Last week brought a tear to my eye with the announcement (such as it was) of Contra ReBirth coming to WiiWare. And now, with the game scheduled to be released in Japan… huh, today, actually… we have tons of videos of the gameplay, plus details to boot!
Vixy of Rockman Perfect Memories (via GoNintendo) claims to have beaten it already (which really leaves one to question the challenge level), and provides the following details.
Put simply, the game is described as being like the child of Contra III: The Alien Wars on the Super NES and Contra: Hard Corps on the SEGA Genesis. Cutscenes are hand-drawn, and despite being the Japanese version, the voices are said to be in English, though the text was not. It sounds like the game may use the same voice clips as Contra 4 did on the Nintendo DS.
For music, she says that it “feels like Mega Drive but in a super-awesome way,” and has classic NES themes remixed, though the Waterfall and Ice Field stages didn’t make it in. However, there is also a remix of a track from Contra III; she doesn’t tell which, but to say “you know which one.”
Unfortunately, there is no sound test; however, you can adjust the respective volume of the sound effects and music.
On the gameplay front, there are four difficulty settings: Easy, Normal, Hard, and an unlockable “Nightmare” setting. Plus, you can set your stock of lives to 3, 5, or 7, and there are infinite continues.
Controls are classic NES-style on the Wii Remote, with 1 being the fire button and 2 making your character jump. “Hold the shoot button to stand still and shoot in all 8 directions. Mash the button to walk and run at the same time,” she says. Weapon switching is off as a default, but you can set it to the A button or B trigger in the settings. Plus, there’s support for the Classic and GameCube controllers.
Weapons seem to be gimped, as you can only have the Normal, Laser, Homing, and Spread guns. No Crusher? No Flamethrower? What gives, Konami?
There are two characters available to start, with two more as unlockables. Bill Rizer, star of the series, is one character, and Lance Bean, his partner from the pre-PlayStation 2 days and Contra 4, is said to be in as well. Rather than Mad Dog and Scorpion rounding out the crew, the character select shows the alien-like “Plissken” as one, and “Yagyu” as the other. Interestingly enough, Yagyu is the surname of Bill’s samurai partner in Neo Contra, where he’s more commonly referred to as “Jaguar,” and they seem to look similar as well.
For stages, there are five to go through, which is said to be “good enough actually if consider the difficulty.”
There are both old and new enemies alike, with bosses that show up early on in a stage and come back later to try to finish you off.
And unfortunately, there is no WiFi, “not even for high scores.”
Vixy has a number of videos with different characters and difficulty levels here, and here are a couple of the first stage to give you a taste:
For tons more, check out the full list GoNintendo has compiled.
Now, the big question is: When do we get it? Come on, Konami, I’ve got money right here, waiting for you.
