Three HUGE gaming blockbusters dominate the spotlight in the latest edition of our weekly screenshot round-up. Prepare to be shocked and awed by gorgeous new shots from Crysis 3, Halo 4 and The Last of Us.

Anything else to care about? You bet! Loads of games were immortalized in screenshot form this week. Other featured galleries include: Gravity Rush, Sly Cooper: Thieves in Time, Theatrhythm: Final Fantasy, Batman: Arkham City’s Harley Quinn’s Revenge DLC, Virtua Fighter 5: Final Showdown, Rayman Origins 3DS, One Piece: Pirate Warriors, Alan Wake’s American Nightmare for PC, Pokédex 3D Pro, Pokémon Black Version/White Version 2, Smart As, Sound Shapes, Madagascar 3: The Video Game, Mercenary Ops, Lollipop Chainsaw, Waveform’s Eris DLC, Worms Revolution, Fray, Dungeon Gate, NASCAR The Game: Inside Line, Tony Hawk’s Pro Skater HD and Final Fantasy XIII-2’s final DLC set.

Crysis 3 (PC, PS3, Xbox 360):
[nggallery id=2390]

Halo 4 (Xbox 360):
[nggallery id=2391]

The Last of Us (PS3):
[nggallery id=2392]

Gravity Rush (PS Vita):
[nggallery id=2393]

Sly Cooper: Thieves in Time (PS3, PS Vita):
[nggallery id=2394]

Theatrhythm: Final Fantasy (Nintendo 3DS):
[nggallery id=2395]

Batman: Arkham City – Harley Quinn’s Revenge DLC (PS3, Xbox 360):
[nggallery id=2396]

Virtua Fighter 5: Final Showdown (PSN, XBLA):
[nggallery id=2397]

Rayman Origins 3DS (Nintendo 3DS):
[nggallery id=2398]

One Piece: Pirate Warriors (PSN):
[nggallery id=2399]

Alan Wake’s American Nightmare (PC):
[nggallery id=2400]

Pokédex 3D Pro (Nintendo 3DS eShop):
[nggallery id=2401]

Pokémon Black Version/White Version 2 (Nintendo DS):
[nggallery id=2402]

Smart As (PS Vita):
[nggallery id=2403]

Sound Shapes (PS Vita):
[nggallery id=2404]

Madagascar 3: The Video Game (PS3, Wii, Xbox 360):
[nggallery id=2405]

Mercenary Ops (PC):
[nggallery id=2406]

Lollipop Chainsaw – Juliet Starling Bonus Costumes (PS3, Xbox 360):
[nggallery id=2407]

Waveform – Eris DLC (PC):
[nggallery id=2408]

Worms Revolution (PC, PSN, XBLA):
[nggallery id=2409]

Fray (PC, Mac):
[nggallery id=2410]

Dungeon Gate (PC):
[nggallery id=2411]

NASCAR The Game: Inside Line (PS3, Wii, Xbox 360):
[nggallery id=2412]

Tony Hawk’s Pro Skater HD (PSN, XBLA):
[nggallery id=2389]

Final Fantasy XIII-2 – Final DLC (PS3, Xbox 360):
[nggallery id=2413]

Check Out These Links:

• First Look at Crysis 3 Gameplay
• NYC Becomes a Real Urban Jungle in Crysis 3
• Halo 4 Launching Worldwide November 6
• Tony Hawk’s Pro Skater HD DLC Levels to Come From Tony Hawk’s Pro Skater 3
• New Last of Us Trailer is Like the Car Scene From Children of Men
• Get Ready for Square Enix’s Nintendo 3DS Summer of Fun
• Square Enix’s 3DS Final Fantasy Rhythm Game Comes West This Summer
• Sly Cooper: Thieves in Time Goes Portable on PS Vita
• Payback’s a Bitch… A Bitch Named Harley Quinn
• New Beta Sign-Ups: Far Cry 3, DUST 514, Mercenary Ops and Fray
• One Piece: Pirate Warriors Goes All Dynasty Warriors on Your Manga-Lovin’ Ass
• Alan Wake’s Pulp Action Spin-off Shines Light on PC This Month

We’re closing out April and ushering in May with our latest giveaway, riding in on a wave of light carrying a small stash of free codes for Eden Industries’ indie PC action-puzzle game, Waveform. If you haven’t played it yet, read our recent review to see why this unique time killer should be on your Steam playlist. For our part, we’re going to help make sure at least three of you out there in the gaming galaxy give it a shot. Enter now for your chance to win!

Contest Details:

Prize: 3 Steam download codes for Waveform. Game valued at $6.99.

How to enter: Do at least one of the following: leave a comment below (with valid email), follow us on Twitter @vgblogger and retweet this message, come ‘Like’ us on our Facebook page and then ‘Like’ and comment on this post, or email us at contests@vgblogger.com with the subject line “Waveform Giveaway.” Only ONE method of entry is required, but feel free to enter via all four methods to increase your chances.

Entry Period: Friday, April 27 – Tuesday, May 1 at 12:00 PM EST. Contest winners to be selected at random and announced after entry deadline on Tuesday, May 1.

Waveform is available now on Steam and Green Man Gaming, and will be coming soon to other digital download portals. Keep up to date on all the latest Waveform news and updates by following developer Eden Industries on Facebook and Twitter.

Eden Industries has added a really cool new feature to Waveform, the unique arcade action game that has you controlling a particle of light as it oscillates through the galaxy. We reviewed it last week; you should check it out!

The first of many weekly Leaderboard Challenges has begun, kicking off a campaign to reward players of this great indie game with free Steam copies of other great indie games. This week’s first challenge, running through Sunday, April 22, has players competing for top high score honors in the Deep Space Mode for the Sun. At the end of the challenge, the Steam community’s top five leaderboard finishers will win Atom Zombie Smasher for free. I hope you’ve been practicing your light wave manipulation skills.

If you want more free stuff — and who doesn’t like free stuff? — tune in next week for our next giveaway. Here’s a hint: We’ll be giving away codes for Waveform. Wait, maybe that hint was too cryptic. Nah, I think you’ll figure it out.

This game continues the solid tradition of accurate labeling.  Rather than try to be clever or cute, Eden Industries has summed up what you’ll be doing in the title to this game.  Other than some level selection, players will spend their time in Waveform messing with a waveform.

The mechanics are unique if nothing else.  A particle of light will travel through each level and it is your job to guide it to other glowing orbs along the way.  The particle travels along a wavelength and the guiding is accomplished by changing the wavelength’s form.  This is done by moving the mouse up and down to change the height of the waves, the amplitude of the oscillating system, and left to right to alter how often the particle will go up and down in a given period of time, the frequency.  At its simplest, the particle does not slow down its rate of movement through a given segment of linear space over a specific period of time, but altering these features will dramatically change the path of the point-collecting particle.  A tight series of thin hills and valleys will cause the ball to run up and down the screen very quickly, mirroring the pencil tip of a frustrated child scratching out a poor drawing, while a longer, shallower series will almost look like the particle is moving in a near straight line.

The process of doing this, the play of the game, is far less clear when it is explained both in text as well as in the game’s brief tutorial.  A more direct explanation would be to sit someone before a computer with a booted up level and say, “If you hold down the mouse button and move the mouse, the path will change.  Try to collect the glowing bits by matching the wave’s pattern to the formation of glowing balls.”

The controls are very intuitive and it is very easy to immediately see the effect of the slightest of movements, but the abstract/spatial brain processing required to accurately determine the best shape for the wave as well as the hand-eye coordination necessary to change it quickly to that form may not be very intuitive.  It is probably safe to say that for most people this is not very easy as there is no direct comparison which can be made to this activity in the course of daily living.  Everyone manually tunes into frequencies all of the time with radios, musical instruments, and they used to do it with televisions.  But this is usually done through sound, clearing up an image or listening for the correct tone, not looking at a visual representation of a wavelength.  As I said, the gameplay is unique.

Moving the mouse on the axis available to a mouse pad is relatively simple and if the game is played for any amount of time, it will be discovered that the core mechanic requires that the upcoming orbs be looked at to see what the shape of the wave will need to be and when the wave will need to start hitting that curve.  If the timing is not right, then the particle will miss the orbs and it can kiss its high score good-bye.  Things almost turn into a weird sort of Dance Dance Revolution remix in that players have to adapt the shape of the wavelength to the shapes of upcoming orbs.  As the levels progress more mechanics are heaped on, such as dark matter which acts as mines that will end a run and start a level over, mirrors to bounce the particle around, and strange oroboros that will assist in picking up orbs can be captured to assist in grabbing orbs.  These odd monkey wrenches and the desire to get a better score on earlier levels serve to keep things interesting.

The game in no way lacks for content.  In a form of loose narrative, the light particle is coached on at the end of most levels to continue its journey from the edges of the solar system to the Sun.  Each significant obstacle in the way that might absorb your light, like the planets in the System of Sol, must be conquered.  In addition to the obvious levels, there are hidden singularities that serve as both warp zones to the next group of levels, as well as secret levels filled with darkness that must be illuminated by going over sparse pulses of light.  The game does have a nice, if somewhat simple, look to it.  Unfortunately, most of the levels look the same and it is doubtful that most players will finish all of what this game has to offer unless they really like the core mechanic.  Which is in no way a bad thing given how much there is to do in this game.  Everything is a chill Technicolor lightshow of anticipating mountains and valleys, with appropriate sounds, shapes and music.  Its only downside, is that it may not be a game people will want to play again and again as the different levels tend to bleed together after awhile.

A Steam achievement which requires every last drop of play be squeezed out of this game hints at a sequel.  It is a little hard to tell if it is a joke or not with a description of “Ready for Waveform 2”, but if it is not, a lot is going to have to change to make a second game worthwhile.  Waveform has a unique mechanic that while probably not the most fun or intuitive in the world, it is bizarre enough that it is worth owning and coming back to occasionally.  Things get increasingly complicated to keep the experience interesting, but if it is just more wave modifications in a sequel, it’s going to be kind of played out.  There are so many levels that it almost feels as though the developer combined Waveform 1 and the hypothetical sequel into this one game.

But, as there is no sequel now, just the original, it is an easy recommendation.  It is a good game to play between doing other things and it is different enough to keep in the mix with old standbys like Tetris and Bejeweled.  While not as good as either of those games, it is low impact and individual enough to put into the same rotation of time killers.

Pros:
+ Distinctive gameplay
+ Simple and charming presentation

Cons:
– It can take a while to wrap your brain around what needs to be done to win
– Music does not sync up with gameplay like one would expect

Game Info:
Platform: PC
Publisher: Eden Industries
Developer: Eden Industries
Release Date: 3/20/2012
Genre: Action
Players: 1
Source: Game purchased by reviewer

[nggallery id=2302]

More Steam Game Reviews:

• Review: Wizorb (vgblogger.com)
• Review: Dear Esther (vgblogger.com)
• Review: Orcs Must Die! (vgblogger.com)
• Review: Q.U.B.E. (vgblogger.com)
• Review: Trine 2 (vgblogger.com)