Proto:Contra 4

A prototype of Contra 4 that dates from 5 months before the game was released in USA. Most notably, this claims that it was going to be released in Europe, which the final game was not. This is very similar to this July 11 build.

Internal Header Data
The internal ROM header gives the game title as "TITLE NAME", while the game serial (AIPE) and the publisher code (52 = Activision) correspond to Barbie in The 12 Dancing Princesses, another WayFoward Nintendo DS game.

Character Select
Although similar to the final game, there are quite a few differences.

Most obviously, the preview of the character shows the sprite's ingame size, whereas the final uses a scaled-up version. Like the menus before it, it also does not feature any music or character voices, which were added for the final.

Most of the character's names had their last name added for the final. However, most notable is the absence of Goldenrod in the final game, although this character is loaded by default in the final's debug menu.

Debug Menu


The prototype boots into this menu. Notable entries are:

Game Menu
The main menu.

Demo Menu
The opening and closing screens of the DS Download Play demo.

- Cerebrum(Gym)
This is actually the final boss, although set to a level using the same tileset as the GYM entry in the final's debug menu. Like the " - Throat" level, the game hangs after defeating the boss as the end hasn't been added at this point.

Wireless Menu
A wireless debug menu.

Rotating Layers
A rotating layer test.

Other Debug Features


The bar beneath the top screen shows... something. Probably the amount of CPU used.



Pressing L and R while playing a level straight from the debug menu will make the player sprite able to be moved completely around the screen, and the current coordinates of the sprite to be shown in the top-left corner of the bottom screen. Any shots fired like this will be shot vertically, no matter which direction the player is facing. This does not work for levels accessed from the end of another level (eg. Waterfall level from Jungle level).

Pressing Select while in a level changes the currently equipped gun. This is most probably the "magic button" that was mentioned in the July build's video above.