C: The Contra Adventure

Written by John Scalzo  on January 09, 2002

Review: Another piece of my childhood dies.

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Somebody should really get a class action lawsuit going and sue Konami for false advertising. You see, C: The Contra Adventure was advertised as one game, and Konami has given us quite a different one.
The game starts with the traditional Contra side scrolling style. You have your machine gun; you shoot the aliens. You shoot the little blimps, you gain new weapons. You fight the big boss at the end of the level. Sure the graphics aren't very good, they're extremely pixilated and blurry. Explosions look particularly bad; I've seen games on the Super NES with better graphics. Yes, the backgrounds have this quasi-3D feel that looks really stupid. Yes, an eagle icon with a letter no longer represents new guns, but different colored eagles that I still haven't figured out what gun goes with what color. Yes, this is the first Contra game to feature an energy bar, no more one hit and you're dead. Yes, the controls are extremely poor and difficult to get the hang of. The sound is weak, but tolerable. And finally, and most glaringly, no, there is no 2 player simultaneous mode, and really what's Contra without a 2-player mode? But I was willing to forgive all of these things, because after all, it was the first new side scrolling Contra in a long time. And while no where near as good as Contra III: The Alien Wars, C: The Contra Adventure had it's moments in that first level.

Then we move into the second level and we see the dark side of C: The Contra Adventure. The rest of the game takes place in a combination 3D/Overhead style that takes everything bad that was in the first side scrolling level and amplifies it up to 11. The graphics are even more pixilated and blocky, with a lot of enemies totally disappearing into the background. The 3D view has huge camera problems, you can't even see where you're going half the time. And if someone's shooting you from above, good luck trying to get the camera to point up so you can shoot him. Want to shoot something across the screen? Can't do it, your bullets only go a few feet on front of you. But that alien on the other side of the screen can pick you off without you even knowing he's there. And if all this wasn't bad enough, the play control becomes even worse in the 3D levels. Just trying to move your Contra soldier through the (ugly) terrain is a chore.

And the bosses they have in this game. I remember a time when Contra bosses were huge hulking monsters that would scare the shit out of me if I ran into one in a dark alley (or a fairly lighted one). But because of the jungle theme of the whole game, all the bosses seem to be mutant plants. And are they the least bit frightening? No, they look like that mutant plant from "The Jetsons." Not exactly as intimidating as The Dragon from The Waterfall stage of the first Contra.

This game is even more of a sore spot for me because of the box art Konami chose to use. There are four screenshots featured on the box. Three are from the first level, the side scrolling level. The fourth is a small picture from the 3D level which I think is level 5, but that doesn't really matter. The point is, is that Konami has led the gaming public to believe that this game is a mostly side scrolling game like the Contra of old with some 3D elements. But in reality, it's a 3D shooter, and a poor one at that, with a side scrolling level tacked on to the front to dupe old school gamers. And the sad fact of the matter is that the first level, the side-scroller, is the most fun part of the game. From there everything falls apart.

And I haven't even got to the cheating AI that this game uses. It's unfairly difficult. Bosses have attacks that cover the whole screen, you can't hide anywhere, and it's instant death. Enemies can shoot you from across the screen, but your bullets are limited to the few feet in front of you. And because the enemies blend into the background, you can get shot and not even know where it's coming from, because you can't see anyone, anywhere.