As a PlayStation only gamer who engages very little with multiplayer and craves worthwhile, single player experiences...
I'm not buying Astro Bot anytime soon.
I have nothing inherently against this game. It looks fun. It looks pretty. It looks like it takes good advantage of the PS5 and will respect me as a gamer.
But in the current economy where every penny counts and I have to think very hard about paying full price for a game because I only make 20K a year and that money has to cover a lot of stuff...I can't in good faith justify $60 for this title.
The long and short of it is, I don't think that I'll get enough value out of it. I'd probably buy it if it were $30. But $60 is just out of the question. I'll get this game on a good sale, or eventually when it comes to PS+ since I am subbed to Premium on that through 2026 (got a great conversion deal some time back).
I want games like Astro Bot to exist. But I don't think this title has enough raw value for me. If it were a game that played a long time, like say The Last Of Us or Marvel's Spider-Man or Ghost Of Tsushima, I'd be all over it. Astro Bot needn't have some huge narrative with tons of backstory to increase its value like the games I mentioned, but I'd like it to have more content than it appears to have.
I feel most mainstream gamers to feel the same, and for Astro Bot to very quickly become "the best game no one is playing". I lamented this earlier this year when I bought Alone In The Dark (2024) at full price knowing it was doomed and would rapidly drop in price. But I've done my charity for this year.
I'd like Sony to steer away from their live service push, and I hope that the epic disaster that was Concord pushes them in that direction. But it's not my responsibility to get them to change their ways. I've already voted for my wallet with live service atrocities by not purchasing the ones that are sold and refusing to engage with the ones that are f2p. I don't feel my spending $60 on Astro Bot is going to make Sony suddenly go. "I understand now. SP is the way!" In fact, I'm quite sure that any positive impact the game has to Sony's finances will be considered a fluke. After all, Hogwart's Legacy was effectively a license to print money for WBD, but they still ran after the live service pipe dream and if the stories are true are designing HL's sequel as a live service. If an IP as large as Harry Potter selling gangbusters as an SP only title can't convince a massive corporation that SP is the way to go, I don't see how a much smaller and niche IP like Astro Bot will have more than a trivial impact on Sony's trajectory.
I hope that people purchase Astro Bot and enjoy it. And when it's price is halved, I intend to as well. But until then, I'm voting with my wallet by hoarding my money.