Crash Bandicoot Shows Up in PS5 Exclusive Astro Bot Despite Microsoft Now Owning Activision

Crash Bandicoot, a character owned by Xbox subsidiary Activision Blizzard, shows up in upcoming PlayStation 5 exclusive Astro Bot.

VGC spotted a reference to the beloved bandicoot in a PlayStation Blog post discussing character designs in Astro Bot, confirming Crash would appear as a cameo character in the reference-heavy platformer. Astro meets characters wearing costumes from games like God of War and Horizon, for example, and Crash Bandicoot is also on the list.

"With all of these characters, the eyes are paramount," said Astro Bot director Nicolas Doucet "Sometimes LED eyes just didn’t work on certain characters because the original design relies so much on the pupils being a certain size or color for instance. So for more cartoony VIPs like Crash Bandicoot or from Ape Escape, the Bots are wearing a mask to help bridge that problem."

Crash Bandicoot debuted as an original PlayStation game from The Last of Us and Uncharted developer Naughty Dog but, while those two franchises are still firmly in camp PlayStation, Crash has found himself on the opposite side of the console war.

The series came under the control of Activision in 2008 when the company merged with original producer Vivendi. In turn, when Microsoft bought Activision Blizzard for a staggering $68.7 billion in 2023, Crash Bandicoot officially became an Xbox-owned franchise.

It obviously still has roots in PlayStation though, and is still associated with the brand given Crash Bandicoot's prominence in the early PlayStation days.

The series has been quiet since Crash Bandicoot 4 launched in 2020, and a former developer recently broke hearts by discussing a fifth game that never got off the ground.

Ryan Dinsdale is an IGN freelance reporter. He'll talk about The Witcher all day.