First Look: Astro Bot Limited Edition DualSense Wireless Controller

Hi everyone! It’s a pleasure to be back here to make another Astro Bot-related reveal.

If you have been following Astro news as of late, then you know Team Asobi have been hard at work on a brand-new game coming out on September 6. The game features over 50 planets, new powerups, lots of enemies, secrets and PlayStation-infused characters to collect. And it also features a DualSense wireless controller turned into a living character and helping Astro on his mission.

Today, it is an immense pleasure to announce that you will be able to charge into Astro’s new supersized adventure along with the cool new DualSense wireless controller – Astro Bot Limited Edition.

We know many of you were hoping for this after seeing the game trailer. So, we quickly asked our lovely bots to engineer this beauty and tada! No, no, I’m just kidding; it had been in the making for some time, carefully crafted by the amazing teams at SIE. And what splendid work they did.

The controller’s design features Astro’s signature blue accents on the handles and buttons, carved-in, sci-fi lines as well as the trademark playful pair of eyes on the touch pad.  It is a true work of art, and we could not be happier with the end-result at Team Asobi. 

With this dynamic addition to your set-up, a supersized space adventure awaits… 

Starting Friday, August 9 at 7am PT in the U.S. and 10am local time in the U.K., France, Germany, Belgium, Luxembourg, Netherlands, Italy, Spain, Austria, and Portugal, players will be able to pre-order the DualSense wireless controller – Astro Bot Limited Edition through direct.playstation.com, as well as from select retailers. Pre-orders will also be available through select retailers in other global markets on the same day. The DualSense wireless controller – Astro Bot Limited Edition will be available in limited quantities for $79.99/ €79.99 / £69.99 / ¥11,980 and will launch on September 6, day-in-date with the launch of Astro Bot.       

I will take this chance to summarize some of the cool things this new Astro Bot game does with the DualSense wireless controller

First, as many of you expect from an Astro game, you can feel the surfaces that Astro runs and slides on, from grass, sand, metal to more squishy textures or water. That was already the case with Astro’s Playroom, but we have increased the number of textures you can feel through the controller.

Next, we doubled down on the adaptive triggers combined with haptic feedback, by tying them tightly to Astro’s new powers. For example, when using Barkster, the bulldog Jetpack, you can feel the thruster ratting against your finger in synch with the animation, giving a very dynamic and immersive feeling. Every new power up has been given that same special treatment so you will be able to experience various expressions through your fingers.

Finally, given the number of enemies and boss battles we added to this new adventure, it was important to work on battle and impacts by combining all of the above. Whether it’s stretching, pounding or pummeling hard surfaces, there are many new types of impacts that can be experienced in Astro Bot. 

And of course, we could not finish this post without mentioning the Dual Speeder, one of Astro’s most recurrent gadgets, allowing him to fly into various planets. The Dual Speeder makes full use of motion control, adaptive triggers and haptic feedback. Here is a piece of very early concept art and how it looks in the final game.

That’s all from us! We’ll be back soon for more news around Astro Bot. Until then, please tell us in the comments what you think of this cool DualSense wireless controller – Astro Bot Limited Edition!

Astro Bot is out on PS5 on September 6, we are waiting for you all to join Astro for his first big new adventure.

Team Asobi out.