{"id":1772,"date":"2012-11-28T17:18:52","date_gmt":"2012-11-28T17:18:52","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.controlpadblues.com\/?p=1772"},"modified":"2012-11-28T17:37:01","modified_gmt":"2012-11-28T17:37:01","slug":"my-top-100-47-contra","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/www.controlpadblues.com\/?p=1772","title":{"rendered":"My Top 100: #47 – Contra"},"content":{"rendered":"
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1987 – Konami (Arcade, NES, ZX Spectrum, Amstrad CPC, Commodore 64, Xbox Live Arcade, PlayStation Network)<\/p><\/div>\n

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I’m finding it\u00a0somewhat difficult to come up with posts about games I’ve already written about – my first non-countdown post about Contra<\/em> is here<\/a>, if you’re interested –\u00a0so I’m about to go a bit off\u00a0topic for this one.<\/p>\n

My first memory of playing Contra<\/em> is much like any other person’s – playing the arcade version.\u00a0 When my mother and I would go shopping at Regent Mall here in town, I’d sneak away with a few quarters, and play whatever game happened to be sitting just outside the grocery store’s entrance.\u00a0 If I didn’t\u00a0have the quarters, it was all good – I’d just pretend to play during the game’s attract mode.<\/p>\n

I could barely reach the controls anyway, so I usually stunk up the show whenever I did play.<\/p>\n

On a recent trip to that same, much larger and oft-renovated\u00a0mall, I\u00a0noticed that the brick wall the arcade cabinets were up against is still there; same colour, same bricks, same everything.\u00a0 There have been two grocery stores,\u00a0two restaurants and two sporting goods stores (well, one company, renovated twice) to take up the space beyond, yet that old beige brick wall is still there.<\/p>\n

For some reason, I find that sort of thing to be\u00a0quite remarkable.<\/p>\n

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