little AR Men to Baby Robots

Astro Bot's journey began with Team Asobi's experimentation with the DualShock 4 controller's connection to the PS4 camera. This led to a demo provisionally named Little AR (Augmented Reality) Men, featuring tiny robots that players could interact with on their living room floor.

"That was the starting point," Doucet shared. "We initially used primitive shapes for prototypes. The characters were just robots made of cylinders with little eyes. We later renamed them AR Bots."

The team collaborated with artists to bring these characters to life, but faced a tight deadline of just five months to implement the demo into The Playroom. To achieve a sci-fi aesthetic in such a short timeframe, they opted for a Sony robotics style.

"However, we also wanted them to be endearing, so we gave them big cute eyes and made them waddle like toddlers, transforming them into baby robots," Doucet explained.

From AR Bots to Astro Bot

As The Playroom evolved into The Playroom VR, the AR Bots were further customised, and Astro Bot himself emerged as a central character for a VR platformer prototype, which later became the Robots Rescue mini-game.

"Internally, we called him Captain Astro," Doucet revealed. "We added a PlayStation blue livery and more parts to make him stand out from the environment, gave him the ability to hover and modified his hands to grab things."

A Solo Adventure and a Refined Design

It wasn't until the 2018 solo PS VR platformer, Astro Bot Rescue Mission, that Astro officially received his name. This venture benefited from contributions from animation and art talent from other development teams, including Gravity Rush and The Last Guardian.

Rescue Mission involved refining Astro's design, both visually and gameplay-wise. Building upon his classic platformer design considerations – a low centre of gravity and a compact frame – the team added several key details, some of which were further enhanced in Astro Bot:

Eyes: Astro's blue LED eyes are crucial for his facial expressions, changing shape to convey various emotions. They also play a vital role in the VIP Bots featured in the game.

Jetpack: "In the original design, whenever Astro hovered, two small wings came out of his back for him to glide," Doucet explained. "We wanted to create a rationale behind the function."

Chrome dome: Astro Bot's star shines in more ways than one, with the plate on his head subtly reflecting the dazzling power of the PS5. From jungles to oceans, all the game's environments are now fully reflected on the back of Astro's silver head plating during his travels.

Robo voice: While Astro's cute, high-pitched voice might seem natural, a lot of thought went into his vocabulary, making him secretly a bit of a polyglot. "Astro fundamentally does not talk, but his sounds blend English and Japanese, as well as universal words and onomatopoeia, masked into robotic sounds," Doucet revealed. "He's enjoyed by children worldwide, so we also had to consider sonority, sounds and syllables that work for as many languages as possible."

Expanding Astro's World

The reflective head plate is just one example of Astro's growth over the years, now enhanced for PS5. The 4K resolution allows for greater detail and fidelity, making Astro and his companions pop, a quality that extends even to the game's flora and fauna.

"There's a lot of wildlife – about 70 new animals in this game," Doucet shared. "From frogs and small insects, to polar bears and elephants, and they all follow the design language of the bots with LED eyes. Even power-ups like Barkster the bulldog booster share these traits. The idea of blue LEDs for friends and red LEDs for enemies has become a trademark we've built upon."

Steeling Beloved PlayStation Characters

Astro Bot features VIP and Cameo Bots – in-game versions of popular PlayStation characters – which have delighted players since their reveal. While the franchise is no stranger to cameos, Astro Bot pushes the boundaries, with meticulous consideration given to integrating robotic tributes to Kratos, Aloy, Nathan Drake, and many others.

"They had to be cool sci-fi designs, but also feature things like fabrics or furry boots, which sometimes felt like we were going against the original intent of the character," Doucet explained. "So we substituted more organic materials, like hair, with materials such as vinyl."

"But with all of these characters, the eyes are paramount. Sometimes LED eyes just didn't work on certain characters because the original design relies heavily on the pupils being a specific size or colour. So, for more cartoony VIPs like Crash Bandicoot or from Ape Escape, the Bots wear a mask to help bridge that problem!"

Are you ready for Astro's first PS5 adventure? Prepare for space, speeders, and surprises as Astro Bot gears up for its launch on 6 September.