Ed's Contra 4 pre-release information sheet
By Ed "Oscuro" Herdman. Second revision: July 19, 2007.

GAME CREDITS:

Head Honchos: Associate Producers: Tomm Hulett and Simon Lai (Konami) and Director Matt Bozon (WayForward)
Designers: Sean Velasco and Cole Philips (WayForward)
Music: Jake "Virt" Kaufmann
Animation (incomplete): Joakim "Konjak" Sandberg
Backgrounds (incomplete): Henk Nieborg
Pixel art (incomplete): "Snake" (also known as SnakeManEXE)
...and many others currently unknown to us!

Special thanks to Adam Tierney of WayForward, and members of The Castlevania Dungeon Forums, Pixelation Forums, SHMUPS Forum, Wikipedia, and others for information, speculation, contributions, and interest.

Storyline: As has been announced to much fanfare (and some small confusion, if not controversy), Mad Dog and Scorpion are now unique characters. Extraterrestrial menace (and Red Falcon ally) Black Viper returns from Operation C (as an aside, for a time Kurt Kalata seems to have been the only person outside Konami who knew that BV was already in the series).

CHARACTERS:
Bill and Lance return. "New" characters Scorpion (as Vin Diesel) Mad Dog (as Wesley Snipes) have appeared in limited screenshots and in the August 2007 Nintendo Power in a fold-out three-panel poster. The art was done by a currently unknown out-source artist.

CONTROLS/FEATURES
Weapon switch: L shoulder button
Stand in place and fire: R shoulder button
Informed speculation:
Up + jump throws a grappling hook (see the GameSpot E3 video at 4:35 http://www.gamespot.com/video/941461/6174741/contra-4-stage-demo)
Down + jump attempts to drop the player down a ledge or let go of a pipe.

Players can throw their weapon down for a friend, and also may steal (or "borrow") lives (assumption: It might work like it does in Contra for NES, with a simple button combination), as confirmed in the 7/19/07 developer interview.

There are no "save points" in the game, but rather there are continue points (GameVideos.com E3 preview with Simon Lai). The game supports the NDS's "sleep mode," although how this is implemented is uncertain.
Multiplayer: Two-player ad-hoc mode is promised. Early NP screenshots show all four heroes onscreen at one time, and it is not certain if four-player cooperative will be available to internet gamers.

Unconfirmed:
I thought I heard about two weapons being used at once as in Contra III's top-down levels, but I have no specifics or evidence of this in action.

WEAPONS

No rapid shot icons in sight. Rejoice!

The weapon icon appears to change to a darker, more angular one when upgraded.

Automatic machine gun: upgrades to two-column fire (i.e. machine guns akimbo); shots also appear more massive

Crush gun: Default shot reaches only to the edge of the screen from the middle, and reaches the same distance fired diagonally and vertically. Upgraded gun reaches to the top of the highest screen and disappears off the screen when fired horizontally or diagonally.

Flamethrower: Default shot is a slow circular swirling vortex of flame; upgraded shot sends out a blast of flame that explodes diagonally in four directions on contact.

Hunter (Homing): Default is a single column of shots. Upgraded version fires three "hornets" at once. Currently seeks out unseen targets, with shots going in directions after unknown targets.

Spread: Default is three-way; upgraded is five-way.

Laser: Default shot can penetrate at least two common footsoldier enemies, and appears to move through the Jungle level bunker boss wall's gun emplacements, although it is only used on one item at a time. At 4:49 in the GameSpot Video the "level two" laser appears; it appears wider and either travels faster or fires more rapidly.


An example of a level's regular enemies as seen in gameplay footage:
Jungle:
Footsoldiers: Still kill you on contact
Snipers: Can fire at arbitrary angles, although the sprite's weapon moves in 45 degree incrememnts only (no surprise here)
Grass-covered hidden gun turrets (as seen in Super Contra's/Super C's third stages) may be stood on.
Machine gunners deployed behind sandbags will kill the player on contact (so don't attempt to stand on them).

LEVELS

First, the tunnel segments are back. WayForward has at least one section done which Simon Lai called somewhat too fast; the 3D effect is impressive and the corridor moves relative to the player's view in real-time. Contrary to earlier statements, the game DOES use the second (lower) screen as a map, but only in these segments, where it is an homage to the arcade game.

SUB-BOSSES/MAIN BOSSES:
Jungle sub-boss: First appears on Page 55 of the August 2007 issue of Nintendo Power (V218). Seen in a demo for GameSpot Video's E3 coverage by Simon Lai of Konami. It remains unclear whether this nefarious device can be destroyed. Its blast will destroy dirt piles on the ground, revealing craters which turn into instant death pits. The track is held in place by five pillars (the fourth is a short one), and has its own loading platform.

Jungle main boss: The sealed wall bunker returns as the first stage boss. After destroying two small turrets, a red seal and (probably optionally) a single defender, the whole base rises out of the ground! The insertion helicopter appears during this second phase of the battle as a platform to attack the upper level of the base.

Waterfall: Screenshots (and brief video?) of a waterfall level have appeared (NP V218 pp.55), but no boss has been shown.

Ocean: With a boss codenamed "Barracuda," it is a large segmented fish-like boss whose scales gradually fall off. Its weak points are either its eyes or boils on top of its head (as seen in a concept sketch previewed in Nintendo Power). This boss's main sequence pattern is a large blue beam sweeping from vertical to the water, starting above its head when it enters the screen. As it exits to the other side of the screen it launches spikes from its back. Seen in the video "gv.com.Contra4UnderwaterGunfightGameplay_640x480.mov" and NP V218 pp.55. Earlier in the stage, players ride jetbikes (all-purpose jetskis) past flexible sea creatures that attempt to encircle and headbutt the player (similar to a fight in the PC-Engine and SNES versions of Dracula X), then fight next to a large space/surface rocket-ship of some sort while enemy skiiers and flying soldiers provide a challenge. After killing a commander soldier on the back of said vehicle, the boss fight begins. Objects under water are subject to distortion - easily noticable when viewing the bottom of the rocket-ship lying under the surface of the water.

Docks (?): A section in bright daylight has the player grappeling and running down raised walkways toward a confrontation with a submarine in a fight that fans of Operation C will feel right at home in - until they discover this craft's many offensive options. Seen in the GameSpot Video demo by Mr. Lai.

City (?): Likely a large insect- or crustacean-like creature. It has a segmented shell, claws for mobility, and multiple red eyes and mouthparts. Players can stand on top of its shell on the top screen, or hang onto a "pipe" protruding from lower on its body. It appears likely that it moves through the city at high speeds, and certainly enemy soldiers on jetbikes appear past it. So far only seen in print (NP V218 pp.55).

City (?): A section of city stage appeared in NP V218 pp.55; players fight alien dogs (with behavior similar to that in Contra III), zombies, footsoldiers, and a different sort of manned gun turret.

(Enemy?) Laboratory: Possibly the City level's goal. A single screenshot of this level has been seen (NP V218 pp.55). No boss has been spotted. It is populated (at least in part) by pink creatures able to crawl along walls and by mindless zombies wearing tattered remnants of green clothing.

Guardian1: A screenshot of a Hard Corps-style ride on a rocket flying straight up has been spotted (NP V218 pp.55). A large "Missile Guardian" robot grabs onto the missile to cause trouble for the players. It is not certain whether the Guardian's back can be stood on; if not, one player in the NP screenshot is taking a dive into the clear blue emptiness! Simon Lai's demonstration cart shown on GameSpy Video 7/12 lists "Guardian1" as the first entry under the heading "Level Missile" and thus we assume it fits here.

Nose cone separation: This is the second entry from the dev screen of Simon Lai's demo copy of Contra 4.


VERSIONS
There does not appear to be any significant difference between versions of the game shown on GameVideos.com in late June, and those shown more recently. Some versions shown have had minor graphical glitches (such as a spray of water remaining on the screen during "gv.com.Contra4UnderwaterGunfightGameplay_640x480.mov" at 1:20 into the video. Adam Tierney of WayForward noted July 12th that explosions had been updated past the classic Contra-style mirrored and rotated ball explosions (appearing most recently in a demo by Simon Lai filmed July 11th).

SPECIAL DEMONSTRATION BUILD FEATURES:
Builds have been seen apparently allowing 9 or 99 lives; Nintendo Power's August 2007 issue seems to contain screenshots from a version with a level select and multiple lives (all screenshots save one show 9 lives; one screenshot taken from later in the Jungle level - at the monorail-mounted track cannon - shows seven lives). After that, versions shown (such as that in the GameVideos.com gameplay demos) seem to have been set to 99 lives.

The version demoed by Simon Lai posted to GameSpot Video on July 12th allows 99 lives and has extensive demo/development GUI functions on a special screen I refer to in making certain assumptions about the game. A clock indicates July 11, 2007, with a running clock under that (a guess - it reads 18:37:01 - 6:37 PM?) - almost certainly the date the video segment was created. To the left of that are some strange menu options: "Crushing layer," "Threat," "Cerebrum(Gym)." Under that lie more standard options: Wireless Menu, Rotating Layers, Scanline Scroll, and then many options which seem level-related. Oddly, two sub-entries appear under Missile (Guardian1 and Nose cone separation). It appears that many core features of the game are thus either implemented or ready to interface with the game.

There are two cyan lines of text at the top of the screen, and a dark blue line of text under the bottom stage entry in white. These appear unreadable, unfortunately. The white text entries are seen scrolling up after the camera switch.

Additionally, Mr. Lai was able to summon different weapons during gameplay with a "weapons cheat" without appearing to input a code using the d-pad or main buttons.

OTHER:

Pixel artist and Contra 4 contributor "Snake" had a bit of a joke at my expense. See it here: http://contra.classicgaming.gamespy.com/contra4-prerelease/junk/Diselelectric37locomotive.jpg