Iron Meat: Contra III The Alien Wars Style Game

[SOAREVERSOR]

Music is meh but other than that pretty good. Demo is out and free.

 

[auntjemima]

Soooooooo is it just me or is that basically exactly like contra?

 

[SOAREVERSOR]

Soooooooo is it just me or is that basically exactly like contra?

It's pretty much exactly like it. It falls into a mix of Contra 3, Contra 4, and Hardcorps Uprising (a game done by Ark System Works of Guilty Gear and other fame for Konami for the PS3/360) from what I've played. The guns are largely similar (you'll notice them all quick). Blazing Chrome was/is a similar sort of thing.

A lot of Konami's old IPs are done like this now. Largely because Lords of Shadow sucked so much they imploded.

 

[Bigbacon]

Wtf is with the music? Terrible..

 

[Comixbooks]

Looks ok but looks the same as any Contra clone doesn't look very fun. What made Contra good was the pacing and fluid movement. There are a few Contra sequels the last one I tried was a mobile one bored in seconds.

 

[Comixbooks]

Last good Contra from 2019 I never tried reviews scared me off.

 

[SOAREVERSOR]

Last good Contra from 2019 I never tried reviews scared me off.

That was terrible. All 3D Contras and Castlevania's have been so bad Konami deserved to go under and have their reputation permanently ruined forever. Not even Daikatan or Atari ET deserve as much hate as Konami's 3D fiascos.

 

[UnknownSouljer]

What made Contra good was the pacing and fluid movement.

This guy gets it. It's something that Japanese game makers understand very well. There's a lot of subtlety that adds up.
I've never seen a US game maker make a Contra style game that gets close. The same for any over head shooter/bullet-hell game.
There are a few exceptions that to me proves the rule and that's Hollow Knight and Cuphead. But literally outside of those two games, I can't think of any others.

That was terrible. All 3D Contras and Castlevania's have been so bad Konami deserved to go under and have their reputation permanently ruined forever. Not even Daikatan or Atari ET deserve as much hate as Konami's 3D fiascos.

That's a little bit overstated I would say. Lament of Innocence was great - I still own my copy and play it from time to time. My only criticism of the game is length at "only" 10 hours. But it has some amount of replay value with "secret code" versions of the game. Honestly, with how much time I game now (which is to say, not much) the "short" length of Lament of Innocence I see as a pro and not a con.
I heard some at least okay things about its sequels, but I never got around to playing them myself.

I can't comment on any of the 3D Contra games, never played them. But whatever that Contra game linked above was, looked abysmal. It looks completely unwiedly and not tight in terms of control. And that's ignoring fundamental issues like having no platforming.

 

[SOAREVERSOR]

This guy gets it. It's something that Japanese game makers understand very well. There's a lot of subtlety that adds up.
I've never seen a US game maker make a Contra style game that gets close. The same for any over head shooter/bullet-hell game.
There are a few exceptions that to me proves the rule and that's Hollow Knight and Cuphead. But literally outside of those two games, I can't think of any others.

That's a little bit overstated I would say. Lament of Innocence was great - I still own my copy and play it from time to time. My only criticism of the game is length at "only" 10 hours. But it has some amount of replay value with "secret code" versions of the game. Honestly, with how much time I game now (which is to say, not much) the "short" length of Lament of Innocence I see as a pro and not a con.
I heard some at least okay things about its sequels, but I never got around to playing them myself.

I can't comment on any of the 3D Contra games, never played them. But whatever that Contra game linked above was, looked abysmal. It looks completely unwiedly and not tight in terms of control. And that's ignoring fundamental issues like having no platforming.

CV64 was a shit show, and the dreamcast one got canceled because of that. The first Lord of Shadows did OK because of hype and Patrick Stewart but it wasn't really a good game at all. The second one was horrible plotwise and gameplaywise and bombed something fierce and pretty much lead to the exit of staff who had worked on the OG side scrollers and the metroidivania style games which is why we now have bloodstained doing both of those styles.

There was a 3D Contra on the PS1 that was pretty horrid and locked up that series. Which cranked out a few disasters after and then landed on it's feet with Contra 4 on the Nintendo DS. Konami's own staff fully admitted that they focused on handhelds because they could get away with publishing 2D sprite based games there and do well, and that a bunch of their classics just didn't work in 3D.

Looks ok but looks the same as any Contra clone doesn't look very fun. What made Contra good was the pacing and fluid movement. There are a few Contra sequels the last one I tried was a mobile one bored in seconds.

Contra 4 on the DS and Contra Rebirth on the Wii are both official games and really good. Hilariously the Wii also got a stand alone 2D castlevania that was better than lords of shadow by leaps and bounds. The true next gen Contra was under the old Hard Corps side of contra and it was also good.

Really the Contra franchise needs to pull a Castlevania where the people involved bolt from Konami and do it their way and ignore 3D forever.