When PlayStation's "Astro Bot" launches on Friday, PS5 owners will get access to a brand new, fully fleshed-out story starring the little robot who previously famously taught gamers all the cool new features of Sony's gaming console when it launched in 2020 via the pre-loaded title "Astro's Playroom."

Four years later, Astro has escaped from his playroom and is on a bigger mission: celebrating Sony Interactive's 30th anniversary in an easy-to-access platformer featuring over 150 cameos from beloved PlayStation characters from mega-hits and deep cuts including "God of War," "Ratchet & Clank," "Ape Escape" and many more.

Team Asobi's original idea for the game, however, was to give Astro a larger space adventure game with more to do, while adding a few PlayStation references and characters here and there. But the enthusiasm for the game across Sony's gaming IP brands led to so much more.

"If you had asked me two years ago how many characters would we be able to fit — well, my job is to look at all the issues, so I tend to be pessimistic — where we ended up with these 150-plus characters was really surprising," Team Asobi studio president Nicolas Doucet told Variety. "What surprised me the most, and what I'm really, really happy about, is the amount of love and care that our partners showed us, because it was their positive attitude towards the game that made it possible. Owning IP and things like that can sometimes be a topic of friction or productivity, and the fact that we can take these characters and twist them, because we often make fun of them, and everyone is just on board and asking for more, I think shows that people really embrace that fun and playfulness. And that's a really positive human experience, because those people were really supportive of what we were doing with their characters."