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gryzor: MAME ROM Information.

History:

Gryzor (c) 1987 Konami.

In 2631, a meteorite strikes the Galuga archipelago near New Zealand, carrying with it a dormant alien lifeform. Two years later in 2633, a terrorist organization of alien origin called Red Falcon takes over the island as part of their plot to invade the Earth. Bill Rizer and Lance Bean, of the Contra unit, are sent to the Oceania island to stop the evil threat.

Gryzor is a hectic 1 or 2-player platform shoot-em-up featuring five stages. Three of the levels are standard side-scrolling platform levels, while the remaining 2 are enemy 'bases'; 3rd person into-the-screen stages in which players must run down series of heavily defended corridors to reach and destroy an end-of-level boss, before moving onto the next stage.

Each player's character is equipped with a semi-automatic machine gun with an unlimited amount of ammunition and can jump, move and fire in all eight cardinal directions. Players can also move and jump simultaneously while firing. Co-ordination of the character's movement is essential as a single hit from any enemy, bullet, or other hazard will instantly kill the player's character and also eliminate the current weapon from the player's inventory.

As players fight their way through the enemy-packed levels, additional weapons can be collected. If the player loses a life, they will also lose any weapon power-up they were carrying. Available weapons are :

* Machine gun [M] : Auto-fire.

* Spread gun [S] : Allows the player to fire five shots in an arc.

* Laser gun [L] : Will shoot a long laser that can take out many enemies in a row.

* Fire Ball [F] : A gun which fires small fireballs in a corkscrew pattern.

* Rapid-fire [R] : Increases the firing rate of the player's currently equipped weapon.

* Barrier [B] : Will make the player invincible for a few seconds.

The game's 5 levels and bosses are as follows :

Stage 1 : Jungle – Defensive Wall – (horizontal scrolling)

Stage 2 : Base 01 – Six turrets and alien eyeball – (3rd-person)

Stage 3 : Waterfall – Large Alien – (vertical scrolling)

Stage 4 : Base 02 – Six turrets and alien head – (3rd-person)

Stage 5 : Snow Field/Energy Zone/Hangar/Alien Lair – Alien Heart – (horizontal scrolling)

- TECHNICAL -

Game ID : GX633

Main CPU : M6809 (@ 1.5 Mhz)

Sound CPU : M6809 (@ 2 Mhz)

Sound Chips : YM2151 (@ 3.582071 Mhz)

Screen orientation : Vertical

Video resolution : 224 x 280 pixels

Screen refresh : 60.00 Hz

Palette colors : 128

Players : 2

Control : 8-way joystick

Buttons : 2

- TRIVIA -

This game is known outside Europe as "Contra".

Here are the official names of the characters : Bill Rizer (player 1) and Lance Bean (player 2).

Bill Rizer makes an appearance as a supporting character in the 1992 Nintendo NES/Famicom game "Wai Wai World 2 SOS.. - Paseri Jou" (A.K.A. "Konami World 2 - SOS from Parsley Castle").

The music from the final stage is also used for the final boss confrontation in "Wai Wai World" (A.K.A. "Konami World" ) for the Nintendo NES/Famicom .

Chad Johnson holds the official record for this game with 1, 546, 600 points on July 15, 2002.

Alpha Records released a limited-edition soundtrack album for this game (Konami Game Music Vol.4 - 28XA-201) on 10/03/1988.

- UPDATES -

Gryzor is the European version of the game known as "Contra" in North America and Japan. The Gryzor version differs from the other regional releases as the 2-players mode can only play alternating, rather than simultaneously.

- TIPS AND TRICKS -

* Use shots wisely : Jump shots and crouch shots allow you to attack while avoiding enemy attacks. Do not hesitate. Keep those shots going!

* Kill before being killed : if you see an enemy, shoot right away. Defeat them before they fire at you. Be the first one to attack!

* Tip for taking down the fortress : Fortresses situated at the end of each level have a weak point (sensor). Concentrate your attack on the weak point!

But Destroy the cannons first. Cannons will remain even if you take out the sensor first and the fortress morphs.

* Tip for 3-D levels : Destroy the weak points of each floor and stop the high voltage electric currents. Taking out the weak points quickly is key to conquering the 3-D levels.

If you press UP on the control pad and touch the electricity, you will be stunned and won't be able to move for a while. Don't move forward until you take out the weak point and stop the electricity.

After you take out the weak point, look at the map while proceeding. You'll know whether to go left or right.

You can dodge enemy bullets by lying down! Destroy rolling mines by using crouch shots.

As you proceed, there are weak points that are positioned so that you can't reach them. Utilize jump shots and crouch shots.

* Beware of Falling off at Stage 4 : In Stage 4 where you climb up a waterfall, missing a platform and falling down will count as a miss.

* Barrier : At specific spots in Stages 4 & 9, you can pick up barriers that make you invincible for a while. However, there is a rule : 'A barrier will appear only when you are NOT equipped with a special weapon'.

- SERIES -

1. Gryzor (1987)

2. Super Contra (1988)

3. Contra Force (1992, Nintendo NES)

4. Contra III - The Alien Wars (1992, Nintendo Super Famicom)

5. Contra - Hard Cops (1994, Sega Mega Drive)

6. Contra - Legacy of War (1996, Sony PlayStation)

7. Contra - Shattered Soldiers (2002, Sony PlayStation 2)

8. Neo Contra (2004, Sony PlayStation 2)

- STAFF -

Game programmers : Satoru, Hideyuki Falco, Koichi Cobra

Video graphics : Kengo

Special designers : Ishiwari Jinbo, Passionate Norio

Sound editor : Kazuki Muraoka (as 'Kazuki Jah')

Engineer : Rom Yamamoto

Directed by : Koji

- PORTS -

The video game console versions had 3 additional levels. In the arcade version, the 5th level is an exceptionally long last level. The disparate elements of it were expanded in the console versions to form 3 additional levels.

* Consoles :

Nintendo Famicom (1988)

Nintendo NES (1990, "Probotector")

* Computers :

Sinclair ZX Spectrum (1987)

Commodore C64 (1987)

Amstrad CPC (1987) [64 ko version] : FX only.

Amstrad CPC (1987) [128 ko version] : FX and Music.

PC [MS-DOS] (1987)

MSX2

- SOURCES -

Game's rom.

MAME Info:

0.123u1 [?]

0.33b7 [Carlos A. Lozano, Jose Tejada Gomez, Phil Stroffolino, Eric Hustvedt]

Artwork available

TEST MODE:

- Press F2 + F3 to enter test mode. Press 1P and 2P together to advance through tests.

Bugs:

- contra & clones: Minor colour issue on startup. Machone (ID 03591)

- Continue countdown sometimes leaves sprites behind. Lord Caos (ID 00401)

- Clone gryzor: Incorrect behavior of the Flip Screen. Smitdogg (ID 00402)

- Clone gryzor: Side-by-side test. Stefan Lindberg (ID 00204)

WIP:

- 0.141u4: hap changed main CPU to HD6309 as seen on Contra PCB, and set interrupt source to K007121. Fixed game freeze after the 2nd 3d stage's boss, before the level with horizontal scroll. Replaced M6809 CPU1 with HD6309 (12MHZ). Changed M6809 CPU2 clock speed to 3Hz.

- 0.135u4: Fabio Priuli added driver data struct and save states to Contra. Added device versions of all the Konami custom ICs currently emulated in machine\konamiic.c and video\konamiic.c. Updated Contra driver to use the new code.

- 0.135u3: Kevin Eshbach added board xtal's and indication of an undumped PAL for Contra/Gryzor. Changed YM2151 sound clock speed to 3579545 Hz.

- 3rd October 2009: Smitdogg - Andy Conroy dumped unmamed clone of Contra. I haven't looked at them closely and I don't know if they will all be added but... Cool news.

- 0.131u1: MooglyGuy merged memory maps in Contra.

- 0.126u4: Fabio Priuli added DIP locations for Contra.

- 9th July 2008: Mr. Do - Contra gets a marquee from the BYOAC/CAG artwork, and the control panel instruction card thanks to Anoid.

- 0.123u1: Brian Troha added clone Contra (bootleg). Changed 'Contra (US)' to clone 'Contra (US, Set 2)' and clone 'Contra (US bootleg)' to parent 'Contra (US, Set 1)'. Renamed (contra) to (contra1) and (contrab) to (contra).

- 0.122u8: Zsolt Vasvari removed colortables from Contra and a number of other drivers, as part of a larger move to phase out old-style colortables. Changed palettesize to 4096 colors.

- 0.111u5: Canim fixed flip screen switch and changed COIN3 to SERVICE1 in the Contra driver.

- 0.108u5: Stefan Lindberg added clone Gryzor (Set 2). Changed parent description to 'Gryzor (Set 1)'.

- 0.70u2: Some Contra dipswitch / input fixes [El Condor].

- 0.36RC1: Nicola Salmoria fixed sprites colors in Contra and other improvements to Konami 007121-based games.

- 0.36b12: Replaced all 64k gfx1/2 roms with 256k roms in all sets.

- 0.36b9: Added clone Contra (Japan).

- 0.36b5: Added proms ($200, 300 - sprite and char lookup table).

- 5th September 1999: Jim Hernandez fixed Contra PROMs.

- 29th August 1999: Phil Stroffolino fixed Contra background palette bank

- 0.36b3: Yasuhiro Ogawa added clone Gryzor.

- 0.36b2: Phil Stroffolino fixed sprites in Contra. Fixed gfx rom loading. Added dipswitches 'Cabinet' and 'Upright Controls'. Renamed (gryzorb) to (contrajb).

- 0.36b5: Added proms ($200, 300 - sprite/char lookup table).

- 29th July 1999: Phil Stroffolino improved the Contra driver, mapping unknown dipswitches and converting it to tilemaps. He also fixed a tilemap color marking bug.

- 0.34b8: Changed YM-2151 sound to YM-2151.

- 0.34b3: Juan Carlos Lorente added high score saving to Contra.

- 0.33RC1: Changed description to 'Contra (US)' and clone 'Contra (bootleg)' to '(US bootleg)' and 'Gryzor (bootleg)' to 'Contra (Japan bootleg)'.

- 0.33b7: Added Contra (Konami 1987) and clones Contra (bootleg) and Gryzor (bootleg) [Carlos A. Lozano, Jose Tejada Gomez, Phil Stroffolino, Eric Hustvedt]. Known issues: There appears to be at least one incorrectly mapped sprite late on the final stage. The weapon-carrying enemies in the "into the screen" stages are supposed to be colored differently (orange). A control bit in sprite RAM exists which seems to serve this purpose, indicating an alternate palette. Sprite horizontal position is sometimes off by 8.

- 20th September 1997: [email protected] dumped Contra (Japan bootleg).

ARCADE RELEASE: Contra (Konami) - 1987/Feb/20

LEVELS: 3

Other Emulators:

* FB Alpha

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Combat School

Romset: 1185 kb / 11 files / 357.8 zip

MAME XML Output:

<description>Gryzor (set 1)</description>

<manufacturer>Konami</manufacturer>