Wave - Against every BEAT! Review

Wave - Against Every Beat is a great concept. Being able to play a bullet hell shooter that reacts to the music you play alongside it conjures up infinite possibilities. Unfortunately the reality isn't quite there yet. Despite this though, it is a pretty cool bullet hell shooter nonetheless.

Arcade mode offers up pretty much what you could want from a shooter. There's no setting the scene with a flimsy storyline. Instead all you need to know is that aliens in the guise of shapes (or cubes as the game likes to call them) are coming at you and it's kill or be killed. Firing is done automatically so all you have to do is guide your ship The cubes follow set patterns and are easily killed but this belies the 'super' cubes that follow with increased strength and health, making for some formidable opponents. Like any enjoyable bullet hell shooter, the difficulty is quickly ramped up here. Fortunately an array of power ups doubling or trebling your power are available and greatly help.

Besides the Arcade mode, there's the predictable but always welcome survival/endless mode. Then there's the Free Play mode which is meant to offer the true selling point behind Wave - Against Every Beat, i.e. the ability to generate your own levels based upon your musical choices. It's not quite there yet though with only part of the level differing.

It's not a terrible failing as the rest of the game is very enjoyable. A series of very cool mini games that appear once you collect enough stars (released by the foes you shoot) break up the gameplay nicely too. It's hard not to feel a little cheated when the game promises so much though. Color Box Software, the developer, promises on iTunes that a future update will implement this fully so it's a minor speed bump in the road to a great shooter. Give it a whirl, there's a lot to like here even without the unique feature.