Welcome to The PlayStation Report! We’ve been having fun running through Nintendo’s vast array of intellectual properties for a while now in The Nintendo Report, but if there’s another company out there with nearly as many names under their belt as The Big N, it’s Sony. Of course, they handle their properties quite differently from Nintendo, with a striking number of their old brands being seemingly permanently retired after a few, or even one entry. 

For our first foray, we’re going to be looking at the letter A (and their one series that starts with numbers) and give them all a health rating. How are Sony’s A games doing? Let’s find out in The PlayStation Report! 

#Xtreme

Sony’s Xtreme games are a series of extreme sports titles, which were rather popular back in the late 90s. Players took part in challenges involving everything from BMX bikes to inline skates to skateboards. This one’s got a bit of an interesting history, too. The first game in the series was called ESPN Extreme Games, but was followed up by the immensely popular 2Xtreme. The sequel didn’t have any of the ESPN branding since Sony’s contract with them had expired, so when they re-released the first game as part of their Greatest Hits line, they renamed it 1Xtreme and removed all the ESPN stuff. Neat! 

Health rating: Basically dead

2Xtreme was followed up by 989 Studios’ 3Xtreme in 1999. It took the series fully polygonal (which is kind of a wild thing to think back on in 2024) and Sony promoted the heck out of it. However, the game’s reception was far from good, and it never graduated to the PlayStation 2. The whole Extreme Sports games genre kinda disappeared too, but honestly, I wouldn’t be surprised to see a game like this perform reasonably well in the modern era. I would be genuinely shocked to see it happen though. It appears Sony has moved on. 

Alundra

This one’s actual ownership is kind of hard to nail down. Sony published both games in the series in Japan themselves, and the franchise has never appeared on any non-Sony platforms as far as I can tell, which suggests to me they have at least some stake in the brand. However, other companies like Working Designs and even Activision published it in other parts of the world. But for the sake of this report, we’re going to say it’s technically a Sony franchise. And it’s a pretty well-liked one at that! The original Alundra is an action-adventure game with a slick anime look and a focus on puzzle solving that earned itself a decent following when it released. Members of its development team were even involved in the old Landstalker series that appeared on Sega’s platforms! 

Health rating: Basically dead

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Alundra hasn’t been seen or heard from in a very long time. A direct sequel was released on PlayStation in 1999, but was critically panned for having less than stellar controls and weirdly little to do with the original game that people loved so much. The first one was released on PSN back in the PS3 days as part of the PSone Classics line, but that’s about it. As far as I can tell, the game’s developer, Matrix Software, is still in business, though they don’t seem to have produced anything since 2020. I’m afraid Alundra might be gone forever.  

Ape Escape

Here we have one of Sony’s most beloved IPs. Ape Escape was a huge hit on PlayStation, and has become a fan favorite brand ever since. It’s a 3D platformer where you have to run around stopping apes with weird helmets from messing stuff up. It’s a super-fun series of games with bright, colorful visuals, endearing character designs, and even some catchy music! 

Health rating: Could be better

The last Ape Escape game was PlayStation Move: Ape Escape which was a motion controlled rail shooter of sorts. Not exactly what fans of the series have been clamoring for, and that was way back in 2011. With that long of a gap since a new release, you’d think it’d be basically dead, but Sony has absolutely not forgotten about this series. Ape Escape gets referenced a lot, which has successfully kept hope alive that a new, proper entry might still show up one of these days. This franchise is extremely malleable, too. The game before the rail shooter was 2009’s Ape Quest, an Ape Escape RPG! Sony could do any number of things with this great brand. Sadly, they seem to have chosen nothing instead. 

Arc the Lad

Here’s another series where Sony’s ownership is, let’s just say “in question.” The series has only ever appeared on PlayStation consoles, the WonderSwan, and mobile. And yes, Sony themselves have published a number of the releases themselves, including the mobile iterations. It’s a tactical RPG series that started life on the PlayStation in 1995, but only in Japan. 

Health rating: Okay

Arc the Lad has seen numerous sequels and spinoffs, the latest of which was 2018’s Arc the Lad R. Like I said above, that was published by Sony for mobile devices, but was never localized outside of Japan. The servers shut down in 2021, which wasn’t all that long ago. It’s hard to say where the series really stands within Sony these days, but the mobile game’s servers lasting for 3 years is a respectable run. I bet we’ll see Arc the Lad again, but whether or not we get a proper console release or another mobile game remains to be seen. 

Astro Bot

One of PlayStation’s newest stars, And now, Astro Bot exploded in popularity earlier this year with the frankly awesome Astro Bot for PlayStation 5. However, this little fella actually got his start on the PlayStation 4 in Astro Bot: Rescue Mission, followed by the pack-in game Astro’s Playroom, which worked as an extremely charming tech demo for the then-new PS5. Astro Himself is also pretty freaking adorable.

Health rating: Great

If you had asked me a month ago, I would have said the likelihood of seeing a new Astro game was slim to none. Astro’s Playroom was super cool, but it didn’t really smell to me like something Sony would turn into an actual franchise. Boy am I glad I was wrong! Astro Bot was far and away the highlight of the most recent State of Play presentation, and I’m far from the only one who feels that way. It’s colorful, looks fun, and is chock full of all sorts of PlayStation references from the company’s history. If Astro Bot winds up taking off, I think we’ll be seeing even more of him in the future. 

ATV Offroad Fury

ATV Offroad Fury was one of those games on the PS2 that was absolutely everywhere. It was easily one of the most common games to find in any pre-owned game store, and just about everyone with a PS2 owned it or at least played it at some point. It easily moved enough copies to make it into Sony’s Greatest Hits line, and was generally a well-liked game. It’s obviously an ATV racing game. It’s got solid graphics, solid controls, what more could you want from an ATV game? 

Health rating: Basically dead

Talk about a series that burned bright only to disappear into the ether. There were a whopping four entries released on the PS2, with the latter two also being ported to the PSP. The series changed developers halfway through, and then it actually crossed over with Acclaim/THQ’s MX games. But the mainline series itself stopped with ATV Offroad Fury 4 in 2006. It seems to have been relatively well liked too, so its disappearance from Sony’s slate is sort of mystifying. It’s not like ATVs stopped being cool. We’re now more than two console generations removed from this series without so much as a digital re-release on PSN as far as I can tell. I think Sony’s given up on this series for good. 

And that about wraps it up for the first entry in The PlayStation Report, and well, that one was kinda rough. It’s nice to see Astro Bot potentially kicking off a proper new franchise, and Arc the Lad has some life, but there’s way too many dead franchises for my liking. We’ll see if the next letter brings us better fortunes though, as we look ahead to the letter B. Will it be any better? Fingers crossed.