For the gamers out there the gunplay is similar to Gears Of War minus the cover system. It's just about as speedy although battles tend to be battle of attritions rather than tactics. The first chapter certainly isn't the most exciting way to open the game. With your alt mode rarely used since its all corridors with so many turns that the alt modes are nothing much but alternative weapons. Get to chapter 2 though and you get to take control of the classic seekers. Where the game areas are large with enough room to fly around. Don't expect dog style fighting. It's much much slower keeping the focus of gunplay similar to on ground as bots. But it just shows how the alt modes can provide a nice gameplay element so non-existant in the first level. Plus I couldn't resist playing as Skywarp.
The game actually has 3player co-op for the main campaign and each level have 3 main characters for the mission. So far the two chapters I've played are all set characters. Not sure if this will open up later for your own choosing. Each of the characters available have their own set of skills and abilities. The seekers for instance has Starscream as a very offensive gunner, with Skywarp being a scout with a cloaking field and Thundercracker able to to do some limited healing and spot cloaked enemies. I think the main campaign will be a lot more fun if played with friends in co-op mode. Otherwise standard 3rd person shooter fare made enjoyable by the use of the Transformers franchise.
The graphics so far have been great. Merging a lot of G1 and movie elements. Mainly G1 for the character designs and movie designs for the art direction of the environments and a lot of the sound effects. The art direction is very dark. They have given us a very mechanical gothic look for the environments which look fantastic. The audio side is decent. While the music is forgettable, the sound effects are great, triggering a lot of recognizable movie sound effects. The voices on the whole is not too bad. Peter Cullen shines as Prime but everyone else have new actors. Megatron sounds ok and whoever voiced Starscream did a decent job. Jetfire's Australian (I think it was Aussie anyway) accent was a nice surprise.
I've only played 2 levels and the levels themselves can get repetetive with some repeated corridors and structures but there are some great set pieces. In particular jumping thru space debris while aerialbots hail down fire or the fantastic set piece of a gunship involving dog fighting and destruction of. There's still 10 levels to go with the first 6 chapters compromising of the Decepticon campaign and the last six the Autobot campaign. Youc an jump straight to the autobot campaign but they are in chronological order and Autobot missions were designed to be played after the Decepticon missions.
I haven't tried multiplayer yet and also just 2 chapters in of the 12 shown. So this is just first impressions. The game is certainly miles better than the movie games but don't expect anything that will blow your socks off. But as a Transformer fan this is worth it. I'm not really versed into the canon and mythology with TF (I'm more of a toy engineering fan
) but it appears to be before everything in G1. Eg. First chapter has Megatron meeting Starscream for the very first time along with Jetfire's presence with the seekers. In this regard the franchise will give the game an X factor for us fans. It won't excuse a bad game but this certainly isn't/ Far from it. It's still very enjoyable and I'm sure moreso in 3p co-op of the campaign.
I might post more the further I get in. Still waiting to see who else turns up. The extras section of the menu promises to unlock Slipstream and Arcee. So looking forward to that.
PS.
Jetfire:
I see you selected Barricade in the first chapter. I did too.
Although Brawl was certainyl tempting to play as.
Originally Posted by SamLoi888
120 inch screen???? Wtf?
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Though I played as Brawl on the first level. I'm playing through on hard (considering I've been gaming for over 20 years, I figured it the right choice) but I'll be honest in saying I've died. A lot. Sometimes I've just had to hold back in a corner and snipe away at bots because as soon as you get surrounded by three of them, it's over in seconds.
