The most American game ever made was created in Japan. It's Contra III!
Contra is legendary for a number of reasons. It popularized the Konami code, was Dark Souls before Dark Souls, and it was one of the first run-and-gun games of its kind. I've never played any other games in the franchise and don't have much experience in the genre as a whole. Let me know if you've heard that one before. I played about an hour of Gunstar Heros a few years ago...
You (and a friend) play through six levels, shooting anything and everything that moves. Along the way, you find six guns, each with unique mechanics, but you can only carry two at a time. If you die, which only takes one hit, then you drop whatever you had equipped at the time. But you can never lose the default firearm. Run out of lives, and it's game over. And you're gonna die a lot. It's straight out of the arcade and meant to eat your quarters. But I'm surprisingly fine with that. The entire point of Contra III is indiscriminate violence. There are so many explosions, over-the-top action sequences, and bullets on screens that there's no room for anything else.
And the gameplay is smooth. Shooting, platforming, wall climbing, top down nonsense: it's all fun and works. That's what I enjoyed most about C3: the variety. It's not all just Mario meets Galaga. There are only six levels, but half of them are different from what you'd expect. Yes, I save scummed through easy mode, but I enjoyed the experience anyway. The bosses were fun and unique. I even saw where I went wrong every death. I just wanted to keep my guns. You can even run through with a friend in co-op for more chaos. It's a short game, so let's finish this review.
Plot: who cares? Just go shoot stuff. 4/10
Gameplay: America. Just go shoot stuff. 10/10
Art: Big fan. I'm quickly learning that I'm a sucker for city backgrounds. And even if I can't see the alien devastation, every level and enemy is unique.
Music: fitting. It's fast and exciting. The director for C3 wanted a movie score that changes with the level, and he got it. It's kinda drowned out by the sounds of American school life, though. 6/10
Charm: so many ways to kill aliens. Designing this was a technical marvel. All the unique boss battles made for some "tricky coding," but it paid off. I can't say for sure how groundbreaking it all was, but it's blowing my mind thirty years after the fact. 8/10
But it is a very hard game. I would have loved to spend all night replaying every level with my friend of yore, but I can't do that now. -2
Contra III: The Alien Wars is dumb fun at its finest. It was never designed for plot or character development. It's a game you turn on to kill an hour here or there or when you're having a bad day and can accept a lot of death. What it's meant to do, it does so well and doesn't try to be anything else. I can see why this franchise is on the greatest games list, even if I'm giving it a 36/50.
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