Contra

Contra is the 1988 arcade port that turned "one hit kills you" into a badge of honor rather than a complaint. Bill Rizzo and Lance Bean fight through jungle, waterfall, snowfield, and finally the alien base beneath a fictional Galuga Archipelago, gunning down soldiers and biomechanical horrors with power-ups scattered as floating capsules — Spread Gun turns every shot into a fan of bullets and is the run's obvious priority pickup the instant it appears.

It's also the game most responsible for making the Konami Code a household phrase. Up, Up, Down, Down, Left, Right, Left, Right, B, A, Start on the title screen grants 30 lives instead of 3 — a cheat originally added by a developer testing the game who got tired of dying, later left in on purpose, and now referenced in games that have nothing to do with Contra at all.

This page hosts the verified Contra ROM, built for Delta Emulator's NES core on iPhone — load it directly with no BIOS file or extra setup required.