ASTRO’S PLAYROOM

Designed to make your PS5 sing! We take a closer look at what make’s Astro’s Playroom special

Little robot fellow Astro is no stranger to shining a light on Sony hardware. The teeny chap was drafted in to demo DualShock 4 and PS VR to us back when they first released. Now he’s here to showcase all the new features of your DualSense, and how it can make you feel the actions our on-screen hero is performing.

During the game’s development influence went both ways, with developer Asobi Team making suggestions as to how DualSense could be further improved.

Nicolas Doucet, the new head of Sony’s Japan Studio, and creative director and producer of Astro’s Playroom, has told how his team sent feedback on DualSense’s adaptive triggers to Sony’s hardware team, who in turn passed on the ideas to the wider PlayStation Studios family. It took two years of tinkering to deliver the DualSense you’ll be holding in your hands from 19 November.

Gogo gadgets

Astro can make use of power-ups collected in the world, which express a new way of using the DualSense. The jet pack is controlled on the left and right triggers and you can feel the boost and rumble of the jets as you pull on them. When using the game’s gun – yes lovable Astro has gone full Charlton Heston – you can feel the weapon ‘rattling’ in your hands. The monkey suit enables Astro to climb walls, and the triggers correspond with the ‘bot’s left and right hands. When you grab a block to climb, the triggers offer some resistance as you move up the wall.

Solid footing

Together, haptic feedback and the DualSense controller’s built-in speaker give you a sense of Astro’s world. As you jump from a leaf floating on water to a wooden plank, the tech enables you to feel yourself moving from a soft, unstable platform to something more solid.

Tilt shot

When you jump you can adjust the angle of Astro’s leap by tilting the DualSense to use its motion sensors. Coupled with height (determined by how hard you pull on R2 to coil Astro’s spring), there’s some real skill to making later leaps in this free game.

Winds of change

The sticks meet haptic resistance that seems to fight back as Astro walks through a sandstorm. You can feel the blast of air as the DualSense emulates the act of walking into a firm breeze, the sound of the sand peppering the pad coming from the speaker, and motion control ensuring you actively lean into the wind.

Get a load of this

At times the game seems deliberately hard, with mixtures of jumps and enemy placements pointing you to a watery death. It means you’ll restart… a lot. But harnessing the ultra-high-speed SSD you’ll be back in the game within seconds. The immediacy is staggering. The days of playing Galaga while Ridge Racer loads are long gone.

Worlds of wonder

The game is a standard platform adventure lasting around five hours and featuring four themed worlds: Cooling Resort; GPU Jungle; SSD Speedway; and Memory Sky. Each is designed to showcase the tech of the controller and console by allowing you to feel Astro sliding over ice or trudging across sand while avoiding obstacles and defeating any enemies.

Jumping flash

Astro can change forms to perform acts such as jumping: hold R2 and he’ll turn into a giant spring. The more you pull on R2, the tighter he coils to jump higher, and the heavier the adaptive trigger becomes.

Combo king

Astro’s not here to just gather items and survive platforming, he can also attack enemies using to unleash combos. Sounds limiting? It is, except you can feel the impact of attacks, and linking strikes builds sensationally on the buttons.

He’s got game

This free, pre-installed adventure features content you’d expect from a full-fat game, including the main campaign, PlayStation homages, collectibles to uncover, and a Time Attack mode with online leaderboards designed to keep you in Astro’s world. If you achieve 100% completion there’s a PlayStation-themed surprise in store.