Rating: 2 Pulses

Genre: Action

After just seeing the new Transformers movie (which was so tight), I was very excited to play the new game. However, my excitement quickly turned into disappointment.

Transformers is one of the most poorly designed games to land on consoles this year. The idea of giant transformable robots fighting each other is such a bad-ass story for a video game, but Traveller’s Tales really messed it up.

The story of the game is the same as the film’s. The classic Transformers battle between Autobots and Decepticons has dropped on planet Earth as the two battling sides search quickly for an object known as the AllSpark.

The one potentially cool thing about Transformers is that it splits the game into two campaigns, with one for each group. In the Autobots campaign, you’ll play as Optimus Prime, Bumblebee, Jazz, and others as you search for the AllSpark and try to protect Sam, and to save Earth. On the other side, the Decepticons campaign has you playing as Megatron, Starscream, Barricade, and others to hunt down the AllSpark and destroy the Autobots. While the prospect to play as both the Autobots and Decepticons sounds interesting, you’ll realize though that there’s very little difference between the two campaigns.

Basically, Transformers is a brawler set in large destructible environments, but that’s not to say that the game is all open-ended. In general, missions and objectives are very linear which is a big issue that limits the game. The game even sets up an artificial battlefield border that you can only see using your radar. Leave this border for too long, and you have to start your whole mission over.

And the combat is even worse. The lock-on ability doesn’t feel very good and the robot’s weapons feel useless because they don’t take off much damage. The most efficient way to hurt an enemy is using the melee attacks and combos. You’ll be using these same attacks during most of your battles, which becomes dull very quickly.

Just like Spider-Man 3 and Pirates of the Caribbean: At World’s End, Transformers is another great summer blockbuster movie that has been turned into a mediocre game. If you’re a fan of Transformers, you might enjoy the new game, but I’d say stick with the classics. The older Transformers games are a lot better than this one, even without the next-gen graphics.

? Rangebar Merani