Playstation 2 - Transformers

Format
Playstation 2
Publisher
Atari
Developer
Melbourne House
Country of origin
Australia
Genre
Shooter

Transformers

By David Rasmussen
16th Jan 05

Studio - Atari/Melbourne
Age - E for Everybody
Genre - Platform

Okay. You know the drill, but just in case...
Based on the recent Transformers Armada, this series kicks off as the Minicons (a new race never before seen in any previous incarnation of Transformers) leave Cybertron for better places, only to end up on Earth. So much for finding better places.

The Autobots and Decepticons, after receiving a signal from the Minicons during, of all things, a major planetwide battle, follow them to Earth and that's where the action starts.

First off you'll notice there's none of the "humans" this time out... of course if you HAD an attachment to certain characters on that score then you'll be disappointed... not really. They weren't that great.
Second off, to suit the game's action, you'll be confronting a new type of Transformers... DeceptiClones. Eh? What's that? Well it's mostly just an excuse to fill each level with Decepticons without creating a million and one distinct and individualized disposable Transformers (or the same several dozen or so that keep coming back over and over again.)

Third off... uh... well, I'd like to say that I shouldn't spoil the story for you... but there doesn't seem to be any story to spoil. You go from mission to mission, retrieve Mini Cons/Data Cons, fight a lot and have a boss battle or two and that's it... kind of disappointing, really, but let's move on.

You start off in the Character Select screen in Autobot HQ, which is just as pretty as the rest of this game... did I mention the graphics are darn pretty? Well NOW I mentioned it! Anyway you can pick between three Autobots, each with their own special uses and strengths.

Optimus is the powerhouse. His truck mode can run over lesser enemies and he's good when you need strength and power. Hotshot is more for speed than power. He has his uses though he's good mostly for recon. Finally we have Red Alert who is a pretty powerful and balanced character.

You have to travel to parts of the Earth. Places like the Amazon and Antarctica for example.
Each "level" has a set amount of Mini Cons and a set amount of bonus objects to find called Data Cons. Yes, yes, it‘s only the one extra to find but that's a good thing.

Finding these (or your portal points for saving or returning to HQ) is not hard, they can be seen from a distance since they glow (yellow for Mini Con or Data Cons, and blue for save point/portal point)... or so I thought. It seems that just SEEING them is one thing, actually navigating yourself to where these things are? Well that's another story! And, yes, it's just that much more difficult without a map feature.

The controls are easy enough to master, and they're customizable so you shouldn't have any complaints about how the controls work. Transformation is done with a one-button push so you can quickly switch out from robot to vehicle mode in short order.

The gameplay is easy enough. Basically you enter a level, seek out Mini Cons or Data Cons (to unlock bonus materials), and fight DeceptiClones. Occasionally you'll have a major battle on your hands, or you'll have to fight one of the Decepticons, but this all shouldn't be a problem since the game autosaves whenever you open a portal gate or find a Mini Con slash Data Con.
The action is solid enough, and it's kind of fun to play.

Now the bad news.
Problem #1 is the lack of "development" for your Autobot characters.
Other than the ability to attach Mini Cons to them to power them up there is NO leveling up!
No experience gains, no skill boosting, nothing. The only adjustments you can make is to the Mini Cons attached to said Autobots and that's it! Your character remains the same from the beginning to the end for the most part, and that's just wrong.
If there IS a way to change the stats on the Autobots other than Mini Con attachments? I sure as heck haven't found it yet!

Problem #2 is what seems to be a lack of a map feature.
I've ended up wandering about the levels occasionally looking for something... not sure what.
Mini Cons? Data Cons? I've looked and looked yet they're not easy to find, and not having a working map feature made them harder to find. At times I just ended up wandering, and wandering, and getting lost, and wandering some more... damn! Having an easy to read map would have been nice. Really.

Problem #3, though this is to be expected, is control of my chosen Autobots.
Now I use Optimus a lot so I guess this is only natural, but the big guy doesn't seem to stop on a dime very well (needs new brakes?), which means I've rolled myself off the sides of roads and walked over edges because he takes a second or two to come to a halt. Though, at this point, I haven't found a fall I couldn't recover from yet (except falling into the deep Antarctic ocean which was instant death) so Optimus falling doesn't seem to be a problem for the most part.

Problem #4, tied into this control thing, is the control of the vehicle mode which is a problem.
The vehicle controls are clunky, and it's pretty darn easy to get yourself stuck fast vehicle mode.
The best way to use vehicle mode is to first position yourself in robot mode, transform, and try to drive in a straight line. Anything more complex or more useage of vehicle mode will just frustrate you.
That's kind of sad since, as Optimus, you can run over most of the weaker enemies but the controls make it difficult to do that!

Problem #5 is the worst though! That would be the lack of a lock-on feature that helps target DeceptiClones! This, if anything, is the biggest problem with the game!
I don't know if this is a feature reserved for a Mini Con or not, but the mere fact that I have this problem (which would make battling large amounts of DeceptiClones, or powerful DeceptiClones) is a disconcerting thing to me.

The problem is even more apparent when your fighting fast boss Decepticons like Starscream (the Antarctic level). As a robot you can fight him fairly easily, but once he changes to jet mode you'll have a better grasp of how much a pain it is to have to dodge Starscream's attacks AND manually aim your weapons at the same time!! And, yes, it'll only get worse as you go along.

But if the controls are a reason to possibly pass on this, the extras are a solid reason to buy this.
NOT only does this have a lot of perks for Transformers Armada fans, it also has a few gems for Generation One fans! And, really, how cool is that!

So far I've unlocked a TV Spot extra which has five classic "public service announcement" clips from the Generation One Transformers series, and a music section that has old and new renderings of the classic Transformers theme song to listen to! I'm still looking, so hopefully there are more of these rare little Generation One gems to savor in this game!

You can view all the extras you unlocked on the main menu (Extras) section. Easy, eh?
Of course you'll have to play the game and find all the Data Cons to unlock all the extras, so that'll keep you pounding away at the game for quite sometime to find out how much stuff you can unlock.

The gameplay is good (though flawed in places), but the animation is where this game really excels!
Talk about pretty! It's all CGI animation, which might remind you abit of the Beast Wars franchise with it's use of CGI... only this is way prettier.

The cut scenes are so darn beautiful, even the game is beautiful animation wise!
Yes, I know, the game does have some shortcomings but you have to admit it's just gosh darn good looking despite all it's "shortcomings"! But are the shortcomings enough to dampen playing this? Let's see...

Transformers Breakdown
What's Hot? - It's a damn beautiful game! With a ton of extras (that seem to even have a few golden gems for Generation One fans though I only found one gem to date) and animation that is just so beautiful to look at? The game is right on. Gameplay is good too, but it could have used a few tweaks here and there... OKAY! It could use some MAJOR tweaks, but still it's got it's good points!
Alright otherwise it's a fairly decent game despite the flaws.

What's Not? - Yes. The game could have done better. The flaws were a major sticking point.
An auto mapping feature (which I don't seem to have), a lock-on feature, maybe the ability to stop on a dime for precision moves or control your Autobot better in vehicle mode, and maybe some unlockable characters -- then again I haven't played long enough yet so MAYBE there are unlockable characters...
I just have to look and see.
If there isn't any, however, then that is just a disappointment! That would have been a good thing.

Overall more work on the gameplay should have been done, but it's still passable despite the flaws.

Moments to Remember? - The cutscenes are beautiful! And the extras are nice too (ESPECIALLY the Generation One stuff which I'm just finding now)! The game? Well there isn't much of a story... find the Mini Cons, stop the Decepticons, and that's it from what I've seen.
So how can things be memorable about the game if the game is so darn straightforward?!? Well, I guess just the fact you get to play with the Autobots and thrash Decepticons is somewhat memorable... now all they need to do is work on a Generation One game and I'd be quite happy!

What to Ignore? - Eh... I'll never get over how some of the Mini Cons are just old "Friends" recycled.
Like that one Mini Con that looks kinda like Bumblebee (somewhat) but is named "Sparkplug"... wasn‘t that the name of an old Generation One Transformer... or was it the name of one of the two humans from Generation One? I can‘t remember.

Speaking of humans? Those wacky kids from Armada are NOT present for the game!
Of course if you actually LIKED the "kids" who teamed up with the Autobots you can forget seeing them since they aren't in this game. But, on the bright side, if you didn't like them much you can "ignore" them since they're not in this game.

Overal1? - All the Transformers (more or less) and none of the humans? This game might be right up your alley... Except that it seems that when they removed the humans they seemed to remove any plot as well.
Somehow just being shuffled from place to place finding Mini Cons doesn't seem to offer much in the way of a deep storyline, but again I guess that's forgivable since there's a ton of things to compensate for that.

The game is animated well, and having fairly decent gameplay... with some flaws here and there.
The game (while having a few flaws here and there as I stated above) should be something for you Transformers fans out there to consider. Then again with the large (larger than any game I've seen before) Extras section loaded with a ton of goodies to unlock (both Generation One and Armada related) you can't go wrong with this game just by the extras alone.

Of course you don't need to be a Transformers fans to at least consider this game (but it helps if you are). Rent it out maybe, if you are not a fan but curious about the game, hell it might even help in your considerations of purchasing this game for your permanent collection.

Me? I think it has some merit, at least to the point of checking out.
It's not a cakewalk due to the lacking functions I talked about, but still it's a halfway decent game with some very very decent extras and CGI animation that is just too good.
It's not perfect, but it's at least passable.
And with the upcoming Transformers movie (2006 possibly) that is just another good reason to be checking this out as it will be one of those things to keep you occupied until the movie hits theaters.

Now all I need is some Generation One Transformers episodes put out on GBA viewing format, a decent GBA Transformers game (or a PSP Transformers game), not to mention a Generation One Transformers game and I'm all set to stand in line for Transformers tickets in the near future!

Because now I know, and knowing is half the battle... oh, wait, that's from the old public service announcements... I thought that was just for GI Joe public service ads though... oh, well.

-- David Rasmussen 16th Jan 05

Playstation 2 Transformers Images