“It was pretty much done, it was in final [quality assurance testing],” Free Radical founder and former studio director Steve Ellis told GamesIndustry.biz in 2012. “It had been in final QA for half of 2008, it was just being fixed for release. LucasArts’ opinion is that when you launch a game you have to spend big on the marketing, and they’re right. But at that time they were, for whatever reason, unable to commit to spending big. They effectively canned a game that was finished.”
They also say the controller mapping is a challenge in the emulation software, but doable. It’s the wii version so I bet the aiming and whatnot is going to be wonky when using a controller or kbm vs the other releases.
Worth noting that the wiimote just uses Bluetooth, so it doesn’t take any specialized equipment to connect to your computer. And Dolphin has built in support for it. The sensor bar was also just a pair of infrared LEDs; All of the actual “sensing” happened at the wiimote directly. So you can just throw a wireless sensor bar (like $15 on amazon) underneath your computer monitor, and it will work fine.
Reportedly found on a Wii test kit discovered at an e-waste recycling center
Man, talk about a find.
The reason for it being canned so late seems to be mostly on internal higher up conflict within Lucasarts, whose leadership became bean counters. www.eurogamer.net/free-radical-vs-the-monsters
And then we went from talking to people who were passionate about making games to talking to psychopaths who insisted on having an unpleasant lawyer in the room." (David Doak on the change within Lucasarts after Jim Ward left)
“LucasArts hadn’t paid us for six months,” says Norgate “and were refusing to pass a milestone so we would limp along until the money finally ran out. They knew what they were doing, and six months of free work to pass on to Rebellion wasn’t to be sniffed at.”
I have not played it myself but what I’ve seen of it looks at the very least polished and made with care. That being said there just wasn’t that much competition this year. The industry is overshadowed with mass layoffs and a smaller budget pool. And yes, of course some good games released, but nothing in the ballpark of a Baldur’s Gate 3 or GTA 5.
John Linneman from digital foundry said the game reminded him of why he loves games after all the AAA slop and UE5 games they’ve been through. Up there in quality with the Mario games.
As a game? Astrobot is a VERY solid and polished platformer.
But mostly it is the nostalgia and target demographic. If you ever had a PS1 or PS2 growing up then you will have insane amounts of nostalgia for all the costumes and easter eggs while not realizing most are from the late PS3/early PS4 anyway.
So… it is basically a modern Nintendo game. Others do platforming and level design better. But only this has the excessive amount of references to nu-God of War and rare reference to Jumping Flash that makes your heart remember the happy times.
And… even though I see it for what it is, I am not gonna pretend I am above it.
For what it is worth? I think it IS the better game than Balatro (one would hope so since it had a full major studio and platform holder behind it…). But I still think Balatro was THE game of 2024 just for how much it pervaded everything and everyone.
It’s a 100% perfect addition to THE core combat light puzzle platformer games. It also has an age range of 0-99 by both having cute jokes and references that would appeal to older folks while never being even remotely offensive.
Also yea, what else was there? Closest was make Wukong which primarily crushed the market because it again proved that the new or smaller studios can absolutely give a better AAA experience than the big studios these days by focusing on delivering a game not a storefront
I just bought it used for $45. Started 5 hours ago, now time to sleep, then play again.
It is a better super Mario game. The difficulty is a bit higher I think, there’s some platforming where I thought like “ain’t no way some of my friends would get this first try”
Not one bit. Sackboy is a 2d platformer, AstroBot is 3d. It feels like a Super Mario Galaxy 3 - better than 2 in every way. If AstroBot would have a wall jump and triple jump it totally would be a super Mario Galaxy 3.
polygon.com
Aktywne