With the release ofAstro Boton the PlayStation 5, we’ve beeninundated with multiple referencesand history lessons from all throughout Sony’s gaming history. There are plenty of characters that could be considered representative of the PlayStation brand, but does the gaming giant have a mascot?
Throughout the years, there have been plenty of characters and series thrown into the ring for consideration of mascot status, but we haven’t really gotten any confirmation from Sony. So, let’s look at some of the most iconic characters from throughout PlayStation history and see who comes out on top in the competition for mascot.
7Crash Bandicoot
While there was a period in the early to mid 2010s where it felt like Crash was starting to be forgotten, thanks to remakes and fresh new titles, the Bandicoot has managed to maintain relevance as an icon in the gaming sphere.
While Crash is still pretty closely tied to the Sony brand, thanks to the remakes, his titles are now much easier to access on devices aside from the PlayStation, slightly diluting his synonymity with the company. However, in his earlier years, Crash was likely the top choice for a PlayStation mascot.
6Aloy
Aloy has quickly shot into the limelight as one of the most iconic female protagonists in gaming, impressive considering she only really has two main outings under her belt. With how much Sony has been pushing Horizon, and the overall success of the games, she’s been closely tied to the PlayStation brand since she debuted.
The main thing holding Aloy back from mascot status is her recency, as well as character design. Aloy’s design is fantastic for the world of Horizon, but as a mascot, her appearance is a bit too intricate. It works within the context of her series but is perhaps a bit too complicated for more simple branding.
5Toro Inoue
A name that might have you scratching your head, and a feline face that you are slightly more likely to have perhaps seen somewhere, Toro Inoue was the star of PlayStation 1 Japanese exclusive life-sim game Doko Demo Issyo.
In spite of his obscurity outside of his country of origin, the PlayStation cat is the closest we have to an official mascot, thanks to how he’s been treated by the company inside of Japan. However, with little effort put into globalizing the character, his mascot-hood is limited. Maybe with a localized release, the world could start to properly appreciate the cat that just wants to be human.
4Spyro The Dragon
Similarly to Crash, Spyro was teetering on obscurity for a couple of years, but this was mostly avoided thanks to the Skylander series giving the character a breath of fresh air, and more recently, remakes have made the purple dragon’s earlier games more accessible.
Spyro’s games were some of the most fun you could have 3D platforming on the earlier PlayStation consoles, but in a similar way to Crash, his titles are now available on plenty of consoles outside Sony exclusivity.
3Kratos
Standing out from the crowd of more family-friendly mascot contenders, Kratos is far from a cuddly critter, but he’s still very closely tied to the PlayStation brand. Both the original God of War series as well as the more recent reboot have been incredibly successful console exclusives for Sony.
While there are now plenty of God of War games available on PC, slightly lowering the close ties the game has to the PlayStation, it is still publicly considered a PlayStation franchise in spite of the technicalities of its exclusivity. Like Aloy, though, Kratos' design holds him back from being a more classic style of mascot.
2Sackboy
A few years ago, it would’ve felt pretty easy to pin Sackboy as the best contender for a PlayStation mascot. He’s cute but has a slightly more grounded appearance, representing the contrast with Nintendo’s more polished approach to mascots, and the LittleBigPlanet series also produced consistent hits.
However, in recent years, the popularity of Sackboy and his series has dwindled slightly, with his newer titles not holding too much cultural relevance and no new named LittleBigPlanet games in years. Maybe it’s because his design is starting to feel a little too 2008, or maybe he’s just a little too hauntingly reminiscent of a Funko Pop, but Sackboy needs to fight back to hold his place as a PlayStation icon.
1Astro
Perhaps it’s recency bias, but since the PlayStation 5 era, Sony has really leaned into treating Astro as a mascot. He was soft-launched in demo titles to show off the PlayStation Camera and VR in thePlayStation 4 era, but both Astro’s Playroom and Astro Bot have been incredibly high-quality titles that put the robot in the limelight.
While the design of the little bot is a tiny bit generic, this has been remedied in his most recent adventure, with a focus on dressing him up and making on-the-nose references to PlayStation’s history as a whole. This closeness to PlayStation and its history is what makes it so easy to place Astro as PlayStation’s mascot (at least for now), since he is so closely tied to the brand and its hardware. With himflying around on a DualSensecontroller, it’s pretty hard to consider him as an entity separate from the PlayStation.
