Transformers War For Cybertron PS3 Review

When you hear the words “Transformers” and “Video Game” in the same sentence, an upwelling of hatred, disappointment, and low expectations follows shortly thereafter. The Transformers name has seen success with multiple animated cartoons and live action films, but for one reason or another, video game success has remained elusive throughout the years, until now… When I first heard of Transformers: War for Cybertron, I instantly thought of all the previous failures I had played over the years such as Beast Wars on the Playstation, the Japanese Transformers G1 game for the Playstation 2 and the movie tie-in games on the Xbox 360 and Playstation 3 systems. Fortunately, Transformers: War for Cybertron is nothing like its predecessors and even adds an interesting multiplayer that anyone can jump into.

The story in Transformers: War for Cybertron takes place briefly prior to the Autobots embarking on their Ark to Earth, which ties into the original Generation One cartoons of the 1980s. The Autobots and Decepticons are at war, with Megatron searching for a new energy source called Dark Energon, that will enable him to obtain more power and eventually destroy the Autobots and recreate Cybertron in his image. The Campaign mode consists of 10 chapters divided in two halves; the first half is dedicated to the Decepticons and the second half is dedicated to the Autobots. The Campaign mode can either be played alone offline or with up to two other players cooperatively online. Both the Decepticon and Autobot campaigns end in colossal boss fights that will leave the player satisfied once completed, and bring back fond memories of the G1 toys to us older players. If rushed, the campaign can be finished in less than 10 hours easily on normal mode, but I would highly recommend playing the game on hard for a challenging strategic play through, although the boss fights will require competent cooperative players to complete successfully. Once the campaign is fully completed, players can view all of the cinematics at any time or peruse through the concept art portfolio.

In addition to the single player and co-op campaign modes, Transformers: War for Cybertron, has competitive multiplayer as well. The multiplayer is very similar to Bioshock 2, where any player can pick up the controller and successfully compete against other players who are ranked higher than them regardless of their perks. The game has four character classes: Scout, Scientist, Soldier, and Leader. Each class has its own specialties, such as cloaking, spawning sentries, whirlwind melee attacks, etc. Each class also has a weakness to contend with, such as Scouts, which are quick and stealthy, but have very little protection against damage and die easily. In addition to their innate abilities, each character class has 3 abilities to swap in, similar to perks from Call of Duty Modern Warfare (and every multiplayer game since then). Players also have a primary weapon and a secondary weapon that can be switched out as well.

The multiplayer modes consist of the usual fare of Deathmatch, Team Deathmatch, Conquest (Control Points), Code of Power (Capture the Flag), Countdown to Extinction (Place bomb in enemy base), and Power Struggle (Control one control point). All the multiplayer modes have been done before in countless other games, but are still quite fun to traverse as Transformers. Multiplayer also has a Challenge Mode that assigns the player a series of objectives, such as obtaining 10 kills with the pistol. There is a leaderboard as well, and rising through the ranks unlocks weapons and abilities. There is also a mode called Prime Mode, which puts a spinning emblem by the player’s name during online matches and supposedly unlock some extra challenges. Prime Mode is achieved by maxing out one’s ranking.

Transformers: War for Cybertron is undoubtedly the best Transformers game ever created, but unfortunately that is not much of an achievement considering the shovelware that came before it. Even with the trash that were the previous games, Transformers: War for Cybertron is an excellent single player game and a solid multiplayer experience that every Transformers fan should play. I highly recommend this game as a purchase to add to the game collection and to support the studio for a job well done. Hopefully, if they get enough sales, a sequel will be created and surpass this stellar gem.