Astro Bot Features a Character Owned by Xbox

Crash Bandicoot is owned by Xbox now, but he'll cameo in the PS5 game.

By Marc Deschamps

When Astro Bot comes to PlayStation 5 next month, the game will feature VIP and Cameo Bots, which include references to iconic Sony owned characters. Well, mostly Sony owned. PlayStation officially confirmed today that at least one character owned by Xbox will be in the game: Crash Bandicoot. As of this writing, the company has not officially released an image of a Bot dressed like Crash, but Team Asobi studio director Nicolas Doucet casually mentioned the character's appearance in a post on the PlayStation Blog. In the post, Doucet discussed the challenges of adapting these characters in the Astro Bot style. 

"They had to be a cool sci-fi design but also have things like fabrics or furry boots, so we sometimes felt we might be going against the original intent of the character. So we substituted more organic materials, like hair, with materials such as vinyl," said Doucet. "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 so much on the pupils being a certain size or color for instance. So for more cartoony VIPs like Crash Bandicoot or from Ape Escape, the Bots are wearing a mask to help bridge that problem!"

Crash Bandicoot might be owned by Xbox these days, but at the start of the PlayStation era, he was basically the company's mascot. The early games were exclusive to PlayStation, and were developed by the Sony owned studio Naughty Dog. However, the character's rights were not owned by Sony, and the character eventually started to go multiplatform, with games released on Nintendo and Microsoft systems as well. Crash Bandicoot was owned by Activision, which was purchased by Xbox last year. 

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While Crash Bandicoot has now been confirmed for Astro Bot, it's worth noting that there have been rumors that Spyro the Dragon will also appear. Spyro was also a big deal in PlayStation's early days, and is similarly now owned by Xbox. Nothing has been confirmed at this time, but if there was a deal made between PlayStation and Xbox (or Activision prior to the acquisition), it seems like a pretty safe bet Spyro will be there as well. With Astro Bot set to be released on September 6th, we won't have to wait much longer to find out! 

Are you excited to see Crash Bandicoot in Astro Bot? Do you associate the character with PlayStation? Share your thoughts with me directly on Twitter at @Marcdachamp, on Bluesky at @Marcdachamp, or on Instagram at @Dachampgaming!

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