Like strapping joy onto your face. This is what VR is all about.

There's been a lot of "Sony's Mario" chat thrown around about this, and it's honestly hard to argue with that. But I've not had this kinda fun with a Mario game in some time. There's a real proper feeling of immersion. I kept pointing at stuff expecting my hand to come into view. Instinctually going to hold my breath as water rose up past my chin. It sounds ridiculous, but you truly get lost in there.

Just you and yer wee pal, exploring worlds, rescuing lost bots, punching enemies, headbutting footballs back at them. Using shuriken to solve puzzles, smashing a giant robot ape's teeth to bits. It's gold, and the kinda thing that feels like proof of what VR can be beyond the gimmick most folk assume.

I do enjoy this game a lot, but a couple of things hold it back for me. So many of the areas, bosses and camera angles are just absolutely stunning and such a great showcase of VR, and had my jaw on the floor the whole way through. Unfortunately to take away from this just ever so slightly, this game reuses stage themes a lot (i.e. cave levels, desert levels etc.) which makes it a little distracting as well as repetitive and overall leaves things feeling a little rushed. Gameplay is the same as the engine that I loved from Playroom, so no complaints with how everything handles and feels, and most stage design varies between "pretty good" and "top notch". The one issue I have with level design is that I wish the final world wasn't as frustrating as it can end up being. The game wants you to keep track of way too many things at once which overwhelms the player and leads to a lot of frustrating deaths. Calculating depth and what hurts you/doesn't can be a big test of patience, and the last 2 bosses wore that thin by hitting me when I swore I should've been safe, causing me to restart a few times (which on the final boss can be upwards of 5 minutes to get back to the point you died on) which soured the end of the game for me personally.

This is great framework for a fantastic VR experience, and of course it went on to power the stupendously grin inducing Astro's Playroom, but I hope a VR sequel comes along on PSVR 2 to fix this game's shortcomings and cornercutting. Still a very fun experience regardless of my gripes though.

highkey the best game on PSVR its better than most mfin mario games. Utilizes the VR headset in a lot of ways that other VR games don't even think of trying. So many games in VR think only in the mindset of being in the first person where you are someone, and while that definitely works with a lot of games and helps with immersion, you can really utilize VR to immerse the player in more ways than just that. Remember how when super mario 3D land came out on the 3DS, everyone was talking about how having 3D in that platformer made it easier to tell depth and where things are in the game? Astro bot takes that concept to a whole other level by fully immersing you in the 3D platformer worlds that you explore, all while also making you yourself an active character in the game as well as astro bot himself. I think that this game pushes so many boundaries on what is possible with both 3D platfomers and VR as a medium to play games on. If you have a PSVR, you HAVE to play this game. It's basically a shining example for what VR can do for immersion in games, and its done so masterfully.

Super Mario Odyssey was the most disappointing game of 2017. It was Mario as a completely modern videogame. Mario as content. With a bad moon economy, a tourism model of exploration, and the most unapologetic fanservice. Not an odyssey but a mockery. Mario Kibbles ‘n Bits. Mario Groupon. Mario Are You Being Served?

So it was the most welcome surprise to find that Astro Bot was not only the best Mario game of 2018, but the best Mario since 3D Land. In many ways, its heir. If the screen can’t get any more 3D, then we’ll just have to go further inside it ourselves. And what we find here is a fully arrived VR experience, perfectly suited to its own limits. There are no compromises or half measures. No nausea from movement or teleportation to hide its lack. It doesn’t apologize for or try to hide its limits but instead delights in them. Which is often the best response to our limits anyway: laughter. Let’s make a game of them.

This is the pleasure of constraint. I’m on a conveyor belt, every level a tunnel, and my little guy is crossing a bridge above me. Or he’s just around a corner up ahead. Or he’s running in circles somewhere beneath me. Point being, I can’t see him well. My view is decidedly sub-optimal. In a typically screened videogame, you would complain about the bad camera and strain against the controls to get a better view. But here, the strain is actually in your neck. You are the bad camera. Every player her own Lakitu.

There is such delight in this. Your body is centered, but you still have an avatar. And it is through this connection, this interplay that the haptic limits to current VR tech are downplayed and instead you feel your centered body anew. It’s not the same as the first person perspective of so many shooters. There you are not a body but a naked eyeball, untethered, flattened via the screen, more point-of-view than center. And this perspective is empowering. Without a body, without defined borders, what you see is the world.

But in VR, to bring your actual body in, its center, its limits, doesn’t empower you. It humbles you, just like in everyday life. You are a thing in the world, one of many, and what you see is a limited view, also one of many. And strangely, by combining the first and third persons and centering my actual body, an unexpected comedy emerges. My body, which I usually like to forget in games, becomes something dear, almost cute. Something to feel out again, gently, curiously, with laughter, even pleasure.

There are so many things to feel anew, which screenshots cannot capture. Heights that take your breath, waves that stifle it, caves that press in and enclose. Near and far, light and dark, the very fundaments of perception, you can feel them. Darkness is not a rectangle of black but the death of sight. Behind is somewhere you can never truly go. Everywhere textures tease. You can’t help but constantly reach out for things that are not there. There is no periphery to remind or frame or distract. You can’t check your phone. You can’t put on a podcast and chill. You have a headcrab on your face. It’s all in or get the fuck out.

I play Astro Bot and it’s as if I’ve never played videogames before. As if it all still lies ahead of me. That future feeling. I’ve known that feeling before. Super Mario Bros. in a Pizza Hut. Final Fantasy VII at Shane’s house. Grand Theft Auto III off the Old Santa Fe Trail. Demon’s Souls in Corte de Monterey. And now, here in that future, I’m still feeling…something. Not disappointed exactly. Their sequels had their moments. But I feel the struggle of all aging groundbreakers. For relevance. Vitality. New Ground. And I pause.

The language of VR hasn’t settled out yet, the genres haven’t calcified. And there are many obvious challenges to meet — bodies in motion, haptics, a basic solipsism. But I’m going to relish this future feeling a bit longer. It’s just a hope to feel new things, to keep feeling things anew. Soon enough videogames will do what videogames do. Domesticate. Capitalize. Sequelify. Turn a future feeling into a past we’re desperate to recover. But it’s not that future yet.

I thought all the talk about Astro Bot Rescue Mission was hyperbole when comparing it to Super Mario 64….but it’s not. Games like this are why VR should exist and it sells it wonderfully. I liked what I saw in the demo, and I love the full game.

The biggest knock against the game would be its simplicity. Astro Bot doesn’t have special moves outside of a spinning punch and his rocket boots, and the enemies rarely pose a threat. Even with this though, it doesn’t dampen the fun at all.

The player acting as a larger robot following Astro Bot is incredibly smart as you traverse levels to discover missing pieces of your friend and lost companions. This allows for wider views of the area and viewing angles you wouldn’t be able to if in the shoes of Astro Bot. I don’t have a ton of VR games under my belt, but this has felt the most natural and I would be shocked if copycats don’t pop up because of it.

Collecting coins throughout levels is another task that leads to additional perks in the form of home base. There, you can use your coins in the vending machine to purchase diorama pieces of levels and enemies to decorate the base. Then using Astro Bot, you can run around and play on these smaller pieces for fun. It doesn’t add a whole new dynamic or anything, but it’s a fun little side activity that gives purpose to something in the game.

Astro Bot Rescue Mission was the reason I wanted PlayStation VR. I wasn’t sure if it would live up to the hype (or the comparisons to an iconic game like Super Mario 64), but it does just that. If PlayStation VR is on your horizon, do not pass this game up. You’ll be hard pressed to find something better in my opinion.

Charming is the word that best describes astro bot. When I saw the design for the first time it looked extremely generic but they managed to convey a lovability personality through this design. The game is a linear 3d platformer in vr and it nails what all 3d platformers must nail control. Astrobot handles like a dream as he jumps hovers and punches enemies. At times your controller is given abilities like spraying water and ninja stars, which reminds me a bit of nintendo land and other early wiiu games. These give the game the variation it needs to keep from going stale. The levels are fun and varied with level themes changing level making no level look or feel the samw as the last. The soundtrack while not having many tracks is realy enjoyable listen to adn you don't get sick of any of the tracks even if you hear them every couple levels. The game also has fun bosses that while being quite easy are a lot of fun to take down. For the completionists there are 8 bots and a chameleon to find in each level. The chameleons unlock challenge levels that will moderately test you but platformer veterans will have no issue. The use of VR in a 3D platformer is inspired and the developers ring most of the potential out of the concept with having you look around corners and from a birds eye view. It's the game I have played VR and is a must play for PSVR owners.