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DF Retro: Contra 3 - The Alien Wars! Sublime 16-Bit Shooting!
- Thread starter chandoog
- Start date
Love Contra 3. It got a lot of play from me on the Wii Virtual Console back when it launched.
Seeing corners like this reminds me of my family's system that we would frequently pull down by accident as we bounced about while playing. It's amazing the thing didn't turn to powder.
Seeing corners like this reminds me of my family's system that we would frequently pull down by accident as we bounced about while playing. It's amazing the thing didn't turn to powder.
It seems odd to exclude Hard Corps from this video, given the fact that the GBA version borrows content from it, but I'm hoping that Hard Corps' absence from this video means that there're plans for John to cover Hard Corps in a separate video to more thoroughly showcase its breadth of content.
Def a surprising choice to just cover Alien 3 instead of pitting the SNES and Genesis Contras against each other, but still a nice video
Ha ha, yeah. I have another NES system (PAL region) which is in perfect shape case wise but I couldn't find the power adapter for it! Doh. The imperfections are part of the charm!Love Contra 3. It got a lot of play from me on the Wii Virtual Console back when it launched.
Seeing corners like this reminds me of my family's system that we would frequently pull down by accident as we bounced about while playing. It's amazing the thing didn't turn to powder.
Well...it's in there during the GBA section.
...however, I basically ran out of time. I worked 14 hours yesterday and a few this morning just get this done. :\
I appreciate the work you put into your videos. I just thought it was an odd choice to not cover Hard Corps with more depth, as I think it's important to note how differently Hard Corps plays compared to Alien Wars (or any other Contra game in general, really). I kind of find the addition of certain Hard Corps levels in the GBA port to be a bit strange, because it's clear that they should've maybe borrowed Hard Corps' slide mechanic to make even some of the Alien Wars levels more playable on GBA. That said, it's not difficult to see why they chose the Hard Corps levels they did if you're familiar with Hard Corps, as those levels at least don't rely on the slide mechanic as heavily as other levels in the game do.
I always thought that reskin was pretty good. The robot designs were cool.
Truth be told, while I love Hard Corps, I'm simply not as well versed or as skilled in playing it. I know Contra 3 inside and out but not Hard Corps. So it would have been a more difficult episode to make right now.
Haha. Understandable. I suspect it'll take a lot more time to get footage of Hard Corps, especially since there are five different endings along four paths.
I will go to my grave defending the Probotector designs over the regular plain ol' Bill Razer and Lance Bean. Those Patlabor robots are awesome and gives it more of a cyberpunky feel (At least in Super Probotector and Mega Drive Probotector's case.
Probotect and Serve
Probotect and Serve
Debatable. Hard Corps does lack any real ports, though, which is another reason to look at 3. The Game Boy port is super fascinating. There isn't really an equivalent for Hard Corps.
The thing about Hard Corps that gets me every time is the lack of shoulder button aiming like in 3. The "A" button to toggle drives me insane. I never managed to get used to it and I continue to grapple with it. It's something I have to think about every time unlike the R button in 3 where it's just second nature.
They're pretty damn good, right?! I'm also a big fan - especially in the older games where the Bill and Lance sprites are kinda bland.
What's interesting about Hard Corps is how it really feels like the remaining Konami team is trying to outdo Treasure. Since Treasure was partially formed by ex-Konami/Contra 3 developers (though there is crossover between 3 and HC), it seems like they wanted to go after Gunstar Heroes in a way - at least technically. Some good ol' friendly competition, perhaps.
Man, so many fond memories of this games I just couldn't get enough of it, I remember that I liked to do and easy, normal and hard continuous run, so I stock up on lives on the easier difficulties in order to tackle hard mode and get the real ending, I love everything about this game.
Also DF Retro is hands down my favorite show on Youtube
Also DF Retro is hands down my favorite show on Youtube
One interesting factoid about the overhead stages from Contra 3 is that Jim Power on SNES uses an identical stage mechanic between sidescrolling stages as well.
And of course, Jim Power had music done by Chris Huelsbeck, who did music for Factor 5 bringing it all full circle.
And of course, Jim Power had music done by Chris Huelsbeck, who did music for Factor 5 bringing it all full circle.
That's a good observation and I'm inclined to agree here. Alien Wars was already good looking, felt awesome, but the way they went at Hard Corps with all the things going on there, there must have been some desire to one-up. It's a shame there isn't really more ports of Hard Corps, I'd like an easier way to play it with modern displays without having to resort to gray area methods.
Yeah, HC is basically like Gunstar... mostly (though fewer) boss battles with little sections of run-and-gun gameplay. Also like gunstar, those boss battles are an excuse to show off what kind of crazy tricks they've learned to push the genesis hardware to do crazy visual effects and stuff. It also helps that the game has soundtrack that will melt your eardrums out of your head with joy.
Well, back then makes sense since they were different but I urge you to try them again - they're super intuitive to play when you're using to modern shooters. You're basically able to strafe like an FPS which makes it easy to move around. That concept was more difficult to understand in 1992.
I remember getting this game with my Snes since my parents got a used bundle. My siblings and I loved it.
The bundle also included Super Mario World and Final Fantasy Mystic Quest. Thanks to being introduced to Final Fantasy like that I skipped every other game in the series on that console.
The bundle also included Super Mario World and Final Fantasy Mystic Quest. Thanks to being introduced to Final Fantasy like that I skipped every other game in the series on that console.
Super good video, even if I'm a Hard Corps guy myself. The overview of the Game Boy port was really interesting.
I think I might prefer them over the human characters tbh đź‘€ They look great both in cutscenes and during the game
The Genesis three-button controller is one of my all-time favorite video game controllers. I just appreciate how certain games consolidate more functionality into fewer buttons and still manage to be very playable. To me, it just kind of makes sense in Hard Corps that you can just roll your thumb over to the A button while holding B to toggle aim modes. The fact that the Genesis three-button controller's buttons are so much closer together than the face buttons on the SNES controller facilitates this. I even though MK3 and UMK3 worked really well on the three-button controller, as your thumb didn't have to travel as far during game play.
I love that pad too, no doubt, but I like having a finger dedicated to position lock. That's really it. I just prefer a shoulder button for Contra.
Hardcorps also has some really bland stages. They are nowhere near as interesting as the SNES version's stages. They just feel like filler between boss fights. The stages themselves are much more memorable than Hardcorps.
Can I just say I'm glad this is a contra 3 video that only covers contra 3 ? I know Hard Corps has a lot of fans but I'm not exactly one of them and it's a different enough game I'd sooner see a look at it that views it under it's own merits , possibly takes a look a the psuedo sequel the guilty gear gang made back on the 360/ps3. Thanks for this one Jon! Contra 3 is one of my GOATs.
Just finished watching this, and it was as good as I come to expect for DF Retro. As always, you made an incredible work @Dark1
I never had a SNES, but a friend did, and I can't remember the amount of hours we sunk into Contra 3. It was our default game to play when I visited.
I never had a SNES, but a friend did, and I can't remember the amount of hours we sunk into Contra 3. It was our default game to play when I visited.
That GBA version was really awful. It could've and should've been so much better! But alas, it fell afoul of the typical lack of budget and care that 3rd parties typically put into their quickie GB/GBA releases (it was basically just put out there to co-promote Shattered Soldier and it shows).
Factor 5's GB version is a little bloody miracle though! I've always wanted to play that version!
One thing I've always wondered though... I know that the SNES isn't capable of rendering more than one Mode 7 plane at a time without the help of the DSP chip (which was originally going to be included in the base unit before it was cut and offloaded into the cartridge; after Nintendo's hardware R&D realised that they had gone way overbudget with the SNES' hardware cost)... so how did Konami pull off the 2 player splitscreen mode for the overhead stages? Those are surely two seperate Mode 7 planes?!
BTW, I had no idea how they pulled off the boss sequences before! That was really inciteful! Cheers Dark1x!
Factor 5's GB version is a little bloody miracle though! I've always wanted to play that version!
One thing I've always wondered though... I know that the SNES isn't capable of rendering more than one Mode 7 plane at a time without the help of the DSP chip (which was originally going to be included in the base unit before it was cut and offloaded into the cartridge; after Nintendo's hardware R&D realised that they had gone way overbudget with the SNES' hardware cost)... so how did Konami pull off the 2 player splitscreen mode for the overhead stages? Those are surely two seperate Mode 7 planes?!
BTW, I had no idea how they pulled off the boss sequences before! That was really inciteful! Cheers Dark1x!
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The best Contra game ever made. I used to be able to speed run this in about 30 minutes when I was younger. At 36, I'm lucky if I can make it through the game in an hour lol.
The best song on the ost:
The best song on the ost:
Great episode, great game. Every time I hear Contra 3 though I get bitter that Hard Corps isn't as well loved.
Love this game, used to play it constantly as a kid, probably was the most played SNES game I had. Really enjoyed the video to, nice work as always DF.
