Because health packs are randomly given and damage is taken so easily, dying becomes a major problem in Revenge of the Fallen. The player is given three lives at the beginning of every level, and, should they die, the game will respawn them in the exact same spot. The game is also nice enough to get rid of surrounding enemies from time to time. But after those three lives are utilized, the player will have to start from the very beginning of a level. That’s right, if you die during the last section of a level, such as during a boss battle, you may very well have to sit through a long loading screen before being asked to play through the 20 minute segment all over again.
And the linear paths through the levels only make this ordeal even more agonizing. Right angles, long straightaways, and boring design are pretty much the norm here. I understand the design limitations due to how the camera is angled almost straight down, but the folks at Savage Entertainment could have at least tried to work around this limitation. What bugs me the most is that the levels are actually obstacle courses. Stepping on and/or touching vehicles results in your character losing health. This can make battles even less fun, as there’s a constant beret of gunfire, and the only way to avoid it is by strafing right into these vehicles.
The graphics are equally bad. Low resolution textures, repetitive animation, bad art direction, funky looking robot designs; it’s all here. There is an upside, in that the enemies stand out from the environment, and do hide in their vehicle forms until you walk up close to them. So if you have a good eye, you can take out a lot of enemies before they even transform. Why your gunfire doesn’t ‘wake them up’ is beyond me, but I won’t complain since it makes the game easier.
I only wish that there was some way to distinguish between friendly transformers and enemy transformers. I know people have complained about this when watching the movies, but at least Michael Bay put small visual and design cues to help out. There’s no help in this game. Everyone looks like masses of garbage with arms and legs. The audio is also bad, and tends to glitch a lot. If a character speaks during gameplay, every other piece of audio magically disappears. And the music randomly drops out during other moments as well, which makes the whole experience very discordant.
This is the type of movie tie-in that makes you question just how bad videogames can get. It effectively lowers the bar across the board in every single way, from the bad voice acting to the horrible game structure and design. The only redeeming factor about this game is that it’ll make a great prank gift for the people you hate.
PlayStation LifeStyle’s Final Score
Bad graphics and poor implementation of sound. Absolutely no fun to be had, and a complete waste of money. |
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