This one's going to confuse people, if only for the reason that there are a few Astro Boy games on the market now; one by published by Sega and developed by Treasure (known for Gunstar Heroes and Gradius 5 alongside a number of other classics) on the Game Boy Advance, and the others based on the movie that was just released in the US today.  All of those were published by D3 for PlayStation Portable, Wii, Nintendo DS, and a port of the Wii game on PS2.  Here's where things get really confusing; Sega also released an Astro Boy game for PS2 back in 2004 that was developed by Sonic Team (guess what franchise they're best known for?)  The games based on the movie were just released, so I'm not covering those yet, unless they hit bargain bins.  From what I understand, they're all side-scrolling action titles that play somewhat like the 2004 GBA game.  Today, we're gutting the 2004 PS2 game, so that no one gets confused when their kids see the movie in theaters and want to play it on their PS2 (You know, since you won't buy them a Wii.)

Quality: Look, Sonic Team, I know you completely butchered your own beloved namesake mascot over the pass few years, so much that I’m wondering why the hell Sega won’t just do everyone a favor and bring Alex Kidd out of retirement to clean up your goddamn mess.  I was stupid and had good faith that you would at least put some effort into a major franchise that not only had a major influence in animation, but your own industry as well.  Hell, MegaMan was more or less a modern day rip off of Dr. Osamu Tezuka’s beloved robot boy, and that kid’s been in more sequels and spin-offs than Jason and Freddy Kreuger combined. 

I mean, I’m just thinking out loud here, but it would seem to me that an Astro Boy video game would not be that hard to make entertaining.  Honestly, after playing this monstrosity, I could have easily dropped the f-bomb 748 times, slapped a few screenshots up, and called it a day, but it’s not only breaking GGP guidelines, it’s also not telling anyone anything except those of you who can interpret “irate closet anime fan”.  The fact that there are now two different Astro Boy games on the market to force me to take a look at this adaptation before people start getting the two games confused pisses me off to no end, but maybe by me doing this I can give them a heads up on which Astro Boy game to buy and earn some karma points after all those babies I've slapped.

My problem with Sega’s Astro Boy isn’t that they didn’t know the source material.  Saying a Japanese game developer doesn’t understand and highly respect Tetsuwan Atom is like saying a movie script writer who specializes in psychological suspense doesn’t understand anything by M. Night Shamalamayamakan; it could happen, but if you’re offering to do something with the franchise, chances are, you’ve got the basics down.  But in a world where some guy apparently saw and understood Donnie Darko only to give us an awful straight-to-video sequel about Donnie Darko’s sister that had none of the neat film techniques that made every teenage cult trend chasing film snob in tears, there’s also a Japanese video game development team that just did not understand what worked in Astro Boy to translate it to a video game.  Sure, he’s got all his robot goodies, his 100,000 strength, his jet legs, the X-ray vision, the finger lasers.  Oh it’s all there, and the Astro Boy universe is presented faithfully.  But when it came time to actually make a game out of the property, it’s almost as if they forgot how to make a fun game.  I’m not shocked, since this same team hasn’t been able to get it together long enough to make a game as good as Sonic Adventure on Dreamcast.  In fact, you can see a few of Sonic Adventure's touches in Astro Boy.  One being that the graphical quality is about the same.  With Sonic, it was excusable as it came out in 1998, but Astro Boy was a 2004 title and shows no signs of graphical improvement. 

Another trademark Sonic Team flaw that’s present is that the controls are absolutely awful!  Combat on foot is awkward enough, but when it comes to flying, it’s absolutely dreadful trying to take down the first boss.  Granted, Sonic Team fans will probably hope for something as playable as NiGHTS when it comes to jetting around Metro City and flying through courses with loops, but sadly, you can’t even make out where Astro is half of the time.  Even with being able to control the camera somewhat, it’s a chore compared to most games of the genre.  Granted, Astro Boy isn’t a totally unplayable mess if you can get adjusted to the steep learning curve, and it is forgiving enough to novice players to give it a try.  Plus it has some neat little monotony breakers, like helping Metro City citizens with sidequests, and collecting cards of Astro Boy creator Osamu Tezuka’s works (the fact that BlackJack is mentioned at all made me feel all warm and gooey inside).  It’s nothing that was revolutionary for its time, plus the game itself is fairly short.

Aquirability: I found my copy used for $6, which included instructions and original case.  It’s far from an uncommon game to find, but it’s probably worth less than what I paid for it.

Overall: If the game wasn’t so cheap, I wouldn’t even recommend it to the most hardcore classic anime fan.  Granted, four to six bucks is hardly breaking the bank, but I’ve found better games in that price range.  I would say that if you came across Sega’s Astro Boy in the same price range, only get it if you’re one of four things:
1. Someone who likes to make fun of mediocre video games as a hobby.
2. A parent looking for a cheap, quick game for their kid (even then, that’s a huge “maybe”) between holidays or big-budget video game investments.
3. A diehard fan of Astro Boy, and are scared to see what an another developer is going to do to the franchise this fall. 
4. You and your kid(s) just got back from the new Astro Boy movie, read this article ahead of time, and want to throw in an extra bonus along with the new game.  Despite my gripes, it's not that hard.

To anyone else, it’s just another case of “you get what you paid for.”