Transformers: Rise of the Dark Spark Review (PC)

Transformers: Rise of the Dark Spark is a third-person shooter that aims to perform many tasks, from developer Edge of Reality continuing the saga quite successfully began by High Moon Studios, to being a crossover title that features Michael Bay’s robots and bringing two transformers universes together.

I’ve never played the previous Transformers games and I’ve never liked the cartoons, except for when I was a kid and didn’t know any better. The fact that adding a lot of explosions to the recent movies made them “better” is a pretty fair indication of their quality.

The entire premise of humanoid space robots transforming into trucks and helicopters seems a tad juvenile, and however you might attempt to expand the lore going from that premise, good luck; you’re stuck looking not much better than the worst sci-fi battle in movie history. Go ahead, look up “worst fight scene ever” on YouTube. That’s what you’re setting yourself up for.

Fortunately, Star Trek was way ahead of its time in many ways, such as portraying women and minorities as equals of the great white male, and it has evolved over the years, coming a long way since its humble origins. Granted, there is still a lot of fluff, but it also has its stellar moments.

That isn’t the case with the Transformers series, however, as it shows no signs of evolution or maturity, and once you’re not ten years old anymore, it’s so glaringly obvious that it’s all just a commercial to sell toys to kids, with little effort to create something truly worthwhile, which means that the writing is, unfortunately, incredibly bad.

The giant robots sound like dudebro cosplayers standing in line for the next Star Wars movie, doing impressions of uninspired dialogue strewn over a bunch of synthesizers. The back-and-forth between the characters is childish and very generic, and what is passed as comic relief seems very out of place within the otherwise very somber events of the storyline.

Granted, there are people who would no doubt pop open a beverage and sit on their porch waiting for a tornado to hit them, but they’re hardly qualified to play the role of defenders of the universe.

Look at that lens flare, JJ Abrams would be proud

Can't tell the difference between friend and foe? Just shoot.

I always allow myself to be pleasantly surprised by a good story, and it’s especially remarkable when such a surprise arises from a place that had little potential to do so. Transformers: Rise of the Dark Spark unfortunately fails to meet the standards of 2014 storytelling.

The action is sadly not much better, there are many glitches and invisible corners, you always sit out in the open like a dork and shoot stuff in the face until it’s dead, with said stuff not having much chance to kill you, until it does so instantaneously.

There are many areas of the game that just scream generic console third-person shooter hastily ported to PC. The developers didn’t even bother to replace all the button prompts with keys, they just left all the press A; no, not that A, the Xbox 360 A stuff. And what’s LS? Left Shift? It didn’t work. Oh well, at least they let you use the mouse, which is a plus in any shooter.

There are many questionable design choices, sometimes there will simply be too much clutter on screen, and you won’t be able to tell what’s going on, while at other times you will just die from seemingly nothing, without warning, because some enemies have just spawned behind you without any indication of why or how they would be able to do that.

The levels are usually pretty simple, kill a couple of waves of enemies with bad AI, kill some more, advance to the next section, rinse and repeat, pull a lever, go at it again, feeling just like any other generic shooter for the most part.

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Transformers: Rise of the Dark Spark fails to deliver an engrossing experience, but it does have a few good points. First of all, you get to play as a massive robot and explore an alien planet for more than half of the game.

You get to see and play as most of the Transformers cast, including the movie version of Grimlock, and you can also edit your loadout at bizarrely placed weapon stations all around the game, taking new weapons for a spin and finding the right tool for the job at hand.

There is a bit of variety, but nothing too crazy, and the game is geared more towards arcade action than proper warfare anyway, so it mostly urges you to shoot something in the face without too much fuss.

The robots themselves each come with their own special abilities, such as using a grappling hook for easier navigation through the environments or becoming invisible and infiltrating the enemy ranks for a surprise stealth attack.

You can also morph between humanoid and vehicle form at any time, even during engagements, which allows you a bit of leeway when it comes to combat and level navigation. Not much though, because they are pretty linear.

The way vehicles handle is pretty weird, but if you played Borderlands, you’ll be safe. If you didn’t, don’t worry, it’s pretty basic and doesn’t require much finesse. The game doesn’t offer you enough control when you’re playing the flyers, though.

But that doesn’t make you miss out on any great opportunities for fresh action sequences, as the game feels pretty static overall, and very scripted. There’s not much deviation from the “one true way,” and your choices boil down to which side of a pillar to shoot from or whether to shoot stuff as a static robot or as a static vehicle, for the most part.

Apart from not being very convincing unless you’re a very big fan of the franchise, the story is also very short, taking just a few hours to complete. There is also an escalation mode, which is basically survival / horde mode, where you can band with your friends and take down computer-controlled opponents, and that’s pretty much it. While cooperative multiplayer is always a nice thing to have in a shooter, there is no multiplayer player-versus-player action, which is just too bad.

Speaking of bad, the idea to include upgrades in a sort of unlockable random drops called Gear Boxes is also something that seems like an afterthought or a microtransactions plan, and not a full-fledged character development system.

That lightning gun is great for recharging batteries

This robot is sad because it wanted to be a bunny

The visuals are not bad by any means, they just seem to have stayed the same way they were in the previous games, which can be disappointing if you are expecting to see next-gen stuff.

There are also some glitches from time to time, like conversations stopped by loading screens during in-engine cutscenes or pre-rendered ones feeling disconnected from the action. The sounds are also a bit weird, sometimes feeling like they’re not coming from the proper distance, with you being able to hear distant enemies loud and clear but having your nearby allies come out muted.

The pre-rendered cutscenes are also made in-engine, and they look considerably worse than the actual gameplay. But the voice acting at least is pretty good, with the robots sounding pretty close to their identities and delivering their bad lines in a pretty convincing manner.

The Good

The Bad

Conclusion