While the game has a similar feel, or tries to, to War and Fall of Cybertron, it fails to completely recapture it. There really hasn't been any change to any of the mechanics of the game to improve, which most sequels strive to do, what flaws were there. And the story falls flat. It lacks a certain epicness and relevance to the Transformers universe. Plus the whole tie in to the new movie feels a little cheap; there's little to explain the context for certain characters' actions. If you're going to do a movie tie-in, do it in a way to attract interest in the movie you're trying to tie into.
As for Escalation, I can't comment on it. Why? Because every time I try to access it, I get an error message saying the servers are down. Maybe it's my computer by I don't think so. That said, should this prove to be the only multiplayer mode, it's an afterthought in my mind. Fall of Cybertron had a decent multiplayer mode that I enjoyed spending hours playing.