The plot of Revenge of the Fallen is basically the same as the film, making as much or as little sense as it did, although many events are condensed so that they can fit within the game's scope. The single-player campaign lets you take control of either the virtuous Autobots, led by Optimus Prime, or the villainous Decepticons, initially led by Starscream. Essentially, the Decepticons are following the orders of their ancient and evil lord, The Fallen, and are trying to resurrect Megatron and uncover a machine on Earth which could harvest our solar system's sun, and the Autobots are trying to stop them.
The story is mainly told through scenes with each team standing stiffly around a hologram of Earth, talking. Which isn't exactly riveting viewing, and neither are the computer-display-like cutscenes which precede each zone. There aren't any clips from the movie to supplement the story, and there are only a handful of in-game cutscenes. Which is a shame, because these cutscenes, while not perfect, are generally well directed and entertaining, showing jets fighting Decepticons or robots smashing into battleships.
Man, do I love me some 'taters.
Gameplay centers around visiting several 'zones' around the Earth, from Shanghai to Cairo, and doing battle with the opposing faction of Transformers. Each zone you visit will have three areas, and each area has around two missions. Completing missions earns you Campaign Points, the amount of which is determined by how fast you were. You're only required to complete one of these missions in each area to advance the story, although if you haven't earned enough Campaign Points to reach the next zone, you'll have to check out one of the side missions to gather some more. All up, if you do well, you can complete each campaign by completing twelve missions on each side, and if you're quick enough you could finish both in under five hours.
About a good 80-90% of the main missions in Revenge of the Fallen center around blowing up as many Decepticons as possible, the remaining 10% being composed of escort or repair missions. Luckily, being a giant robot means you're well equipped for blowing things up. Each Transformer is equipped with a main weapon and a secondary weapon, and can also melee attack. You'll soon realise that except for certain key characters, meleeing isn't very useful at all, which means you have to stick to shooting things up. The weapons that each character are equipped with are usually fairly varied, with some carrying machine guns and rocket launchers, and others carrying flamethrowers and sniper rifles. The more enemy robots you kill, the more energon you'll receive to upgrade your weapons. All of this works fairly well, even if it feels very repetitive.
Of course, it wouldn't be Transformers if you couldn't transform. In this game, you won't be required to transform that often, and the only times it's required are usually to reach land with a flying Transformer. Nevertheless, your character can transform into their vehicle mode by holding down the right trigger. Releasing it returns you to robot mode. It's an interesting choice, as you can pull off certain special moves by being in vehicle mode, then holding down a certain button as you release the right trigger. However, transforming is mapped to the same trigger as firing your weapons, with the difference being that holding down the left trigger puts you into 'weapons mode'. This can lead to some frustrating situations when you're trying to quickly shoot, but instead transform into a helicopter, or vice versa. Another niggle is that while your character can climb buildings, they cannot defend or attack while doing so, which means that any climbing on your part makes you a sitting duck, as well as leading to some easy kills in the single-player campaign.
This is a picture of an explosion.
As mentioned, there are several side missions, but most of them follow the pattern already established, such as kill so many enemy robots, or repair so many satellite dishes. What is interesting is the unlockable system in place. There are bonus objectives in every mission, as well as a list of the title's own in-game achievements. Completing these unlocks a range of very cool stuff, from Decepticon propaganda posters to actual episodes of the G1 Transformers cartoon. For fans of the franchise, we can imagine that unlocking this content may prove to be more rewarding than completing the game.
The game also has a decent multiplayer mode. It's much more fun going up against real opponents, and you'll play through standard modes such as Deathmatch and Team Deathmatch, as well as more interesting modes such as 'One Shall Stand', where the objective is to take out the other team's leader (and feels a lot like a real Transformers battle). There's not a lot here that makes it stand out from the crowd as something different, but it'll provide a few hours of fun with friends.
Flame on.
The game's presentation, as mentioned, is a little all over the place. While the game's talking-heads cutscenes aren't anything special, the design of the robots are generally quite good, as are their transforming animations. The environments are bland, bland, bland, and the level of destruction that the Transformers cause is reasonable, but not as much as you'd hope. Voicework is pretty good for the most part, with Peter Cullen and Frank Welker returning to breathe life into Optimus Prime and Megatron. Strangely, Bumblebee can talk in this game, while he cannot in the film - not that he has much that's interesting to say. Shia LaBeouf reprises his role of Sam Witwicky, and is largely incomprehensible. He speaks so fast and in such bizarre word-strings that we had no idea at all what he was saying at any time, so when he was giving us objectives, we thanked our stars we had a radar to follow on-screen.
Transformers: Revenge of the Fallen is a game that works well enough. Despite the Transformers paint job, it's just a third person shooter, which sees you shuttled from location to location as you point and shoot at everything in sight. With inconsistent presentation and a barely-used transforming mechanic, the game presents nothing special for the average gamer. However, if you're a Transformers fan, the multiplayer mode may be worth delving into with your buddies, and the unlockables on offer are quite cool indeed. Transformers: Revenge of the Fallen is near the top of movie tie-in games, although that isn't saying much.
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