Widely regarded by a huge number of fans as the worst Transformers cartoon ever to be made, due to its crude and primitive computer-generated animation, inconsistent writing and shallow characters, error-laden dubbing, and the fact that the story stops halfway through, then goes on to repeat itself. Some think the reason for this is that a regular Japanese anime show is "required" to have 52 episodes (one for each week in a year), and the writers couldn't figure out a better way to meet that quota.
Whenever the characters needed to emote, surprisingly well drawn, high quality cel animation was used instead of the usual CGI animation. This is because the primitive CGI models were very stiff and were unable to feature any facial expression besides "closed mouth", "open mouth" and "wide open mouth". This technique was also used to animate the transformation sequences of the combiner teams.
The facial structure of the Autobot veteran Bulkhead, with his goggles and prominent mustache, was based on Paul Teutul Sr. from American Chopper: The Series (2002), according to the toy designers.
The series marked the 20th anniversary of the original G1 animated series.
The appearance of Megatron/Galvatron was based directly on the original Galvatron design from The Transformers: The Movie (1986), with many of the same design elements carried over, which was a rarity in this era of Transformers. The similarity in looks makes more sense in the series' original Japanese version, in which the character is called Galvatron throughout.