Romhacking Spotlight - Contra, Sor2 and Bubble Bobble

Contra Hard Corps - Hit Points Restoration Hack

If you were a Megadrive/Genesis owner back in 1994 you were probably as glad and surprised as I was when Konami released a Contra game for the system. And what a game!. Contra: Hard Corps features 4 different characters with 16 unique weapons, a total of 14 levels with 6 different endings and 38 different bosses to fight!

But when Hard Corps was released outside Japan something was changed. In the original Japanese version of the game each character actually had a health meter letting your character take two extra hits before being killed. This was removed making the game a bit harder as you could only take one hit. So let's fix this and bring back the healthmeter using the power of romhacking!

Before restoring the health meter I recommend starting with a hack called “Contra: Hard Corps Enhancement Hack” released by M.I.J.E.T. that has a long list of small fixes and improvements. After this is done you can with the help of a little application apply the next hack “Contra Hard Corps Hit Points Restoration Hack” created by MrNemesis. This hack not only restores the original Health meter, it also gives you the option to set total lives to 10 instead of the standard 3. It also gives you the ability to pick the same characters in 2-player mode!

Streets of Rage: The Return of the Fighters 2019

There are a lot of romhacks released of Streets of Rage 2 but most of these are just new character sprites that replace the main characters. But the romhack “The Return of the Fighters 2019” by Dha Lau Hoo gives you a really nice upgrade that spices things up but still has the same feeling as the original game.

The Return of the Fighters 2019 takes the character sprites from Streets of Rage 3 and upgrades them with some new features. The hack also replaces Max with Shiva. Mania difficulty and a Stage Selector will also be available from the options section. For a full list of all the new features check out this romhack at romhacking.net

Bubble Bobble Deluxe

I first played the arcade port of the original Bubble Bobble for the Commodore 64, I loved it back then and I still love it today! And when romhacks appear with new levels - like the amazing “Bubble Bobble: Lost Cave” hack - then I just have to play it again! Recently a new level romhack appeared, this time for the Nes version. Bubble Bobble Deluxe is created by Polar Hacker and the hack features 100 new levels for the game and some new graphics and tweaked colors. If you want to try some new challenging levels for this amazing game then try the Deluxe romhack.

Posted by @Thermoptic