Transformers The Game

by Activision

Product Details

• ASIN: B000QCYQYS
• Media: DVD-ROM
• Average Customer Review: 2.0 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (8 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #18,053 in Video Games (See Top 100 in Video Games)

Product Description

This software is BRAND NEW. Packaging may differ slightly from the stock photo above. Please click on our logo above to see over 15,000 titles in stock.

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

13 of 17 people found the following review helpful:

2.0 out of 5 stars Now all we need is a little energon, a lot of luck...and a LOT of update patches, July 26, 2007

By 

Ian (USA) - See all my reviews
(VINE VOICE)   

This review is from: Transformers The Game (DVD-ROM)

Of all the video games that come out each year for the various consoles and platforms, the subgroup of movie based tie-in games are quite possibly the most feared and most dreaded, due to the constant low quality of many titles. Transformers, regrettably, is another example of a game based on a great franchise, yet for the most part doesn't succeed in creating an enjoyable and fun game.

As a game based off the extremely successful movie, Transformers follows the plot of the film. You play as either the Decepticons or the Autobots and wage a campaign to obtain the Allspark, the mythical object that gives life to the transformer race. Along the way you take on hundreds of Autobot/Decepticon drones and get into enormous fights with the main robots of the opposing side, such as Bumblebee, Starscream, Jazz, Blackout and of course, Megatron and Optimus Prime. You'll fight, shoot, and drive/fly through several stages on your quest to either destroy the world or save it. And while the idea of giant shape shifting robots running around and beating each other up sounds like a surefire concept...the game, incredibly, disappoints on almost all aspects.

It seems almost inconceivable that such a sure-fire franchise can be so simplistic and disappointing when developed for a video game, yet Transformers the game does exactly that. How to begin? Well, perhaps the worst aspect of the game...moving around as a vehicle. An essential part of the Transformers mythos is their now famous ability to become a vehicle such as a car, truck, jet, etc. And sure enough, this ability makes it into the game. With a simple touch of a button you can change from robot to vehicle and vice versa. The first time you do this it's pretty much guaranteed that you'll be giddy with excitement. The speed and agility at which it happens (usually less then three seconds) is exciting enough to watch that one never gets tired of watching it happen. Yet...the moment you start moving around and driving, you realize that something is wrong. Driving around as a car is difficult...very, very, very difficult. When your car is swerving around the road and close to crashing at any given second, you realize something...the driving controls for this game are HORRIBLE. They are, without a doubt, the worst I've ever played in a game. It's not the controls themselves that are bad, but rather the responsiveness. Driving a car, thanks to the over-responsiveness and loose feeling, feels like you're always driving on ice. A simple tap to turn left will have you veer left at such an angle that you quickly tap right to correct, only to swerve so far to the right that you immediately press the left button to try and correct, etc. As a result, you end up swerving back and forth almost endlessly as you try to get to whatever your destination is. A simple over-tap of a button and you'll be swinging around in circles while your enemy is speeding away (and much to your disgust, navigating the roads perfectly). One of Bumblebee's missions inside Hoover Dam is rendered almost impossible by the controls (You have to hunt down security drones before they sound an alarm), leading to many, many restarts and shouted curses as these drones that drive perfectly through the roads.

The controls for flight aircraft (such as Blackout in helicopter mode and Starscream as an F-22 fighter jet) are, shockingly, even worse then the driving controls. When you take to the air, things get even worse as you frantically try to control your jet or helicopter, wobbling up and down so much that an observer would think that the pilot was dead drunk and close to passing out at any moment. These controls are ATROCIOUS, so much so that at times it's virtually impossible to complete what should be a simple mission. For example, at the end of the first Decepticon mission, you have to shoot down twenty jets in six minutes while flying Blackout around as a helicopter. It sounds so simple, yet due to the over-reactive controls it borders on next to impossible to complete. While going in a straight line and turning is simple, aiming your craft up or down is a nightmare. You'll move the mouse down to tilt down, yet nothing happens. You move the mouse harder and then you tilt...but at a much steeper angle then you wanted. Now you're plunging towards the ground and frantically move the mouse up. You tilt up, but your nose is now pointing at the sky and you're heading up like you mean to head up into outer space. The problem with the flight controls is that when you want to go up or down they are under-responsive, seemingly not registering a simple control movement to make a small adjustment, forcing you to over-react to compensate and as a result, you take on the appearance of a drunk pilot. Things only get worse when you're being hounded by dozens of planes that are trying to blow you up.

When in robot mode, things get better in game play terms. Transformers the game uses the now immortal WASD control scheme. You use the W, A, S, and D buttons to move around, using the mouse to control your direction and the camera movement, as well as the mouse buttons to fire your guns. Thankfully this part of the game doesn't have any problems with controls, but it does have another issue...the fighting system. To sum it up, it's too simple and too repetitive. You have a main gun, a secondary gun, and your melee attack. The problem is that the melee attacks consist of a single button (or mouse wheel, depending on how you set the controls) that you tap over and over again to do the same three hit combos. Virtually all battles are fought by running up to the robot and hitting it until they die. Sometimes you'll have to consist with a shield, a spinning crane that you have to disable, or some other barrier or obstacle that you have to deal with before knocking the enemy robot into rubble. So it boils down to running up to your foe and hitting him until he's dead. Rinse and repeat. While it's okay at first, it does get repetitive and disappointing as time goes on. It especially becomes disappointing when most of the boss fights consist of attacking the bad guy until he runs away, then you fight his henchmen for a while, then attack the bad guy again until he runs away again, etc. Even the Prime vs Megatron fights boil down into this disappointing pattern. It would be great if there were multiple combos to use in the game, or perhaps a few choices in fighting styles, but sadly the combat remains simplistic and ultimately disappointing. And on the issue of combat, many people have pointed out how your robot may be equipped with powerful guns, yet over half the robots you encounter have impenetrable shields that make them completely immune to your high powered laser gun/cannon. Even mighty Megatron's enormous gun can't penetrate the shield of a simple drone. It gets exceptionally annoying when you have a powerful gun and can't use it because your foes can instantly raise a shield and keep it up indefinitely, even when they are getting thrown through the air and getting onto their feet.

The campaigns that you go upon, whether it's the Autobot or Decepticon, will take you to various locations seen in the movie, such as the Qatar military base, the suburbs that the Whitwicky family live in, the inside of Hoover Dam, and a big city where the final showdown between Autobot and Decepticon takes place. Every level is basically a big, free-roaming stage where you drive to various points to get your next mission or objective. For the Autobots, most of these objectives and missions consist of,

A. Destroying Decepticon Drones
B. Driving somewhere within a time limit
C. Doing both A and B
D. Fighting a Decepticon Boss.

Decepticon missions are roughly the same, with the exception that they involve much more destruction and chaos then the Autobots. While most of these missions are serviceable and generally okay, you eventually wish there was more variety. For example, I'd like to see some autobot missions where you have to save humans in trouble or do a few stealth missions. Or perhaps some Decepticon missions where you have to smash into a heavily guarded base to get some fuel for the Decepticons and then have to contend with an unexpected Autobot invasion, or even an attack on an Autobot base of operations. There are some creative missions and some very fun moments (one of the best is when you're playing as Megatron and your only objective is to cause as much destruction as you can) such as Jazz's final mission, but these are few are far between, with most of the missions being "search and destroy".

Despite it's flaws (and they are serious ones), Transformers the game does have it's good points. If your system can support them, the game does offer some great graphics, especially on the robots. The environments are huge and detailed, offering a lot of things to look at (and blow up). If you look closely, you can even see the inside of buildings, such as rooms and furniture, especially when the walls have been blasted away. With regards to the robots, it's fun to simply rotate the camera and marvel at the incredible amount of detailing on each robot. And as said earlier, it never gets old watching the robots switch back and forth between vehicle and robot forms, so much so that you wish there was an option to slow the process down so you can get a better look at how it's done. As another bonus, the game is very cheep compared to most movie tie-in games, available for purchase at most stores for only twenty dollars, so it's quite cheap. And as a final bonus, the final movies at the end of both campaigns are great fun as they showcase the true powers of both Optimus Prime and Megatron (and the final cutscene for the Decepticons is great!). If you like... Read more ›

6 of 8 people found the following review helpful:

1.0 out of 5 stars This game Deceptisucks, July 7, 2007

By 

Fly Guy (Eastern Shore, Maryland) - See all my reviews

This review is from: Transformers The Game (DVD-ROM)

I bought this game at ****** for my boys and installed it right away. From the get go, you could tell the graphics and sequences are choppy (despite my rig that runs Company of Heroes without a hitch). The controls are probably some of the worst for any game out there....the flying and driving sequences are nearly impossible. Some of the missions that you have to accomplish can't be done in the time alloted. In one of them, you control Scorponok and have to wipe out five communications rigs in 2 minutes....and they're scattered all over the map. Unless I have a teleportation ability that I don't know about yet, I can't figure out how to do it....all the time fighting the controls to get him to do what I want. The targeting system is the worst I've seen in a 3rd person shooter game. All in all, I would hope that the console versions are better, because I'm glad I only spent twenty bucks on it. My kids are disappointed because they wanted to progress through the game and see the different missions and characters. The only reason why it gets zero stars is because I can't choose it. Unless a patch comes out, this will sit on my shelf.

1 of 1 people found the following review helpful:

1.0 out of 5 stars You'll scream with frustration!, July 28, 2009

By 

majorlynch (Cork, Ireland) - See all my reviews

= Fun:1.0 out of 5 stars 

This review is from: Transformers The Game (DVD-ROM)

Where to start.

You only get to play certain transformers on certain levels, you hardly get to play Optimus prime at all.

You're cannons are pointless as must enemies just shield themselves and most characters need to be hit with something, like a tree or a brick
before they stop being invincible.

Some levels are so frustrating you'll scream, e.g.
- Theres a level here where Megatron can be kicked around by "invincible" Autobot characters, which is just weird.
- When you're Blackout fighting Ironhide he's hard to control, easy to kill and trips over everything.
- Many levels are 20 minutes long and if you die you start again.

No replay value, barely any play value.

Stay miles away unless you're a hardcore Transformers fan why isn't bothered by anything.