It’s sounding like Astro Bot is a certified hit, as the game has apparently performed better than any other 3D platformer bar Mario over the past decade.
These days, if you set out to make a 3D platformer, you’re possibly in for fighting an uphill battle. While the genre dominated 3D gaming’s earlier years, interest in it dwindled over the years, even if it’s had a bit of a comeback on the indie front in more recent years. Only Nintendo can manage to put out a truly successful platformer, but it does seem like Mario is in for some amount of competition. GamesIndustry.biz’s Christopher Dring, who has access to various bits of sales data for consoles and games alike, shared on Twitter earlier this week some tidbits about where console sales are at, but also how Astro Bot is doing.
According to Dring, in Europe Astro Bot sales are 34% higher than Sonic Frontiers, and 52% bigger than Crash 4, both of which are obviously impressive given how much more brand recognition those series have than Astro Bot, a relative newcomer to the genre. Dring didn’t go into specific sales numbers, but when one fan responded saying that beating Sonic Frontiers was nothing, Dring explained that “It did more than [Sonic Frontiers’ sales] across Europe alone. But it can only play in the market it’s in. Astro Bot has done better than basically every new 3D platform game in the last 10 years (Mario aside). Its true success won’t be known for years, but it’s had a strong start for the genre.”
It’s not particularly surprising that Astro Bot hasn’t been able to beat Mario, that’s quite that tall mountain to climb, but this does seem to be a little robot that could kind of story. PlayStation boss Hermen Hulst did say last month that Astro Bot is “very, very important” to the platform, and with a launch like this, it’s probably safe to assume we’ll be seeing the little guy again sometime in the future.