If you gamed in the 80s you knew Contra. It was that crazy game that let you and your buddy battle together against the forces of the evil Red Falcon and could easily eat up a whole weekend due to its difficulty and addictive game play. But did you know it started as an arcade title?
That’s right, the game renowned for the ridiculous level of perfection required to beat it, started off as a quarter muncher. Now Konami, capitalizing on the success of their previous XBLA release, is bringing Contra home to the Xbox 360. The question is, did it survive the translation? The answer, yes and no.
Game play remains the same shoot-dodging experience we all fell in love with as kids, however if you’ve only played the NES version you may be in for a bit of a surprise. The levels in the arcade versions are a little on the short side, but the tradeoff is the game’s vertical alignment that gives you less space to maneuver and makes dodging shots noticeably harder.
Jump controls feel a little tighter then the original arcade version, however jumping and shooting down does seem to have problems. With the analog stick it seems to be fine, but with the d-pad you’re unable to fire a single shot. Maybe, just maybe you may get lucky once in a while and one will actually go off, but it was uncommon.
One other complaint that may prove to be a major annoyance for some gamers is the lack of adjustable controls and poor button mapping. Using A for fire and B for jump feels awkward at first and takes a lot of getting used to. The game doesn’t even offer the option of using the other industry standard of X for fire and A for jump.
Article comments
1 - Calder
Great Review as always.