As an ever faithul fan of the Konami franchise "Contra", I just couldn't resist picking this rom up. I played and played and played some more and this title sure isn't one to disapoint. I don't remember Contra 2 very well, but Contra sticks vividly in the back of my mind as one of my all time favorites. From the previous titles, here's a brief run down of the story (Note: I never read the manuals so im just going to say how it appears to be, sorry if im wrong). Basicaly there are two commandos who are sent on a mission to stop this alien race from conquering earth. You start of on this island and must work your way to the center to destroy the alien's central being. You kill the big boss, head back home and get some R&R, thinking the job's done. Guess what? Its not. Now there back and stronger than ever and it's up to you two to stop them again. Contra 3: The Alien Wars gives us some new features which are very useful.

Some of the new features include the dual weapon mode, where you can pull out both your guns and spin around shooting both of them. The rate of fire is slowed down when you do this but if your trying to lay down some cover fire (especialy if you've got homing rockets or the spread gun) this is the trick for you! To pull out both your guns hit both shoulder buttons (R + L) then press and hold the fire key. Took me a while to figure it out, so I thought I would spare you the agony of not being able to figure it out. Another cool feature is the share lives mode, which pools both players lives together. It's a nice touch, but it's not why I would buy the game. The gameplay in Contra 3: The Alien Wars is unrivalled in the field of first person shooters except by one (Duh! Super Metroid!).

The game plays nice and smoothly, with very few breaks in the action. Many of the original "puzzles" from the previous Contras appear in this one. There's the classic standing-on-an-elevator-and-defending-yourself puzzle, the jumping-from-platform-to-platform puzzle, the holy-shit-how-the-*censored*-do-I-beat-this-huge-boss-!?!?!? puzzle and the jumping-over-columns-o'-fire puzzle. Thos aren't all of them, im just naming a few here. The bad guys are nice and varied (though there is the odd pallet swap here and there) and as mentioned before, the bosses are HUGE.

Final word: It's a keeper for me. If your a fan of Super Metroid or of the previous Contra's you should definetly pick up this title. If your just looking for something new to try this one is also something you should think about. If your going to download it go to www.Freeroms.com.