Contra Hard Corp (Genesis) as Ray

For quick navigation on Contra Hard Corps review:

·        Part A (Ray)

·        Part B (Sheena)

·        Part C (Fang)

Part D (Browny)

We know that Contra is the pioneer of Run n Gun. Its basic are: shooting aliens from left to right, power-up dispenser has form of Eagle-like, interesting boss design, spread pattern shoot, etc. This time i review one of the series that has lot quirks than the basic: Contra Hard Corps (1994).  

Spoiler: I'm not hardcore fan of Contra. Because an idea of lone (supposed to be) elite soldier that vulnerable to enemy's touch, is atrocious to me. That's the reason i prefer Gunforce or Metal Slug. Nonetheless, i still have high interest on Contra. Especially this one. I'm quite sure lots of you know that Contra Hard Corps feature 4 characters and multiple ending. Thus i make the article into 4 types ('part' will be quite imprecise). This one, i play as the (boring) male blonde: Ray and through the 'good ending 1' plot. 

Here's the man himself. In character selection he looks fine and quite awesome. While in intro he looks...unwell like someone that's recovered from pox disease yesterday. Fighting alone against the menaces really takes toll, huh?  

 

Unlike previous contra, there's proper mission briefing. Spoiler: the missions are not far from moving and shoot everything. The instructor looks really badblood (especially with that dark glasses), you can tell that he must be veteran of countless wars. What also looks awesome is the briefing room. So futuristic cool.

 

I really love dynamic & bombastic entrance like this. No way i put this scene in still image. I hope you agree with me. I mean look at that! It's certainly action level of Hollywood's movie, right there.  

 

The enemy move fast, Ray move fast, his bullets move much faster, the power-up dispenser move fast. Everything here is fast thus make the game feels relentless. I hope you don't expect gentle start. If not, this game is simply not for you, then. The control: direction pad for aim/move, A button to cycle weapon/screen-clearing bomb selection, B button to shoot, and C button to jump. Pressing A button while holding B button will change your stance. Stance #1 allow you to move and shoot at the same time. While stance #2, will make you stand still whenever you're firing. This will allow you to shoot to any direction without moving. The shot indicator that's near the photo, indicate your current stance.

 

A short walk after that this pyromaniac robot bursts the background then sprays flame. Fortunately it's too short to reach me from the corner of the screen. That's kind of same flaw/weakness/problem for Pyro. You notice that Ray's gun no longer shoot the ordinary red bullet. It's laser now. That's because i picked 'A' power-up weapon from before. Contra Hard Corp has 4 distinctive characters with 4 weapons each: A to D weapon. Normally every character start with the red pellets weapon once you get 'A' power-up, you will get special version of your standard weapon which deal bigger damage.

 

Once The robot get heavily damaged, it crashes into that building that soon become slope for Ray to progress. But he has to jump over it otherwise he's dead. That fetal position is him currently jump. I believe it isn't contra game if the player jumps in mid-air somersault manner.

 

On top of this building there's another mid-boss. It's giant Cyclops robot. It demonstrate its laser eye destruction before come here and come to face me.

His sweeping optic blast is fast. But the thing that really kills you are these explosion array that burst after its laser beam.  There's enough gap for you to park safely and the explosion is telegraphed fairly but still fast. You have to shoot its very-one eye to damage it. Otherwise it's not working.

 

One of bar pod went wild when i grab it. Soon it's destroyed by some off-screen shooter.

 

The shooter is the boss of this stage. He jumped from the roof then land into that car. Am i the only one imagine "My Car!!!" voice in lots of Penguin of Madagascar episode when i see this scene?  

For 1st boss, he's quite easy to beat but still can kill you if you're careless. He does hopping a lot and occasionally shooting. His shoot can be dodged by crouching. By the way Ray's C weapon is spread bullet shoot. This is really Contra game!  

 

After get enough damage, the robot's weapon is destroyed. So it attacks by spinning his upper half and sometime do dashing punch. Duck its upper half, jump it while dashing by using that 2 platform. Simple yet deadly if you let your guard down.      

 

Once the robot destroyed, the pilot come out and introducing himself as Deadeye Joe. He looks like villain from Gi Joe comic.

 

Then he mock Ray to chase after him. But there's distress call from a research center. Here comes the branching path. Will you give in to your emotion to chase Deadeye Joe or will you follow heroic instinct and answer the distress call? To get good endings you have to choose latter option. So i do that.

Ray know that he couldn't make it in time. Suddenly an air police give him a ride. But that doesn't mean Ray won't get speeding ticket for this. Even though the traffic is quite ,right now.

Not quite anymore. As there's hostile vehicle that shoots personnel-loaded pod and takes the middle lane! It will get tickets for sure. It's impervious to any of Ray's weapon but for strange reason it's vulnerable for the impact of its rolling dead brethren. So the strategy will be: jump the rocket, shoot its passenger, rinse and repeat. Actually, this battle can be avoided if the pilot fly his plane higher in the sky.

Finally, the pilot decides to fly his plane higher. But there's jetpack assassin and this deathplane. The sky isn't safe from enemies, afterall. The deathplane is so far the most difficult mid-boss if only for that 3-way gun on its wings. While the center gun spews flame that quite easily avoidable. After get roughed, it bumps our plane from below and we have to make emergency landing. 

Luckily we safely landing near the Research center so I can shoo away the attacker. Seriously, this is awkward rescue situation. 

 

Then i have to stop the enemy from getting alien cell that's keep here. In this situation where's some enemies are perched on platform while there's respawning enemies on both sides, you have to do the basic things of run n gun: Just run forward and shooting. If you stand still too long you will get surrounded and die. Briefly stop only to either duck enemy's bullet or deal with enemies on your back.

 

The alien cell is in upper floor. Ray couldn't find any mean to get him there like elevator or escalator. But he can climb the wall bare-handedly. Maybe he was bitten by spider when he was in High School.

Of course, Ray still couldn't make it in time. The alien cell has been stolen and he has to fight this tinker robot. I mean it slam the area to drop these debris, constructs them to be moving/jumping garbage then leaves temporarily. Still dangerous though.    

Every time its creations get destroyed, it will come down angrily and then repeat the process. Most of the time you can avoid its creation by climbing either side but you have to immediately drop down or you will get his wrath. You can only harm it by shooting its head while not angry. 

Three days later, we found out who's the hacker that cause that big ruckus: Noiman Cascade. You can tell that he's legit hacker (which is probably big nerd) because he's fat and wearing enhanced eye transplant. His eye got damaged because he took too many time on computer and internet, you see.

 

His base is in a junkyard and he got robots to guard it. I like these motorcyclist robot come from that hill before charging on my head. Very nice graphic feature.

 

Beside those robots and cars that shoot rocket. There's this junk golem with snake tail, guard the place. It attack by either throwing punch or swinging its tail. Its weakness is its eye. It could be prototype of the cyclops on previous stage.

 

Am i the only one who think that these narrow corridor with 2 door before boss fight, could be adaptation from Megaman? No? Good.

Noiman cleverly diverted me by chatting so he can move me to his virtual reality machine before perforate him with my bullets. Very clever.

 

Noiman's VR is where he can transform into one of Zodiac. First he become Taurus that fly above my head and occasionally charging downward.

 

Next he turns into Sagittarius. Still keen on levitating above my head. But he can shoot homing arrow. You can destroy the arrow by shooting it. Actually, you have to shoot both The centaur and its arrows if you want to survive. 

Lastly, he become Gemini. His bouncing orbs fall randomly. All you can do to avoid it stay away from them and hope for the best.

 

But those are only warm-up. Yes, Noiman is also the boss stage but this time he turns into small square and expand into large box then this craggy tank. He somehow can't tread you over if you stand still in left corner. But hitting Noiman, is tricky due to its position. At least not if you use homing missiles (Ray's D weapon) or any weapon that cover wide area.

Then he turns into that Lego-ish chopper.  My underestimation toward the enemy, takes death toll. Because that tail propeller that suddenly swooping down, catch me off guard, you see.  

Finally he's defeated. Wait! You make robots riot and raze a city only for $1? Spy_negativevocalization04.wav

 

At least Noiman tells us who hired him. It's Colonel Bahamut. He once a hero but later he attempt Coup D'état against government. An anti-government hero got Alien Cell. That's pretty much recipe for disaster.  

 

Welcome to the jungle! We got rabid small apes that could be Blanka's alien nephews. Tons of them. By the way, Colonel Bahamut's base is said to be here.

Then i meet this stage 1st mid-boss: the bridge yanker. Beside yanking the bridge, he can shoot rapid-fire bullets from its proboscis when it's not in mood for snatching this bridge like mean bully yanks his/her victim's hair. Its weak point is obvious: its red bald that could be its exposed brain.

 

Destroying that monster somehow destroying the bridge too. Luckily, there's Apatosaurus that serves as emergency landing pad. If you shoot around its head, it will snorts deadly orbs. This could be trick to break your friendship should you play this game in 2 player mode.

Then i meet another mid-boss. You can tell that CHC is really generous for mid-boss battle. This time i'm against hi-tech sphere that can grow legs and muzzle that could be like its beak. It likes to bounce/jump around. It can spray flames along the ground. It can throw its legs. It spray orbs upward. I have to say that it really got moves.

 

But then another sphere latch onto another to become this 2-sphere robot. It can walk across the screen. So you have to either jump over it or slide pass it. Sliding can be performed by holding down then press jump button. The sliding act as evasion maneuver like in Cabal or Hard Times. With addition you can inflict damage if passing enemy. You're invincible during sliding but you have to mind about brief vulnerability when you're finish sliding.   

Dude. That statement is so anime-ish. It's another bout against Deadeye Joe as boss fight.

 

2nd battle against Deadeye Joe is long staged process as if it can be stage on its own. His vehicle/ride/robot/machine can only be harmed during stage where it stays. On other time, it's auto-scrolling section where you can only walk/climb while keep yourself alive, which can be boring. Some people dislike this battle. Where am i you, you ask? I'm away above on rightside of the wall. I learn this from someone in Youtube. Before this playthrough i can pull this trick safely. But this time he manage to chop me with his machine's propeller off-screen. I think i was too late to climb the wall.     

 

There's nice visual feature where Deadeye Joe's machine change its color from green, yellow, then red. In this final stage of the battle, the machine latch in the center and sometime emit colorful laser in counter-clockwise manner. If it get shot, it will be pushed in direction where it get shot. If you stop shooting, it will recoiled that can potentially hit you. So you have to shoot it periodically instead continuously. After rigorous process, it will goes down.

At the start of the stage, i got ambushed by Col. Bahamut and his troops here. Turns out the professor is on Bahamut's side and he intent to use the Alien Cell for nefarious experiment. Such typical mad scientist you're, doc. Here's another branching path option: fight till the end or surrender for awhile. I'm pretty confident with my capability to avoid danger from those gunpoint. So i choose stand and fight. 

 

Turn out, i don't have to deal with those soldiers. They descend me into this experimental chamber to fight every crossbreed of monster that i have fought in jungle. The professor may seems generous with this decision but it's reasonable to test your dark-experiment result quite soon.

Most professor's creations are up to kill me. But this little certainly not, it gives me weapon pick-ups instead. But again, i can't take risk too much thus i jump over it.  

 

After my failed attempts to become "proper" guinea pig, both the doctor and the machine goes crazy. Then this monster created....and killed the doctor. Engineer_specialcompleted11.wav

 

This could be hardest boss battle because its weak point which is that flesh orb, is so difficult to hit. The safe yet unreliable method: 1) shoot the orb while the monster jumping 2) Shoot its leg with explosive weapon, hoping the explosions reach the orb. The reliable yet dangerous method will be: infiltrate under him so you can free to shoot the weak point. But you have to mind carefully 1) its legs 2) laser coming from the orb 3) seeds that are spat from its top head. Usually the homing missiles are reliable weapon for most bosses and mid-bosses. But in this case, its efficiency drop to 14%.  

 

Next mission will be chase down the colonel. So i will have to strike his HQ on an island. It's like vacation to holiday island, except with alien cell and shoot-y violence. Lovely!

On my last play, i pressed the wrong button for screenshot capture so there will be less screenshots around this point. I deeply apologize for it. I hope this gif will make it up. These 3 robots that i have thrashed before, seek for revenge by combination/gattai. It reminds me of Voltron or later Zoids. They can transform into 3 forms depends on the their order. Neat!

 

After storming this HQ a bit, i meet the Colonel himself. First he praise me as great soldier or whatever and offer me to join his cause. If you agree, you will get evil ending where the world is under Colonel's and your conquest. And if you refuse, you will fight him. He may be stupid not to use gun and instead use giant claw to fight me, but he's still formidable foe. He jump around, charge straight at me, or snatch ceiling debris and later throw it at me. Due to his speed and erratic movement, he's difficult to hit. Actually some bosses have this kind of pattern but Colonel is bit harder amongst them. Once he's defeated, the game is not over. Because his demise trigger a gigantic rocket that carry alien cell that will destroy the world. How am i supposed to do to catch the rocket?  

 

Ride smaller ones is the answer. This time, Deadeye Joe shows up for the last time and he's easy to beat as he only serves as stage filler mid-boss. Rest in peace, you magnificent sod!

 

Once i reach the top of the rocket, another slithery monster come up from the head. The other ones come out while i'm climbing the rocket, by the way. You can tell that my standing ground is reduced to 80%, compare to whole screen length which limit my movement. Falling from the rocket is insta-death and this monster won't hesitate to corner me with its rapid orb shoot. I don't think you can survive this battle without knowing how to do proper sliding.

 

Then the alien cell itself comes out. You have to blast every of his arms ASAP otherwise you will get clawed immediately. Spread weapon will certainly works best here but thanks to my clumsiness and my sense of fairness i lost it.

After i blast its arms many time, this long-necked alien come out where it vomit maggots, show its flesh orb (that certainly boss's weak point) for awhile, swinging to other side, and repeat the procedure. Shoot the maggots, shoot the orb, and slide pass the head. That's the drill.

 

With the alien cell destroyed, the gigantic rocket also falls apart. Luckily the air police come at the right time for me to land. Of course it's not free.

 

You should get retire soon or at least have long vacation. You don't look too good, Ray.

Character review: Ray is medium type character with Contra's standard arsenal. His weapon 'A' which is laser only act as powered version of standard bullet with no real significant change except in damage rate. His weapon 'B' (grenade) can be used to clear enemy group or deal hefty damage to bosses but require precise shooting as there's distinct delay on firing rate if you shoot it rapidly. While his weapon 'C' (the spread shoot) is perfect for crowd of enemy and deal moderate damage to sub-boss/boss that don't have specific weakpoint. His weapon 'D' (homing missile) is recommended  for most boss battle to seek boss's weakpoint easily. 

Route review: You got to see trio robots that can unite into 3 different form like from Tatsunoko or something. You can also get evil ending if you feel like you're tired become the good guy in game. The final battle with Deadeye Joe is truly magnificent: you ride on missiles while he wears jetpack. Remarkable. It's not so difficult battle too. The final boss can be big problem if you don't slide around like amateur football players. You get your character saying "good job!" in the end, could mean that this is the best ending? Yes, i think.

That's Contra Hard Corps (1994). Is it great? Superb even. Is it difficult? Sadly, yes. I have to admit i can't enjoy the game to its fullest. You can play it relaxily. You can finished it. But you can't do both. But maybe with rigorous training, you can accomplish that. The musics are very great. The graphic are gorgeous. The gameplay is certainly wonderful, with enough uniqueness on every stages and those mid-bosses. The boss fights are amazing and interesting. The branching path certainly make up with replayability font. That's certainly what the classics lack of. The distinction between the characters also good feature. Also that shooting stance. It works very well and slick.

Overall i can surely recommend you to play Contra Hard Corp (1994), especially if you're Contra hardcore fan (unlike me). Do note that Japan version has 3-hit kill system instead of 1-hit kill system like US version that i played. If you don't care much about any reading and want fairer gameplay. You should go for Japan version. Whatever your choice, you can go wrong with playing this game. I mean it has multiple ending, and tons of explosive action. Come on!