For most studios/publishers yes. But, Sony very much cares about the prestige of the Playstation brand and other studios have very much cared about Metacritic scores to the extent they've tied them to bonuses. Obviously, they care the most about sales (or in Sony's case about bringing people to the Playstation eco-system so they can make the 30% off third-party sales).
Astro Bot (PS5 - 9/6 - 94 Metacritic)
- Thread starter The Merchant
- Start date
Beau Knows
Registered User
This looks great.
I don't know why Sony and Microsoft haven't been trying to make more games like this.
I don't know why Sony and Microsoft haven't been trying to make more games like this.
- Aug 24, 2011
- 28,302
- 13,169
Seriously. It’s going to have great sales the whole rest of the year too, if not for years to come
Mikeaveli
Registered User
I saw there is a full on Ape Escape level in this game complete with monkey catching lol. I'd like to see this team get a chance at making Ape Escape 4.
I'll check this game out if it ever drops on PC.
I'll check this game out if it ever drops on PC.
What you see is apparently the remnants of a new ape escape game the dev team pitched, but were shut down on.
They absolutely do mean something. Lots of studios base their bonus structure entirely on review scores.
syz
[1, 5, 6, 14]
- Jul 13, 2007
- 30,357
- 15,830
This has become increasingly less true over the last decade or so as influencers have replaced the press.
But even so, whether or not a developer gets a bonus has no impact on the larger trends in the industry. Your game can be 100 on MC but if it doesn't make enough money to keep investors happy your studio is still at risk.
I just beat the mainline of the game, and absolutely enjoyed it. Truly a tribute to PlayStation. The themed levels were just amazing, and used 3 of my favorite Sony IPs, and the other one were good references to the history of Sony's Japan Studio.
If you don't want to be spoiled on all the bots, don't watch this, but this explains the references of every themed bot in the game. A lot of them I caught, as I'm quite familiar with some of the iconic IPs used. But, quite a few I never would have got what its a reference too.
Edit: Slight spoiler
If you don't want to be spoiled on all the bots, don't watch this, but this explains the references of every themed bot in the game. A lot of them I caught, as I'm quite familiar with some of the iconic IPs used. But, quite a few I never would have got what its a reference too.
Edit: Slight spoiler
While, this game with the bots has a great amount of IPs that were iconic and even if not exclusive to Sony, people would somewhat connect them to the brand. I was pretty surprised that at least 2 games/franchised weren't referenced. First one is Spider-Man, my guess is Sony didn't want to pay whatever ridiculous licensing fee Marvel would want for even a reference bot to it. The other very shocking one given the relationship between the companies is there isn't a single FF7 reference, very surprised to not see at least a Cloud Strife bot. It seems Square didn't allow any of their IP to be used, which is a bit surprising given their relationship with Sony, and alongside Crash, Spyro, Tomb Raider, Resident Evil, Gran Turismo and Metal Gear Solid I'd say are the the defining games of the PS1 era. All of those except Gran Turismo I believe are referenced. Capcom, Konami and even Activision/Microsoft (who knows when the agreement for Crash and Spyro was signed) were fine with their IPs being used. In Konami's case Metal Gear Solid, in Capcoms case references Street Fighter, Devil May Cry, Monster Hunter and Resident Evil and in MS's case they own the IP to Crash and Spyro now[./SPOILER]
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I finished it as well (platinum trophy and all) and all i can say is; fantastic
Going back and forth on the level design for a bit i was trying to figure out what their biggest inspiration for this game was. Someone here said Mario 3D World which after playing the first couple levels i was like "yeah okay i can see that." But after playing through it entirely? Honestly, the game gives me major Sunshine vibes with a lot of the levels having verticality to them and some of astro's powerups being straight up lifted from that game. The chicken is literally just the rocket nozzle by a different name, the penguin giving you the ability to speed through water like the speed nozzle, Astro's basic jump being a hover caused by shooting two beams into the ground to elevate him. Difference is i dug this game a lot where with sunshine...not so much lol.
This design choice also helps to seriously diversify the experience for the player. Each level essentially has its own gimmick to it and cleverly reuses said gimmicks. You might see the slo-mo power up multiple times, but it's never quite used in the same way. Biggest standouts are obviously the end levels of each world which are built in the image of specific Playstation games. They do a fantastic job of infusing whatever the big gimmick is in that game (like Kratos' leviathan axe or Aloy's bow combat) into this to the point i was so stunned at how natural it felt. "Oh this is a god of war level time to start throwing my axe...wait what?" type of thing.
Everything else, as stated is basically a big. cutesy love letter to playstation's history. Everything from the dumb inside jokes (Kratos' astro bot being referred to as "dad of boy" and the god of war level using BOI as a beat drop for the music) to the amount of games referenced. They got everything from the obvious first party sony stuff old and new like Crash, Spyro, and Jak to the new generation of heroes like Aloy, Nathan Drake and Ellie/Joel. Then there's the stuff that while not exclusive to Sony these days, it absolutely made its mark thanks to Playstation like Resident Evil, Tomb Raider, Tekken and Metal Gear Solid. Then there's the stupidly obscure/deep cuts which went way farther than i thought.
All in all, fantastic experience. Do recommend.
Going back and forth on the level design for a bit i was trying to figure out what their biggest inspiration for this game was. Someone here said Mario 3D World which after playing the first couple levels i was like "yeah okay i can see that." But after playing through it entirely? Honestly, the game gives me major Sunshine vibes with a lot of the levels having verticality to them and some of astro's powerups being straight up lifted from that game. The chicken is literally just the rocket nozzle by a different name, the penguin giving you the ability to speed through water like the speed nozzle, Astro's basic jump being a hover caused by shooting two beams into the ground to elevate him. Difference is i dug this game a lot where with sunshine...not so much lol.
This design choice also helps to seriously diversify the experience for the player. Each level essentially has its own gimmick to it and cleverly reuses said gimmicks. You might see the slo-mo power up multiple times, but it's never quite used in the same way. Biggest standouts are obviously the end levels of each world which are built in the image of specific Playstation games. They do a fantastic job of infusing whatever the big gimmick is in that game (like Kratos' leviathan axe or Aloy's bow combat) into this to the point i was so stunned at how natural it felt. "Oh this is a god of war level time to start throwing my axe...wait what?" type of thing.
Everything else, as stated is basically a big. cutesy love letter to playstation's history. Everything from the dumb inside jokes (Kratos' astro bot being referred to as "dad of boy" and the god of war level using BOI as a beat drop for the music) to the amount of games referenced. They got everything from the obvious first party sony stuff old and new like Crash, Spyro, and Jak to the new generation of heroes like Aloy, Nathan Drake and Ellie/Joel. Then there's the stuff that while not exclusive to Sony these days, it absolutely made its mark thanks to Playstation like Resident Evil, Tomb Raider, Tekken and Metal Gear Solid. Then there's the stupidly obscure/deep cuts which went way farther than i thought.
All in all, fantastic experience. Do recommend.
As someone who loves the recent Sony IP, I completely loved those themed levels. I would say if you loved Playstation growing up and like 3D Platformers, this game is priceless.
Edit: Before playing I think I said 3D World, more in the level based sense. Wasn't anything past that.
