Play: Transform your gaming experience

2009/08/15

FAIZUL AZIM SAIFUL

FAIZUL AZIM SAIFUL gives the thumbs-up to Transformers: Revenge of the Fallen for its fantastic graphics, gameplay and storyline. Transformers: Revenge of the Fallen (PS3, XBox 360, PS2, PSP)

I’M sure most of us had felt nervous and even some trepidation when Hollywood announced that it was making the movie Transformers. Seeing how television tie-ins are usually flops (and with games turning out even worse), I don’t blame you.

But after having seen both movies, there is only joy, excitement and relief, especially with the blockbuster Revenge of the Fallen, which this review’s game is loosely based on.

I had my fears when there were rumours last year that a Transformers game was in the works, because in 2007, a horrendous title came out which made me wish Megatron would punish those who did it.

But Transfomers: Revenge of the Fallen has restored my faith with tie-ins. In fact, it has provided me with hours of fun.

You can choose to follow either Optimus Prime and his warriors or Megatron and his minions.

Both campaigns are well-drawn out and are different enough that it is worth experiencing either side of the game.

But I have to warn you that you may initially feel a bit awkward with the controls especially since the button to transform is also used to do battle. Once you get the hang of it, you will realise that control mapping does have its function.

You’ll be moving between different forms fluidly while dispatching your enemies with style.

The gameplay is reminiscent of most third person shooters, and each Autobot or Decepticon comes equipped with a main and sub weapon along with a special ability, like Ratchet’s area heal, Optimus’ temporary invincibility or Bumblebee’s stun pulse.

There’s also an overdrive mode that can be activated after you’ve filled up the corresponding meter.

It basically superpowers your character, keeping your guns from overheating and making you more destructive.

Each enemy that you kill will grant you energon, which you can use between missions to power up a few team abilities, like increasing your health or decreasing your weapons cooldowns.

There are three levels for each skill and the game is meant to have multiple plays for each level, so you’ll be revisiting sections often to max out your abilities.

To accomplish each mission well, there are three modes which you can transform into — robot, vehicle and weapon.

In robot mode, you walk around in the familiar humanoid form and can jump, climb buildings and melee attack; the vehicle mode gets you around or avoid gunfire in a hurry; and weapon mode gets you shooting down your enemies with your primary or secondary weapon.

Each Transformers has two main weapons. These include machine guns, missiles, grenade launchers and rifles.

You also have melee attacks that you can link up into a combo or charge up for a more powerful attack.

The most interesting attacks are those that you can pull off after coming out of a transformation.

While in vehicle mode, you can hold down a button and as you transform, you’ll execute a special and powerful move that is quite helpful in combat and is shown in awesome metal-crunching slow-motion.

The AI does a good job of controlling the enemy as they go into vehicle mode to race away if you get too close and they’ll take up flanking positions when appropriate although there are times when a “dumb” Transformer tries to climb up a building while you’re pounding it silly.

The missions are played out in an open destructible environment (cars, tankers and light structures) and because of its diverse mission types — defend/destroy, repair, race, miniboss fights — the action keeps you on your toes.

Bonus challenges and unlockables do a good job of keeping things interesting.

Accomplishing the two bonus objectives in each mission nets you a solid haul of attribute-boosting energon, and shooting the five targets in each area will earn you even more energon, as well as stall the clock so you can strive for a higher medal by finishing quickly.

Overarching objectives challenge you to accomplish tasks with certain characters, and doing so unlocks episodes of the original Transformers cartoon as well as vintage paint jobs and concept art.

Visuals are top-notch, with each character model coming straight from the movie and every explosion and flare of weapons fire just adds to the polish.

But they could have done better with cinematics in between missions rather than the dull unknown base-camp.

Voice-acting is less impressive. While some Transformers, such as Megatron and Optimus Prime sound great, others are almost unintelligible, thanks to poor volume matching or overzealous robotic effects (and there are no subtitles).

The Transformers were all well-voiced but the human characters (specifically Shia LeBeouf and Megan Fox) just makes you feel thankful there are only a few missions which involve either of them.

Transformers: Revenge of the Fallen has proven that not all movie tie-ins are bad just as long as the developers are passionate about the project and put enough effort into enjoyable gameplay, solid graphics and a good storyline.

• The game can be bought at Playtime Electronic in Bangsar Shopping Centre, Kuala Lumpur.