PlayStation quietly confirms return of iconic PS1 mascot from our childhood

I don’t think it would be unfair to say that it’s been a relatively quiet year for PlayStation.

It was to be expected, I suppose.

Recent years have brought us Marvel’s Spider-Man 2, God of War Ragnarök, and Horizon Forbidden West.

That rules out several of the company's biggest IPs from appearing for a couple of years.

We did get the excellent Final Fantasy VII Rebirth and Helldivers II this year, and while Stellar Blade and Rise of the Ronin faded into oblivion fairly quickly, those too were both decent titles.

The last few months in particular though have been exceptionally quiet, perhaps because Concord has died an instantaneous death.

Worry not though, a familiar little bot is on the way to restore our faith.

That’s right, we’re just over one week away from the launch of Astro Bot.

A sequel to the very popular Astro’s Playroom, a free tech demo installed on every PlayStation 5 console, Astro Bot will see the lovable little guy return for a fully-fledged adventure.

You can even bag yourself an Astro Bot themed DualSense, although they’ve almost sold out.

Just like Astro’s Playroom, Astro Bot is set to feature nods to PlayStation’s vast history - and that includes both the company’s IPs and hardware.

We already know that God of War, Ratchet and Clank, and Bloodborne are just a few of the franchises that’ll be referenced.

Yet another one has just been confirmed though and I have to admit, it’s taken me by surprise.

Crash Bandicoot. Let that sink in. Crash. Bandicoot.

This Naughty Dog creation was once the face of the PlayStation brand but as we’re all aware, he then became the property of Microsoft following the company’s acquisition of Activision Blizzard.

With Toys For Bob splitting from Activision but retaining a partnership with the company, it’s not exactly clear what fate beholds Crash but we do know that he’s returning to PlayStation to feature in Astro Bot.

In a new PlayStation Blog post, Team Asobi’s studio director spoke about the evolution of the character and how Astro’s appearance is adapted to mimic various IPs.

“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,” he explained.

Yes, that confirms Crash’s inclusion in the game. That’s all we have to go on right now but with Astro Bot releasing on 6 September, we don’t have long to wait to discover the game’s secrets for ourselves.