Transformers Prime was a hit TV show that kind of fused the modern movie transformers with some aspects of the retro Transformers. It was a huge hit and spawned a ton of merchandise including a video game that was released on all the available Nintendo platforms including this 3DS version.
Story & Presentation
Now from a story point of view this is the same classic Transformers stuff that you have seem a million times before. The Autobots and Decepticons are on earth and a battle for Energon is underway. The Autobots have some human friends in Jack, Miko and Raf just like in the TV show. The game follows the events of the TV show very well and if you are a fan of Transformers Prime or any other incarnation of Transformers for that matter you will enjoy the story. So while from a story point of view the game does not offer anything radically new its decent enough that you want to play through it.
The game is nice enough to look at. They have managed to capture the look and the feel of the show very well. The way the characters transform looks pretty cool and they move fairly athletically despite the fact they are huge robots. But as nice as the game looks this is not a game that you will be using to show off the graphical power of the Nintendo 3DS. But to be fair the game looks just like the TV show so what more could we want?
Gameplay
With the huge critical and commercial success of the Fall Of Cybertron games Transformers have seen something of a rebirth in terms of video games. And I will go as far to say that even the games based on the movies have not been all terrible (the 3DS version of Dark Of The Moon is terrible though) So I went into this with pretty high hopes and I will say right from the start that I had a great time with this game.
Unlike other modern Transformers games there is no two sided story in this game. You only get to play as the Autobots and do not get to experience the story from the Decepticons point of view which is a shame. But you do get to play as different Autobots. Optimus Prime, Bumblebee, Bulk Head and Arcee they each have their own strengths and weaknesses. And each chapter where you play as one of them really does feel different from the one before. For example chapter 1 sees you playing as Optimus Prime and he is just a full on bad ass shooting and pounding any Decepticons who come into his way. Then chapter 2 sees you playing as Arcee in a high speed chase. So there is a great diversity to the game play.
The game controls very well and where as the last Transformers game on the 3DS the movie tie in Dark Of The Moon forced you to always be in vehicle mode (what were they thinking?) Transformers Prime lets you transform at your own will. This is really cool and you can do some really cool combo attacks by changing to a vehicle in mid combo.
Transformers Prime’s single player campaign is really fun and to make it last longer there are some collectables that you can hunt for in each level. And as the game is fun to play you will want to go back and play through the levels again. As well as the fun single player campaign there is also a cool multi player mode. In this mode you do actually get the chance to play as the Deception characters as well.
Final Thoughts
Transformers Prime is actually a really good game. It is the best Transformers game that has been released on a Nintendo handheld in years. If you are a fan of the show or just want a fun action game then you certainly could do a lot worse than this.
