Super Contra (Arcade)

Super Contra
Also known as: Super Contra: Alien no Gyakushu (JP) Developer: Konami Publisher: Konami Platform: Arcade (Super Contra/Thunder Cross hardware) Released in JP: January 28, 1988 Released in US: March 1988 Released in EU: 1988 This game has unused graphics. This game has unused music. This game has regional differences. This game has revisional differences.

Thanks to a bigger development team and more capable hardware, Super Contra is bigger, flashier, and more cinematic than its predecessor. The quest for freedom continues!

Unused Music

To do: Can these tracks be found inside the game itself? If not, add them in a Prerelease page instead.

These unused tracks were published in the album Music from Super Contra & A-Jax (catalog number K30X-7702).

Title	Track	Notes
M-1		Appears to be alternate music for the high score entry screen.
M-2		Appears to be an unused stage theme.
M-3		Another unused stage theme. This track was later used in the NES version (Super C) as the background music for Area 5, and then later on given the title "MASSACRE MOUNTAIN" on the album Contra Chronicle Vol.2 The Beginning of the Legends (EMCA-0025-1~3).
M-4		Probably an alternative Game Over theme due to its short length.

Unused Graphics

The unused frames of the Alien seen near the end of Stage 3. They're never seen outside their eggs. It's possible they were meant to charge forward once the player breaks the egg, but they get destroyed along with them at once.

The animations of explosion, "Firing the gun" effect and the missile, which has only a single horizontal frame. Could be that the variant of Ledder sitting behind the sandbags was originally suppose to fire missiles instead.

A set of letters that can form the word "Prologue" is hidden within the attract mode / game story's tileset, but is not used in any version. These letters are separate from the letters used everywhere else.

The font in this game is displayed with only 2 colors. The reason for this it's because it contains the pattern, covered with 7 identical colors of grey, similar to the text combined with the flashing red palette seen during the Intro and the Continue Countdown.
At one point, the regular font was meant to appear like that as well.

Right after the used font, there's a similar one and fully shaded, recycled from A-Jax. There's no correct palette to display the font in full colors besides the one with just two.

The entire 16x16 Japanese font went unused, as the Ending Credits were kept in English in both versions (The text at the beginning of the Intro along with the subtitles are stored in separate tiles). The graphics include Roman numbers and gender symbols, hinting that the game may have had a high score name entry screen similar to Gradius planned at one point.

Unused	Used

There are 2 versions of the helicopter seen at the beginning of Stage 1. The unused one has the graphics with and without the rope and the frames for the propeller is also part of the background, while the propeller in the used version is represented as a sprite.

Music Interruption

In-game	Without interruptions

The music played during the Intro, "WHAT IS THIS PLACE" cannot be heard without the voice clips and other samples obscuring the drums and orchestra hits (the Alien sound is actually part of the track), as those share the same sound channel. It's most noticeable at the sequence, where Bill fires his gun.

Bugger Spawner

By setting the value 03 at the RAM address 40D6, the game is able to spawn Buggers in the same way as Greeders and Orians. However, it's unknown if that was intentional because this enemy is too tricky to deal with, given their speed along with the ability to jump usually when the player is not on the ground and the same value spawns the Alien type from Stage 5 during the overhead view stages. Bugger seems to check the ground collision only when it jumps, meaning that the flat ground is required for them to work properly.

Regional Differences

Two versions of the game were produced. The international version uses program code E, whereas the Japanese version uses program code F. This seems to suggests that the Japanese version was a slightly later build of the game.

Unlike the original Contra arcade game, which had a separate version titled Gryzor distributed in Europe, Super Contra seems to had been released in Europe under the same title used in North America (as evident by this flyer and its coverage in magazines at the time), hence why only one international version of the game seems to exist.

Title Screen

Japan	International

The Japanese version is subtitled エイリアンの逆襲 (Eirian no Gyakushū) or "The Alien's Counterattack".

Opening

Japan	International

The opening text in the Japanese version gives the date in which the game is set, which was omitted in the international version, as was the case with the original Contra (which kept the game's futuristic setting ambiguous in its international promotional materials). The rest of the Japanese text is only slightly different from its English counterpart, as it doesn't mention the Red Falcon Organization (the antagonists in the first game) by name, something that the Japanese flyer and instruction sheets for the first game also did curiously enough.

Text	Translation
西暦2634年12月、 謎のエイリアン軍との戦いから 1年、地球はその魔の手から 逃れたかに思われていたが‥‥。	December 2634 A.D. One year after the battle with the mysterious alien army the earth seems to be free from their clutches. However...

The red scrolling text after the first image naturally differs between the two versions as well. The text used in the international version is the same tagline used on the American promotional flyer.

Japanese	Japanese (translated)	International
いま、あの魂斗羅が再び起つ！！	Now, Contra rises to action once again!!	THE QUEST FOR FREEDOM CONTINUES...

Japanese	International

Bill's and Lance's digitized voice clips are given subtitles in the Japanese version, making the opening even more cinematic than it already is.

Second Loop

The English version ends the game after the fifth and final stage is completed. However, the Japanese version continues into a harder second loop following the end credits, which sets the difficulty level into its highest setting (regardless of the actual DIP settings being used) and has continues (including 2nd player join-ins) disabled. It is only after completing this second loop that the game truly ends in the Japanese version.

Oddity

Magnus, the Stage 2 Boss contains two electrodes, that generates a electric field attack from time to time. While it looks deadly to touch, it doesn't seem to hurt the player at any point.

Revisional Differences

In Contra Anniversary Collection, the voice lines during the Intro spoken by Bill and Lance along with Announcer's "Please Continue" were removed in this version.