Robots in Disguise
We get our first peek at next-gen hot, hot robo-on-robo action in Transformers: The Game and offer up impressions inside.
Published: April 20, 2007
Bumblebee is a Camaro. Megatron is a stealth bomber. Soundwave is nowhere to be seen. Barricade is a friggin' Mustang Saleen police car. The Transformers movie is doing a lot of things that will probably piss off guys in their late 20s/early 30s now that more or less grew up with the original series. Hell, the sheer amount of cross-promotion and the shift from a story about warring 'bots from Cybertron to a tale of "a boy and his car" are enough to piss off even non-fans. Oh, and then there's the fact that Frank Welker is not the voice of Megatron in the movie (Hugo Weaving, Agent Smith from the Matrix movies is, though Peter Cullen is reprising his role as Optimus Prime).
For their part, though, Activision and UK-based Traveller's Tales are doing their best to take the main elements of the movie and make a game out of them -- a game that includes Walker as the voice of Megatron and that still shadows the basic plot of the movie with a lot more stuff exploding. Stuff you caused to explode, we might add. Did we mention the fact that you can play as either Autobots or Decepticons and explore the storyline all the way through from either view point? Yeah, there's that too.
So here's the gist of the game: the AllSpark, embodiment of leadership among the Autobots in the so-awesome-it-rocks-your-face-clean-off original animated movie, is buried somewhere on Earth and only one boy knows about it: Sam Witwicky. See, his great great great (great great) grandpappy happens to find something in the Arctic Circle which tells of the location and hundreds of years later, Sam unknowingly possesses the locations which means a whole shatload of transforming 'bots are comin' for him.
Right from the start of the game, you're given the chance to play as Autobots or Decepticons in parallel "what if?" scenarios where the good guys or the baddies eventually get to the AllSpark first. Though we didn't see the full complement (Activision wasn't about to blow their whole load weeks before the game's release sometime near the July 4th blockbuster), we do know that there will be nine playable Transformers to choose from; four Autobots and five Decepticons. It should be noted that, while we haven't gotten a chance to see it in action yet, the PSP version will actually feature a whopping 20 different characters -- including variants from the movie and the original 1st Generation cartoon from the 80's.
Though they were quick to caution against using the dreaded S word (sandbox), the game world of the Transformers is fairly free-wheelin'. Nearly everything in a given level (we peeked at a bucolic Midwest town and a U.S. Military base in Qatar pulled from the movie) can be picked up, punched, kicked and blowed up real good. Picking up a passing car and chucking it at a building, for instance, turns the whole thing into a mess of shattered masonry and splintering glass in a bit of a nod to the level of destruction in War of the Monsters (though we're not making any direct comparisons right now). Thank to Traveller's Tales' internal physics engine, just about everything in the game exhibits fairly predictable real-world properties; fences can be kicked out of the way in segments, cars go flipping through the air, and, when it finally came time to tussle with some bad guys, smacking around other Transformers can result in a little ninja-like flip through the air only to land on their feet with a skid.
We were able to see only three levels in the game, and sadly weren't allowed to get hands-on time with the game at all, but what we saw was at least interesting. In the first scenario, we had to battle a handful of drones that kept crashing into the city in waves via big pods. It was a chance to witness the kind of destruction and interactivity that were built into the world, but also a glimpse into both the ranged weapons fire and up-close melee modes. By tapping a shoulder button, specific enemies can be camera-locked to allow circle strafing and some light basic punch and kick combos. If an enemy is knocked down completely, they can be picked up and chucked into a nearby building for extra oomph or just another enemy to stack up extra damage.
For their part, though, Activision and UK-based Traveller's Tales are doing their best to take the main elements of the movie and make a game out of them -- a game that includes Walker as the voice of Megatron and that still shadows the basic plot of the movie with a lot more stuff exploding. Stuff you caused to explode, we might add. Did we mention the fact that you can play as either Autobots or Decepticons and explore the storyline all the way through from either view point? Yeah, there's that too.
So here's the gist of the game: the AllSpark, embodiment of leadership among the Autobots in the so-awesome-it-rocks-your-face-clean-off original animated movie, is buried somewhere on Earth and only one boy knows about it: Sam Witwicky. See, his great great great (great great) grandpappy happens to find something in the Arctic Circle which tells of the location and hundreds of years later, Sam unknowingly possesses the locations which means a whole shatload of transforming 'bots are comin' for him.
Right from the start of the game, you're given the chance to play as Autobots or Decepticons in parallel "what if?" scenarios where the good guys or the baddies eventually get to the AllSpark first. Though we didn't see the full complement (Activision wasn't about to blow their whole load weeks before the game's release sometime near the July 4th blockbuster), we do know that there will be nine playable Transformers to choose from; four Autobots and five Decepticons. It should be noted that, while we haven't gotten a chance to see it in action yet, the PSP version will actually feature a whopping 20 different characters -- including variants from the movie and the original 1st Generation cartoon from the 80's.
Though they were quick to caution against using the dreaded S word (sandbox), the game world of the Transformers is fairly free-wheelin'. Nearly everything in a given level (we peeked at a bucolic Midwest town and a U.S. Military base in Qatar pulled from the movie) can be picked up, punched, kicked and blowed up real good. Picking up a passing car and chucking it at a building, for instance, turns the whole thing into a mess of shattered masonry and splintering glass in a bit of a nod to the level of destruction in War of the Monsters (though we're not making any direct comparisons right now). Thank to Traveller's Tales' internal physics engine, just about everything in the game exhibits fairly predictable real-world properties; fences can be kicked out of the way in segments, cars go flipping through the air, and, when it finally came time to tussle with some bad guys, smacking around other Transformers can result in a little ninja-like flip through the air only to land on their feet with a skid.
We were able to see only three levels in the game, and sadly weren't allowed to get hands-on time with the game at all, but what we saw was at least interesting. In the first scenario, we had to battle a handful of drones that kept crashing into the city in waves via big pods. It was a chance to witness the kind of destruction and interactivity that were built into the world, but also a glimpse into both the ranged weapons fire and up-close melee modes. By tapping a shoulder button, specific enemies can be camera-locked to allow circle strafing and some light basic punch and kick combos. If an enemy is knocked down completely, they can be picked up and chucked into a nearby building for extra oomph or just another enemy to stack up extra damage.
