Well, about Transformer games. The toys are fair game. I’ve had my hands on the console version of the movie game a couple days now, and ultimately I gotta say the DS version impresses me more. It’s not the worst game I’ve played, but the controls are a lot looser than the portable, especially in regards to picking up objects (while simultaneously making said task mandatory far more often.) See, there’s a large issue with the physics of the game wherein the slightest brush against a house or car is roughly equivalent to driving straight into it at top speed. Until you get the feel for the sweet spots, there are a lot of instances of accidentally booting debris away you meant to pick up in order to defeat a stubborn mini-boss.

That said, even though a lot of it ends up being accidental, the game does render mass destruction satisfyingly. Fighting Barricade at the power plant for example takes place at first within rows and rows of explosive chemical tanks. Inevitably they chain-react and blast the holy hell out of pretty much the entire battlefield, leading to frustrating glitch two. Sometimes, massive explosions pull you inward rather than backward. Hilarious. Still, it ain’t all bad if you’re a fan since some of the game-only character designs like the wannabe Constructicons are pretty cool. It’s rather like the DS game’s prettier, but airheaded sister.

It’s really rather annoying, I was expecting the DS version to be a toned down sample of the console, but the omission of the original character and vehicle scanning takes away a slightly more meaningful collect-em-all aspect than collecting doodads to unlock old comic posters and dated movie trailers. Curiously, the DS also featured a seemingly more robust selection of in-game voice acting. Instead of police chatter and the shouts of “IT’S A DECEPTICON! GET HIM!” as your enemies reveal themselves, there’s a general white noise of panicking bystanders.
So yeah. As Soundwave would say: DS SUPERIOR. CONSOLE INFERIOR. But who am I kidding, I still love both.