Before I write my junk, I do have to mirror reviews and suggest that if you were to play this that it would be better off playing the Japanese version (or a patched U/E ROM file). Purists may say it's the intended experience to be playing with one-hit-deaths but that puritanism is an effect of elitism that often permeates around older titles on legacy consoles. Completing the game using an English release IS an achievement... but one that requires a lot of investment and practice that many of us simply don't have.

Hard Corps isn't existentially brutal when you can survive a single hit from any of the grunts, creatures or robots. Most of your challenge is in learning boss patterns on your 2nd or 3rd go around. Most of them are straightforward enough, move to a different side of the screen or jump at a certain time. A few last a little longer than expected and the words "how much health does this guy have?" left our mouths more than once.

The branching paths is a fun idea, another mechanic that is a little more forgiving if death isn't a 16x16 tile away. There are about 4 choices available and all of them seemingly have some form of consequence in stage selection and bosses fought. Regardless of that, most runs will only have 6 stages. It was a shock to us that we beat the game. That's it? We need to play again then!

If there were any major criticisms to be had on a personal level, the game is perhaps too visually cluttered. It looks wonderful when you watch someone else play it or when you get a chance to appreciate the environmental art and enemy design. More often than not, you are locking your focus on projectiles wandering across screen praying that you don't get hit by some random object you seemed to miss. Exaggerate that issue of focus when you're playing co-op, both of you spraying bullets everywhere.

I am looking forward to play this again, clear another path and hopefully convince some people on retroachievements to add support for the Japanese release.

Contra is hard, Contra Hard Corps is hard by Contra standards. This game will filter people even if they play the JP version that gives you a health bar. If you are ready for the challenge and a fair bit of trial and error you will find an absolutely fantastic game. Four unique characters and four branching paths makes the game highly repayable. The pace of the game is really good each run will only take you around 20 minutes (deaths not inculcated.) Some of the best boss fights in the series and the best OST in the series. You also have a completely invincible slide to get you out of touch spots. That slide feels really damn good and its a shame its the only Contra with it. The only problems I have with the game has more to due with the Genesis. Its a three button game that should really be a five button game. Having a six button controller helps a little, but it still would have been better if they built the game from the start with a six button controller in mind. Also the graphics can be a little crusty sometimes with the final boss of the rocket path becoming a mess of pixels during its first phase. Rather minor issues that otherwise doesn't bring down this masterpiece.

Really, why hasn't any other Contra done unique weapon load outs for characters and branching paths?

The game is good, I liked it, the feeling of going back through old levels and mastering them to get another shot at making it deeper in and eventually beating the game is a gameplay loop I enjoyed. However, it frankly feels like this game just didn't earn a lot of those restarts. Attacks that came out without warning or were too fast to reasonably react to as a first time were where the majority of my deaths came from here, rarely did I actually die to a boss after learning what their attacks did and what their telegraphs were. It felt like it was forcing me to go back instead of me going back as a result of me not being good enough. But admittedly that isn't a terrible issue, the game (on a single run) is short, only taking about 6 levels to get to the end (at least on the path I took, I assume the others are around the same length).

The game has very high replayability, with 4 distinct characters to choose from and different level paths being available, which definitely helps the longevity of what would otherwise be a pretty short game.

The game aesthetically is wonderful, high quality visuals with a great soundtrack that perfectly fits the gameplay as well. I really love the sounds the Genesis produces in general, it makes for good music.

I think Contra Hard Corps was a good game, but it's overhyped, especially in the difficulty area. If this is the best the series has to offer, I'm unsure if I'll continue spending my time with Contra. I do hope to complete the other paths of this game in the near future though, maybe I'll change my mind on it after I truly finish this one.

He completado la version americana con todos los personajes y rutas sin continues.

Facilmente uno de los mejores juegos de accion que he jugado nunca, simplemente el juego no para, pusieron al limite a la megadrive llenandolo de jefes uno tras otro (tanto que parece juego de treasure) contando con diferentes personajes a escoger con diferentes finales y niveles regidos por las decisiones que tomes en la historia.

Este es el primer contra en donde te presentan 4 personajes jugables cuya diferencias reacaen sobre todo en las armas que usan, son cuatro 4 armas de las cuales estaras cambiando una con otra para ofrantar cada una de las situaciones que el juego te presenta y esta de mas decir que todas son muy utiles. Ahora en cuanto a los personajes existe una diferenciacion de tamaño que puede beneficiar o perjudicar al mismo, Brownie es el mas pequeño por lo que facilmente puede pasar por debajo de las balas, y de hecho el jefe del cuarto stage se facilita mucho con brownie ya que uno de los ataques del boss pasa por encima de el. Luego esta Fang que es el mas grande y por lo tanto un blanco facil.

Siendo honesto al principio pense que brownie seria el personaje mas OP del juego no solo por su tamaño sino tambien por su doble salto y por que su arma C es muy fuerte pudiendo despachar a algunos bosses muy rapido, pero la verdad diria que el balance de los personajes es cuando menos decente, brownie tiene unas armas muy gimmick por lo que aveces desearas tener armas mas normales para afrontar algunas situaciones, y Fang no se queda atras podra ser grande peri tener armas potentes de corto alcance como el arma B y su arma D esta super OP se trata de un disparo cargado que te va a ser mas que util en varias ocasiones para matar a varios enemigos en fila con un solo disparo o literalmente humillar a algunos jefes. Con respecto a Ray y Sheena, Ray resulta ser el equivalente al personaje clasico de contra con las armas de siempre, y sheena esta preparada para todo.

En cuanto a la historia, aqui te permite tomar decisiones para cambiar el rumbo de la historia lo cual se resume a pasar por niveles especificos para cada ruta que eligas, pienso que la historia es coherente con el gameplay pero solo no me quedo claro una cosa, y es que si decidis dejar vivo a dead eye joe y luego pelear con el doctor desbloqueas el mejor final en donde matas al colonel y matas al alien cell en el misil, pasa que si decides ir tras dead eye joe en el segundo nivel para matarlo el final cambiara, lo que no me explico es como la existencia de dead eye joe afecto esto, siendo que en ambos casos el doctor muere.

De ahi en fuera me a parecido un juegazo redondo, konami fue muy ambiciosa con este contra y sinceramente lo dio todo.

(This is the 97th game in my challenge to go through many known games in chronological order starting in 1990. The spreadsheet/blog is in my bio.)

It surprised me to see the very positive reviews about this game online. Usually, I find that my thoughts on these older games align for the most part with consensus, or are even more positive. With Contra: Hard Corps, the follow up to 1992's excellent Contra III: The Alien Wars, I stumbled upon a game where I found my time to be significantly less fun than it seems to have been for many others.

I'm not gonna dive too deeply into it because I "only" played the game for 3 hours, but as someone who thought that Contra III definitely was among the 3 best games to release in 1992, the amount by which I disliked Contra Hard Corps was very surprising and easily my biggest disappointment out of the 1994 playlist. Why? Level design would probably be my number one answer to that. For a game that is as fast-paced and action-packed as Contra games tend to be, there were a LOT more moments in this game where you couldn't skip dialogue or certain scenes. For a game made to be replayed constantly, this had me bored out of my mind after the 10+ failed attempts each area took me. Then there is the bosses and mini bosses in each level, which felt unfairly designed here more than anything. Where Contra III's bosses usually made me feel like I mastered them after a while and could reliably get past them, bosses in Contra Hard Corps just seem to constantly corner you or have attacks that are just barely avoidable by a frame and overall feel way less reliable to beat. Weapons seem to do less damage here than in Contra III as well, which means for a lot of fights with basic enemies, you can't just "run and gun" your way past them, but instead have to stop, aim and shoot, which for a game like this really isn't something I should ever be forced to do.

There is no stand and shoot diagonally button for starters. Controls are not tight either. If one projectile comes at you, they are reliably dodgable, but two or more and I found myself praying to the Contra gods that my input would allow me to dodge them. Even if you do, hitboxes seem too large and you get hit anyway.

It's things like that that just made this incredibly frustrating to play. I can't say I enjoyed any of this. It felt like a less clever, more unfairly punishing Contra III with worse visuals.

Clearly, I'm in the minority with that opinion, but unfortunately this was my experience for a game I was looking forward to.

The best game on the series was somehow on the Mega Drive all this time. I legit wasn't expecting to like Hard Corps this much.

For starters, four different characters, each with their own weapon loadout - that's sixteen mostly distinct guns. My favorite ended up being FANG, a humanoid wolf with a gun for an arm, that also wears sunglasses. Video games, man.

Half of his guns don't shoot in multiple directions, but they are all absurdly powerful, making for an incredibly satisfying character.

The game also features some branching paths, with a few unique levels between those paths.

There is also a slide with some very generous i-frames, and it's immensely satisfying to use that.

But really, maybe what puts this above other games in the series is that this is a healthy challenge. Something like Contra 4, for example, is absolutely brutal, and the NES games are stuck in that memorization arcade mentality.

The auto-scroller boss is a bit of a pacing killer though, and fairly brainless. So brainless that you can actually fast-forward through a good chunk of the fight on an emulator, since the screen just auto-scrolls and you can't damage him at all in these sections. Lame.

Play the Japanese version though, or the American version with the proper romhack. It features a 3-hit life bar and infinite continues, while the western release has you die in one-hit and features limited continues, get out of here.

Every now and then I'll play an older game that makes me go "whoa". I didn't expect a Contra game to achieve that. Yet another split-second decision to play during a long car ride, I ended up beating it five times over two days to reach all the endings. Don't get me wrong, the Contra games are all fine. They're fun, twitchy types of games that ask you to be extremely precise with your movement to the detriment of the overall experience, since you die in a single hit. That's the first big change in Hard Corps, as there isn't a whole lot of those moments. Hard Corps is far more interested in providing spectacle using better hardware than they've worked on prior. The absurdity of the physical requirements is lessened due to the absurdity of the setpieces you find yourself fighting on. I'm sure there's a lot of divisiveness in the core fanbase over whether this change was actually good, as Hard Corps is far more about pattern recogntition and understanding how all your tools can work together to take on boss fights. Most of the game is spent up against wholly unique boss monsters who usually have fairly deliberate tells for each of their attacks. I will choose this type of challenge one-hundred times over the type of difficulty offered in earlier Contra games. There's still some grievances I have with one-hit deaths and loss of power that comes with it, but you get to keep any of the upgrades you didn't have equipped when you die, which is nice, and Switch has save states, which makes the lives system optional. Regardless, the pattern-recognition style of gameplay isn't as fun when you absolutely have to die in order to better understand them. You can make adjustments in other games, but that's not really a possibility until you see how an attack works, which will usually result in getting hit and losing core abilities and precious lives. But this is all minor when put up against everything Hard Corps excels with. Not a single dull moment passes in it's 45-minute campaign. You can even unlock different stages and battles through choices which makes the prospect of learning the systems through replay more engaging. All the characters have unique weapons which can impact how you fight in a variety of ways. The game has basically no slowdown or flicker despite constantly banging out what should be too many effects. This is among one of the best action games ever made. 6/6

Cleared on March 4th, 2023 (SEGA Genesis Challenge: 2/160)

Contra Hard Corps is a 2D side scroller shoot em up where you run through dangerous battlefields and enemy territories to stop them of their devious plan to use the Alien cell for world domination, and it is radical. It's really hard as you lose a life in one hit (oddly some versions have it where you take three hits before losing a life), but it's a game that you can get really good at because it doesn't go over-the-top with its difficulty through spikes although still hard enough that it may warrant using save states if you don't have patience.

They save the over-the-top aspect for the visuals and the action because good god it's wild. It's a sci-fi military world in chaos with machines and aliens running rampant and it looks incredible in its pixelated form. Also, I just love the music of this game. GTR attack is a hype-infusing song that boosts adrenaline and the bosses that this song accompanies tend to be the most fast-paced. The Last Springsteen invokes terror and suspense as you are about to square off against whatever monster you end up having to face last.

One of more interesting features of this game is that it has multiple routes which lets them add so much to the overall game while confining the general length and encouraging replay value to see what set of bosses you will get to face next. There are four routes that change based on the simple decision that only serves to move you along one of those routes. Of course, some bosses are mandatory to fight in all routes.

If this somehow sounds tedious, there are four playable characters and you could do what I did and assign those characters to a specific route. I'll go over them one by one.
Ray is about what you'd expect a Contra character to be. All of them share the same core mechanics as you jump, you shoot, you run, duck, and even powerslide (which from my understanding is new for this game and you are going to need it). However, Ray has weapons that are familiar enough to a classic Contra game like the Spread Shot from all Contra games and the Homing Shot from Contra III. However, from what I hear, the Spread Shot is argued as the best weapon in most of those games, but here, it feels kinda underwhelming and really, he's just the most underwhelming of all the characters to me.
Sheena is a favorite of mine as all of her weapons feel useful in some way. Her weapons deal impressive damage and if she needs some spread damage, then her Ax Laser should help her.
Fang is a cool character in visual style, a cyborg anthro wolf with sunglasses? That's awesome! But when playing as him, be extremely careful during the opening level because early on he picks up a charged shot in the middle of an enemy barrage that will put a delay on your attacks which will make you very suspectible to getting taken down. This is an issue exclusive to Fang and unlike the others, he doesn't really have a "Spread" shot, but his weapons do supposedly the most damage.
But then we get to Browny who is quite frankly the most busted character in the game. He's small which gives him an advantage when it comes to having a smaller hitbox than all the others. He doesn't jump as high, but why worry about that when he could double jump? He has many weapons for different situations be it single-target damage or pulverizing mobs. But what really stands out is his Yo-Yo which just shreds bosses and it locks on too. So if you ever find yourself struggling with this game, bring these guy out.

The routes themselves also linked with difficulty. Route A and B are kinda easy (at least for this game's standards), but Route C and D are pretty hard. My advice is to just start with Route A and then go from there, and you'll have a much better time with the game.

But regardless of how you do it, it's a fun game and among my favorites from the Sega Genesis catalog.

January 7th, 2024 Update: I went back to replay the game as the Japanese version intended with 3 hit points, and I was shocked at how easy the game was in comparison. Not only does 3 hits give you a better chance to not get smoked almost instantly at the first level, but because of how the game's mechanics work where you lose the weapon you have equipped upon losing a life, you can actually hold on to your weapon much longer which allows you to deal significantly more damage throughout the game, making it much faster to clear. If Contra Hard Corps is giving you a hard time, finding the means to buff your health points be it through a patch or the Japanese version may be your best shot.