"Astro Bot: Cut Content Revealed - Bird Flight Level and Headless Astro"

Astro Bot fans are well-acquainted with the story behind the sponge power-up, but did you know that developer Team Asobi also experimented with even more outlandish concepts like a coffee grinder and a roulette wheel? This intriguing tidbit came to light during IGN's coverage of GDC 2025, where Team Asobi's studio director, Nicolas Doucet, delivered a comprehensive talk titled, "The Making of 'ASTRO BOT'". In his presentation, Doucet delved deep into the game's development process, showcasing a variety of early prototypes and cut content.

Doucet kicked off his talk by discussing the initial pitch for Astro Bot, crafted in May 2021, shortly after Team Asobi started prototyping the game. He revealed that the pitch underwent 23 revisions before being presented to senior management. Initially, the pitch was creatively conveyed through an adorable comic strip that outlined the game's core pillars and activities. Clearly, this approach resonated well with the audience.

A slide from Nicolas Doucet's GDC talk, "The Making of 'ASTRO BOT'", featuring a comic book-style pitch of the game.Next, Doucet elaborated on how Team Asobi generated ideas. Unsurprisingly, extensive brainstorming sessions were a key component. However, the team's unique approach involved forming small, interdisciplinary groups of 5-6 members. Each member contributed ideas on individual sticky notes, culminating in a visually stunning brainstorming board.

A slide from the talk, displaying the brainstorming board covered with sticky notes from Team Asobi.Doucet noted that not all ideas transitioned to the prototyping phase. In fact, only about 10% of the brainstormed concepts were prototyped, yet this still resulted in a significant amount of experimentation. He emphasized the importance of prototyping across all departments, highlighting an example where audio designers created a theater within Astro Bot to test haptic controller vibrations that aligned with various sound effects, such as the different sounds of a door opening and closing.

A slide showcasing a sponge prototype alongside concept art of Astro Bot transforming into a sponge.The dedication to prototyping was so integral to the project that a few programmers were specifically assigned to explore concepts unrelated to platforming. This led to the development of Astro Bot's sponge mechanic, which involved squeezing the sponge using the adaptive trigger—a feature that was both fun and ultimately integrated into the game.

A slide displaying various prototype activities developed for Astro Bot.Doucet shared an image featuring multiple prototypes, including the balloon and sponge that made it into the final game, as well as unimplemented concepts such as a tennis game, a walking wind-up toy, a roulette wheel, a coffee grinder, and others.

Later in the talk, Doucet discussed the selection and design of levels, which were tailored around specific mechanics. The aim was for each level to offer unique gameplay and avoid redundancy. While reusing power-ups across levels was not entirely off-limits, Doucet stressed that their application had to be sufficiently distinct to maintain a sense of variety. He illustrated this with examples of a cut level themed around bird flights, which was deemed too similar to existing levels using the monkey power-up.

"In the end, it was decided that the overlap was not healthy enough to create variety, and we just cut this level entirely," he explained. "We'll never know if that level would have been popular. But in hindsight, I think it's a good thing that we got to spend that time elsewhere."

A slide comparing a cut level from Astro Bot with two other implemented levels.Doucet concluded his talk by discussing the game's final scene, which comes with a Spoiler Alert for those who haven't completed Astro Bot yet.

In the game's final scene, players reassemble a broken Astro Bot with the help of other bots. Initially, the scene featured a completely dismembered Astro, with only the torso intact. However, Doucet noted that this version upset some players, prompting a change to the more intact version seen in the released game.

A clip from Doucet's presentation showcasing the original ending of Astro Bot.Doucet's talk provided numerous fascinating insights into the development of Astro Bot, a game that IGN awarded a 9/10, praising it as "A fantastically inventive platformer in its own right, Astro Bot is particularly special for anyone with a place in their heart for PlayStation."