Contra: Hard Corps

About Contra: Hard Corps

Contra: Hard Corps (1994) is Konami's first Contra on a Sega console, a Genesis run-and-gun with four commandos, branching routes and multiple endings.

Contra: Hard Corps in Depth

The player shoots through each side-scrolling stage to a boss, sometimes riding the Motoroid, a hoverbike that turns into an ostrich-like robot. Unlike earlier Contra games, there are no overhead stages, and the player chooses one of four characters, the commandos Ray Poward and Sheena Etranzi, the cyborg Brad Fang and the robot Browny, each with their own set of weapons. Two can play at once but not as the same character. The controls follow Contra III, adapted for the Genesis pad: a button toggles between running while firing and standing still to aim in eight directions, the player can climb walls and ceilings, and a new slide makes the character briefly invulnerable. Up to four weapons, lettered A to D, can be carried, and the current one is lost with a life.

Set five years after Contra III, the story follows the Hard Corps task force against Colonel Bahamut, who has stolen an alien cell to make weapons. Cutscenes advance the plot, and decisions at key moments send the player down different routes to several endings, including joining Bahamut.

Making Contra: Hard Corps

Development leader Nobuya Nakazato told BEEP! magazine in 1994 that the game was made for the Japanese Mega Drive market, against the idea that Konami had shifted its focus to the West. The team wanted replayability through branching routes, varied stages and little reuse of enemies; the first stage was packed with set pieces so it would stay interesting on repeat plays, and each character changes the tone, from serious with Ray to comic with Browny. Nakazato said it was made from the team's passion as longtime Contra fans rather than for commercial reasons alone.

Famitsu recorded 23,365 copies sold in Japan, where Micom BASIC Magazine ranked it first in popularity in December 1994. Critics praised its bosses, graphics and intense action, though EGM found the difficulty frustrating, and Next Generation called it "the ultimate side-scrolling shooter". It led to its own spin-offs, including Hard Corps: Uprising, and was re-released in the Contra Anniversary Collection and on the Genesis Mini in 2019.