Transformers Prime, which aired on Discovery Family (known as The Hub back then) and ran for three seasons, ranks as one of my favorite incarnations of the Robots in Disguise. It carried darker themes, a more serious story, and the smaller cast of characters allowed for an opportunity to really flesh out motivations and personalities among the Autobots and Decepticons. At the peak of the show's run, a game based on the show was announced. Yeah, I'm a Transformers mark, of course I was gonna buy it.

Released exclusively across all of Nintendo's platforms at the time, Transformers Prime: The Game was also one of the Wii U's launch titles and developed by NOW Production, who have a handful of titles under their belt, like the powerfully lukewarm Sonic Riders. 

Rather than abridge a set part of the TV series into a condensed play through, Prime offers an original, non-canon story that seems to be a spin-off of the season multiparter about Unicron. The Deceptacons are attempting to mine and harvest a huge chunk of dark energon and Team Prime looks to intercept and destroy the malicious rock. During the raid, the energon is jarred loose and the Autobots are caught in the middle of the whiplash, sending them all plummeting back toward Earth, along with Unicron’s encrusted meteorite.

For what it’s worth, the story is pretty decent, roughly on par with any plot developing episodes from the TV show. The downside is most of it isn’t particularly fleshed out. Early chapters follow Arcee, Bulkhead, and Bumblebee fighting their respective rivals with aid from the children and the game exclusive villain, Thunderwing, does not come off as menacing as you would think, despite his colossal size. He is officially introduced just a little more than halfway through the single player mode and he talks like any given generic Deceptacon. He sounds like Skyquake. Overall, a pretty straightforward story, but it lacks any kind of drama, characterization and interactions is simply already established material, and there isn’t much to sink your teeth into.

The character models are very impressive, closely resembling their TV counterparts. Their eyes seem a little dead and cold, and close-ups reveal some choppiness and unpolished textures, which is a little unforgivable given the power of this technology. Thankfully, these slight visual flaws are only noticeable during cut scenes.

The in-game action moves pretty slick. The screen is never jam-packed with too much action at one time, so slowdown is not a problem. The layouts, while mostly taking place in vast, rocky ravines and canyons to interiors of mines and warships, look great and are rendered well enough that you won’t get bored just staring at the same plateaus, or wall over and over. The Wii and 3DS versions are riddled with slowdown, choppy textures, and poor lag times.

It’s a little too bad that more con-mashing mayhem doesn’t take place in any large metropolises or cities, but then again, this mostly takes place in Jasper, Nevada anyway. And the one time they went to New York, they stayed in the subway (I’m still a little peeved about that).

Transformers Prime is a brawler, and while simplistic, it can be quite satisfying at times. All you pretty much do is clear the screen of enemies and proceed to the next portion of the level. Stages aren’t terribly long, they can roughly finished in a matter of minutes, but there are a great deal of foes that are thrown in your face. You have a set number of melee combos, no more than three buttons with several variations, and your secondary weapon is your blaster to take down long-range enemies. At various points throughout the game, you are thrown into a high-speed chase, which is a nice change of pace from all the frantic button mashing.

I am legitimately sad that one enemy never made it into the TV show. There are these hulking tank vehicons that come equipped with shields to fortify their defense as well as dish out some heavy damage. How on earth did these bad ass sentries not get featured in the series at all!!?? These guys look awesome!! At the very least, make me a toy of one of them!! Honestly, the battles in the show would’ve used some muscle like this in the Deceptacon ranks. There's only so many times I could see Bulkhead trash the same generic soldier over and over. Transforming increases your speed and handling your bot in vehicle mode is not too bad, though turning around can be a bit of a pain. It’s a great way to get quickly out of danger and the ability quickly jump and go immediately back into vehicle mode is awesome.

A game like Transformers Prime has the right idea, even if the experience is fleeting. The single player story is adequate enough and in-game sidequests, like earning a higher mission grade and finding all of the Cybertron Artifacts to unlock bonuses, will keep you playing for a while, and the multiplayer modes are very fun with human combatants. It’s not a perfect game, but it will certainly fit the bill if you have a hankering for some ‘Con-smashing mayhem.