Soundwave past bipedal mode before he came to Earth and changed to a drone as his alt mode.

And yes, for the people who did not know, Soundwave was originally a Gladiator like Megatron (and even went up against him before).

So no, he was no recorder bot that would recorded the fights in the Pit's of Kaon or something like that.

But the picture...

Just 👌👌👌👌

Beat his ass Soundwave.

Beat

His

Ass