Team Asobi is a Japanese video game company located in Tokyo. It works directly with Sony Interactive Entertainment and was created in 2012 as part of Japan Studio. In April 2021, it became its own separate studio under Sony's PlayStation Studios. The company is most famous for creating the Astro Bot game series.

History

Team Asobi was created in 2012 as part of Japan Studio in Tokyo by Nicolas Doucet. The team’s name comes from the Japanese word "Asobi," which means "play." After forming, the team worked on technical demonstrations and later developed The Playroom (2013), a downloadable augmented reality game that showed how the PlayStation Camera and DualShock 4 could be used with the PlayStation 4. Doucet and some team members had previously worked on games for the EyeToy and used their experience to create The Playroom. Team Asobi also made a virtual reality version of The Playroom VR to demonstrate the PlayStation VR device when it was released in 2016. The Playroom introduced a robotic character named "A5081," which looked similar to the word "ASOBI." This character became the basis for the Astro Bot character used in later games, including Astro Bot Rescue Mission (2018), Astro's Playroom (2020), and Astro Bot (2024), which won Game of the Year at The Game Awards 2024 and the 28th Annual D.I.C.E. Awards.

In late 2020 and early 2021, several members of Japan Studio, outside of Team Asobi, left the company. Sony confirmed that by April 2021, Japan Studio would focus on Team Asobi due to the success of Astro's Playroom. In June 2021, Sony announced that Team Asobi had become a separate studio within PlayStation Studios. Doucet continues to serve as the studio director and creative director for Asobi. Since January 6, 2025, Astro Bot has become the most awarded platformer game in history, surpassing It Takes Two with a total of 106 Game of the Year nominations and wins.