ASTRO BOT Rescue Mission (2018) is one in every of hottest PSVR exclusives up to now, nonetheless Sony-owned builders Workforce Asobi are releasing its broadly hyped PS5 follow-up Astro Bot with out the addition of VR assist. Don’t maintain out hope for a VR port both, because the studio has now confirmed it’s merely not within the playing cards.
Speaking to DailyTech, Workforce Asobi studio head Nicolas Doucet confirmed the upcoming Astro Bot can’t (and received’t) ever be a VR sport as a result of its distinctive improvement for TVs.
“We’re focusing 100% on PS5,” Doucet advised DailyTech. “Rescue Mission was nice enjoyable to make. Each medium has its robust factors. Within the case of a third-person sport, whether or not you’re employed on TV or VR is radically totally different. This concept that we might add a VR mode is just not relevant to this sort of sport. It’s relevant to some first-person video games like racing, however not for this sort of sport. So our selection was to go 100% for TV to actually have as many individuals as attainable taking part in this sport.”
Chatting with Push Sq., Doucet fleshes the choice on why it wasn’t developed with a hybrid TV/VR mindset:
“Sure video games can afford to be hybrid, like first-person video games, as a result of there’s a more in-depth similarity. However in our case, the design philosophy for each are very, very totally different. So, you realize, it was a call to broaden on the world of Astro’s Playroom and produce Astro to the large stage. So from the start, that was actually our focus.”
Granted, Astro Bot’s origins have been first rooted in flatscreen from the start, with the character’s improvement stretching again to 2013 when PlayStation’s now defunct SIE JAPAN Studio launched the bundled mini-game demo THE PLAYROOM for PS4, which was created to indicate off the console’s then-newly launched PlayStation Digicam.
Later displaying up in 2016 on the unique PSVR, Japan Studio launched The Playroom VR, one other bundled set of mini-games, this time tasked with displaying off the headset’s capabilities.
This is able to finally spur Japan Studio, the place Doucet was Inventive Director and Producer of Astro Bot, to launch the full-fledged Astro Bot Rescue Mission in 2018. It’s been broadly celebrated as one in every of, if not the most effective VR video games to return to PSVR. Actually, we appreciated Astro Bot Rescue Mission a lot, we scored the VR native platformer our first [10/10] in our full evaluate.
Then, in 2020, simply previous to Japan Studio’s closure, the studio launched Astro’s Playroom, which served as a tech demo to PS5’s DualSense controller. Workforce Asobi would reside on, headed by Doucet, whereas Japan Studio can be shuttered by PlayStation in 2021.
Notably, Astro Bot Rescue Mission has by no means acquired a PSVR 2 port, highlighting but additional the headset’s lack of backwards compatibility with unique PSVR video games.
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Possibly this “one for flatscreens, one for VR” sample will proceed on, however we’re not holding our breaths for now, because the studio is little question full steam forward on hyping the upcoming PS5 unique, which we now know for certain won’t ever come to VR headsets.
