u/2mock2turtle

I'm making a list of games to buy on PS3 before the store shuts down, and since the search bar isn't working, I'm going through PS2 Classics first. I have Dead or Alive 2 Ultimate on my Xbox Series X, are there any good reasons to play Hardcore in addition/instead? The only concrete thing I can figure is that Hardcore has an English dub that Ultimate doesn't; other posts on this site and others allude to some other features that aren't included in Ultimate, but I'm having more difficulty figuring out what they are. Any help would be much appreciated. Thanks!

So let me kind of provide some background information before I ask my question. I have heretofore never interacted with the Transformers franchise, my closest exposure being the Transformers: Devastation video game, which I bought because PlatinumGames developed it. And even then, it's been in my backlog ever since. However, in the past year or so, I've started going to the movies very frequently, and when I saw the 1986 movie was coming back to theaters, I thought about diving in so I could go see it. I really didn't give it much more thought until Peter Cullen (who I knew as Eeyore) died, and then I thought "okay, I'll watch Transformers so I can go see the movie in his honor." I didn't actually get around to it until earlier this week, because I am a disaster, but I got there, and I'm currently in the middle of season two on Tubi. I should also mention that, whether due to undiagnosed ADHD or force of habit, I tend to use my computer at the same time I stream a series. (This will become relevant in a moment.)

All that being said: is the original series supposed to be so... confusing? Like I know due to the standards of the time and the production constraints, there wasn't a huge focus on continuity. Even with that context, though, it seems unusually difficult to keep track of everything going on. For example, my biggest problem is that characters seem to appear out of nowhere and then disappear just as quickly. I literally just finished episode "Make Tracks" (S2 E25), and I deadass didn't know who Tracks and Seaspray were. I looked it up on the wiki and was like "yeah, they've been here before," but even then one of them says in the actual article "[X] first appeared unexplained in [Y episode]," so it's not even like my perception is unprecedented. There are also just so many characters, and while I do have a few favorites, they start blending together for me unless they're Optimus Prime, Megatron, or Starscream. Another problem is I have trouble following the rules of the world, like how or when the Autobots need energy, or when the Decepticons can go to or from Cybertron. And so on and so forth. This is the part where I worry that perhaps my splitting attention is what's causing my issues with perception, but on the other hand, I feel like I don't usually have this much trouble following anything else. Is that it, or is the OG series just kind of best enjoyed on a vibes-based basis? Or is there another take on this I'm not considering altogether?

On a separate note, as I said regarding my progress in the series a moment ago, I have about 8-9 hours left of streaming of season two before I'm (in theory) caught up for the movie. Unfortunately, I had planned to see it tomorrow afternoon, since that was the best time that worked for my schedule, which doesn't give me much time to finish. Will I be at a disadvantage if I can't finish the season first? Alternatively, are there any skippable episodes -- or, inversely, absolutely vital ones -- between episodes 27 and 49 of season two in Tubi order?

Any help on any of this would be much appreciated. Thanks!