Thanks to KONAMI for the review code
Title: Contra: Operation Galuga
System: Steam (PC)
Price: $39.99
Release Date: 03/12/2024
Story
In this reinterpretation of the original Contra story, you take control of Bill and Lance, who set out to investigate the Galuga Archipelago after a strange series of terrorist attacks kick off. What they find there is more than they could have ever imagined…
Honestly, Contra has never been known for story, outside of maybe Shattered Soldier on the PS2. Most of the plot elements from the classic games have just been small nods connecting the games together, and Operation Galuga decides to reboot the timeline from scratch and start again with a retelling of the first game, taking the general story outline and incorporating a bunch of new elements to tell a story that turned out better than I expected.
Nothing groundbreaking mind you, but as one who played most of the retro Contra games, I really liked some of the nods thrown into the story, and it does a good job at connecting the stages together, and ultimately left me wanting more plot at the end of it all. Of course if you prefer to just go through the stages without any of the plot or tutorials, you can do just that in Arcade Mode.
Presentation
In a big shift from most 2D Contra games, Operation Galuga goes 2.5D, bringing 3D models into the side-scrolling action. It kinda reminds me of Contra Shattered Soldier in that regard, and just like it the game is honestly rather ugly at points, and doesn’t leave a good first impression visually. Still, even with character models and the early environments being incredibly janky looking, Operation Galuga does pull off several neat tricks to make the style a lot more interesting, such as certain stages having cool perspective changes in them and some visual gimmicks that impact gameplay in some later stages. A few of the later levels do look far better in detail than the initial set of stages, but considering most of the levels in OG are using themes from the older games, their overall level design still ends up being a bit forgettable and ugly in comparison to those older games.
At the very least, the game runs great on steam deck, and I had little problems playing this both in docked and handheld. It mostly kept at a 60FPS save for the occasional hitches and stuttering during some of the later stages, but even then the game looked and felt very smooth.
Interestingly enough, the ending story mode cutscene is done in a cool comic book style, and I really liked how that looked. I’d much prefer if the rest of the cutscenes were done in that style rather than it being saved for the very end of the adventure. Still, if you’ve played a typical 2.5D platformer or the aforementioned Shattered Soldier, you have a good sense at what you’ll be seeing here.
The music on the other hand… Wow, this kinda hurts to talk about. There are plenty of unlockable OSTs to obtain, and a bunch of them are outstanding! You have a selection of NES Contra songs, assorted NES Konami games, Contra 4′s OST, and the Castlevania trilogy, for some odd reason, and all can be used as your background music for runs of Arcade mode or the Challenge Mode levels once you unlocked them. This means if you want to play the story mode, you’ll be stuck with the game’s new, original soundtrack, and quite honestly Operation Galuga might just have the most generic OST I’ve ever heard from the series, and that says a lot.
It starts off incredibly strong with an outstanding rendition of the Contra title theme, but then falls off a cliff from that point and becomes a series of very generic instrumentations that vaguely harken back to older titles, but not packing the energy of those classic tracks. The music isn’t awful or anything, just incredibly generic and will exit your memory banks the minute you quit the game, and I struggle to remember a single song from OG’s soundtrack outside of that title theme. I’d rather listen to the Contra Force soundtrack. The most irritating aspect of not being able to use those alternate soundtracks in the story mode, however? The fact that there is a brand new, remixed OST of all the retro 8 bit Contra songs that the Retro Mix contains, and the remixes are absolutely incredible. Still not the best renditions of the NES tunes i’ve heard, but a lot of them are very catchy and strong remixes of the classic tracks that keep the energy of those original songs, just like they should.
Why you can’t play the Retro Remix OST during the Story mode (or why this wasn’t the direction of the new OST to begin with) is beyond me, but it just really bugs me that these guys did make a great new OST for the game; you just can’t use it and will have to grind for it, and you’ll be stuck with the generic noise in the meantime.
Thankfully, the voice acting was an aspect that far exceeded my expectations, and the cast gave a great performance during the story mode. Each of the characters are well-acted with great voice work, providing just enough charm to make each scene worth listening to, and I found them to compliment the story well. As a bit of a heads up, the characters will make constant grunts during gameplay, even in Arcade Mode, though luckily you can turn off the VO entirely if you just want to focus on the gameplay and ignore the voices.
Gameplay
Contra: Operation Galuga is structured like your typical 2D Contra game, taking place across eight stages. You have the new Story mode, which guides you to each stage, saves your progress and has narrative elements in the levels, the Arcade mode, which just plays the eight stages in sequence like the classic Arcade games, and a challenge mode akin to the one from Contra 4, which is packed with short, very tough challenges that require you to have mastery of the movement tech, the weapons, and a character in order to complete. The Challenge mode is definitely the toughest part of the game, but also the one I felt was the most rewarding and perfect for shorter play sessions.
When I first started Galuga, I jumped straight into the Arcade Mode to treat it like a classic Contra and see how it would hold up going in blind, and I’m happy to say that the Arcade Mode is pretty darn solid! You have the classic jump and shot, the double-weapon system from Contra III, and two slots for abilities you can assign to the characters in the form of perks. You also have a new overload feature, where you can sacrifice your weapon to unleash a special attack dedicated to it, such as a wild barrage of spread bullets, a laser-fueled time stop, a giant fire wall, a set of drones, etc. This really helps in a pinch and honestly made the weapons in general just a ton of fun to use, with none of em having a big negative that I noticed, unlike the original games where some weapons felt outright useless. (Hello, “R” and “M” weapons!) Here in Galuga though, upgrading your weapon or using an overload technique give them way more usage, and adds to the fun factor.
Each character also has their own special technique by default, including double jumps, high jumps, or hovers, and more skills can also be applied to characters via the perks. It seems a bit overwhelming at first, but the game is fully beatable without bothering with the Perk system, and when it comes down to the basic feel, this is just a really tight Contra in the vein of the classic games, blending a bunch of elements from Contra NES-4 while mainly sticking to the level themes of the first game. The controls feel super responsive and you can even choose between 8-way aiming or a handy 360 degree aim that makes combat a whole lot easier.
These stages aren’t just spruced up versions of the NES levels either; the level designs are brand new, with some stages feeling like a remixed take on a NES stage, while others are a completely new interpretation, such as the base stage being turned into an autoscroller on a bike akin to a level in Contra III, and the waterfall level throwing aspects from Super C’s jungle stage into it. The last few stages of the game are also rather fun, and is where the game gets more creative with the level designs, with one level theme coming out of nowhere as a new, delightful surprise. Unfortunately, there are still some rough spots along the way, with stage 2 being a level I just outright didn’t care for upon replays, and that’s the autoscroller I mentioned earlier. The stage is still better than the chaotic mess that was in Contra III, but it goes on for way, way too long, even if you try your darnest to speed things up and defeat the enemies as fast as possible. (I often clocked in at around 9 minutes no matter how fast I tried to clear it) Considering how most of the other levels feel like the player has more control of their pacing, (and even a later stage with an autoscroller bit is more fun and goes by a lot quicker, and the player’s actions feel more impactful to the pacing of that stage) Stage 2 is just a pretty bad pacebreaker to throw at the player early in the game.
The other rough aspect comes from the excessive grinding for credits needed for the Perk Shop. Again, while you don’t need to bother with perks at all to enjoy the stages and just play the game like an older Contra, they are helpful if you want to make things a bit easier or to flesh out your favorite character, and they’re also how those extra OSTs, some bonus characters, and a new mode are unlocked. Needless to say, some of these perks are gated behind an absurd amount of credits, and while the Challenge mode nets you a good amount for clearing them under par time, they aren’t a repeatable resource to obtain in this way; thus, most of your credits will be obtained through beating the main eight stages over and over and over again.
And after I was done with my first arcade and then a story mode playthrough? I honestly had my fill of the game, and I don’t see myself playing it again for a while. While it does have local co-op, with 4P support in the arcade mode, it lacks online support of any kind, and it does stink that I can’t just jump into a random game to help someone out and also grind away at earning credits. Still, it has the traditional life-stealing mechanic you remember from the original games, so it should be an OK time if you happen to have a buddy around, and with how 7/8 of the stages are still very engrossing and tight Contra fun, I did enjoy both of my runs of the game.
You have different difficulty options too, making it easier if you want to ease yourself into the game or invite someone over who may need a bit of extra help, whether that be using a life bar akin to The Hard Corps mixed with the easiest setting, or classical 1-hit deaths on the highest difficulty for the ultimate challenge. Still, those three main modes are all you get here, for better or worse, and the bulk of the game besides that fun 8 stage romp is just a bunch of grinding.
Conclusion
In conclusion, Contra OG turned out way better than I expected, and honestly managed to even stand above Contra 4 due to how much more flexible it of a game Galuga is. It still has a few slow moments during the eight stage romp which bring the experience down a bit, but overall this is a very polished game, and nails the tight platforming of the franchise and was a game I had a lot of fun with. The main game may be short due to the typical length of such an arcadey game, but damn, this is still a fun set of stages to replay, and the assortment of characters, challenge stages, and difficulty tweak to play around with give you more than enough reason to replay the game a few times, especially if you have friends over.
Still, that perk grinding is ludicrous, and the autoscroller in stage 2 is more than enough of a pacebreaker to make me wish I could outright delete it from the game. Just because Contra III did it (and you did it better than that game) doesn’t a long autoscroller you can’t speed up is a good idea, guys.
The price is also a bit of a sour spot; a lot of games I covered have been tributes to Contra or games of that era, and often times their gameplay loops were much tighter and less padded out, and were available at a lower price point. Even $30 I feel would have been much better for what you get here compared to the $40 MSRP, since while the short main game is still fun and replayable, I really don’t like the idea of most of the hours you’ll spend here if you try to 100% Galuga being focused on repeating the same stages over and over again, just to grind out points to unlock all the perks in the shop. That’s artificial padding at its worst, and it really drags the overall game down a bit as a result, especially considering games like Blazing Chrome have an equally short main campaign, but are much more polished and far better on the presentation front, too, and are much more affordable by default.
Galuga may not live up to those first two NES/Arcade titles by a long shot, but the fact it manages to be just a bit better than Contra III and Hard Corps for me more than makes it worthy of being part of the 2D lineage. Sure, it leans a bit on nostalgia at times, especially early on, and doesn’t look the best, but at the end of the day, we have a game that’s on par with those later 2D entries, and after Rogue Corps, I’m just thrilled we have a Contra game that turned out as fun as it did. I just wish it matched the highs of Rebirth from the late 2000s though, since that is still the best Contra post-NES that exists, and Galuga could have surpassed that if it was a bit more bold and not afraid to take some more risks with level theming.
I give Contra: Operation Galuga a 7 out of 10.