The Bugger (把妖虫 バッカー Wa Yōchū Bakkā?, lit. "Demon Insect Guard Bugger") is a recurring enemy in the Contra series. They are newborn aliens which quickly scurry along the floor or ceiling.
Description[]
Buggers are scorpion-like alien critters that incubate and hatch from living ovums known as Eggrons. When facing intruders, they will either leap at them, pounce diagonally from the ceiling or floor, or just continue their way, bumping into any enemies that happen to be on their path.
Appearances[]
Contra[]
First appearance of this enemy in the series. Buggers only appear in the final stage, Alien's Lair. They are the only ground-based enemies found in this level and only make their entrance just a few steps before the final boss. This makes this area arguably easy, as the player only has to watch out for Wadders and Gels for the majority of time.
During the final confrontation against Gomeramos King, while some Buggers will just rush past and ignore the player, others will intentionally make an attempt to kill them.
Super Contra[]
Buggers make their return in both versions of Super Contra, although they appear in different stages.
Buggers appear in Area 3, Deep Jungle, ambushing the player by either dropping from the top of palm trees or by leaping from the ground, often semi-concealed by trees in the foreground that block the player's view.
In the NES conversion of the game, Super C, Buggers are continuously spawned from Eggrons in the exclusive level Alien Area 2, as the player makes their way to the deep bottom before reaching the Temple of Terror. As expected, the only way to stop their reproduction is by destroying the Eggron hatching them. This variant is considerably faster than that from the arcade version, although the player will often have the opportunity to destroy the Eggrons from a safer position on the floor above.
Operation C[]
Buggers are found contained inside large glass tubes in a laboratory, from which they break out and scurry toward the player. This implies that they were either captured and being studied upon, or perhaps even being artificially created.
Contra III: The Alien Wars[]
Buggers are once again encountered defending Gomeramos King, just as they did in the first game, and follow the same attack patterns. They appear in the last stage, Alien's Main Base, in a faithful recreation of that fight, as part of a gauntlet of minibosses from previous installments that are fought in that level.
Contra: Hard Corps[]
Buggers have a slightly unique look in this game, featuring what seems to be either a multitude of red eyes or tumor-like growths along the front of their body. Unlike previous games where they are seen in horizontal passages, the Buggers in Hard Corps are exclusively seen in a vertical shaft within the alien hive (Alien Space), running from the top of the screen toward the bottom, and will sometimes jump from one side of the shaft toward the other. They are predated upon by two Ngagogos, although the latter will also lunge out to eat nearby players.
Their different appearance, along with this predator-prey relationship among the aliens, may be unintentional consequences of Colonel Bahamut's inexperienced research team tampering with the Alien Cell that birthed the hive and its inhabitants.
Contra: Shattered Soldier[]
Buggers appear from Eggrons similar to previous appearances. Their presence within this time period is likely the result of the Blood Falcon Enemy Commander possessing an Alien Embryo to recreate these creatures from the past. Most of the time (if not all the time) Buggers are not worth any score to the Hit Rate but can still pose a threat to the heroes if not eliminated or bypassed successfully. Buggers appear in two general areas:
- In the Seabed base, a hive of Eggrons line the walls and surfaces. Upon first entering the base, Buggers will crawl up the walls and take large leaps toward the hovering player(s), ultimately reaching the opposite wall to continue climbing if not destroyed. Well timed Homing missiles can help eliminate a small swarm of buggers accurately before the player has to avoid their great leap. They later appear at the bottom of the base in a nest of Eggrons spouting Buggers, with the Buggers that appear here attempt to make small leaps forward during their walking. In one nest, there is a small pool of water nearby. A Bugger that touches a body of water will instantly vanish.
- In the Archipelago, a minor group of Buggers walk around the island without any Eggrons present. Eggrons and Buggers later reappear during the mutated Gomeramos King battle (similar to previous incarnations of the alien heart battle), with infinite Buggers suddenly appearing from the boss room's roof crawling downward. The buggers on the island do not appear to leap forward or toward anyone.
Neo Contra[]
| “ | An alien that infinitely springs out from the Eggron. Often known to have parasitized larger aliens, it may also spring up from the bodily fluids of other aliens. | „ |
| “ | A Backer that has grown significantly over the years. The behavioral pattern is not much different from that of newborn specimens, but physical strength is increasing. | „ |
There are two variants of this enemy in this game:
- Newborns that spring out infinitely from Eggrons. They can also be spawned from a pink substance that spews out of Kimkoh's rear end, which is able to produce seemingly unlimited amounts of offspring. These creatures are also created from Kimkoh's moth form, which can also spray a liquid from which the Buggers emerge.
- The second variant has grown bigger and stronger, and can even spew out acidic venom out of their mouths (presumably similar to a spider reducing their prey to liquid). This suggests that these two variants represent a different stage in the creatures' life cycle.
Contra ReBirth[]
A totally different enemy appears in this game which instead resembles a one-eyed brain (similar to a miniature version of Searle) that moves around through the use of long tentacles. Nonetheless, this enemy follows an almost identical behavior to the Buggers from previous installments, likely being a replacement for them in this game. Further supporting this theory is that they can be seen being born from Eggrons in the game's alien hive stage, where they also act as Gomeramos King's main method of attack, behaving pretty much the same way as the common Buggers did during previous counterpart encounters, by incessantly hatching from Eggrons attached to the ground and ceiling (composed of columns in this case) and scurrying along the room's surfaces.
Gallery[]
Screenshots[]
_-_01.png "Bugger - Super Contra (MS-DOS) - 01.png (12 KB)")
Sprites and models[]
_-_01.png "Bugger - Super Contra (arcade) - 01.png (4 KB)")
Artworks[]
_Manual.png "Wadder and Bugger Super Probotector (PAL) Manual.png (331 KB)")
Trivia[]
- The shape and manner these enemies behave, as well as the type of organic hatches they are born from, are direct references to the facehuggers and ovomorphs from the Alien franchise, which the Contra takes inspiration from.
- Additionally, the word "Bugger" is also phonetically similar to "Facehugger".
- In Operation Galuga the internal name for the Bugger is "Face Hugger".
- The Maksurion, an enemy from Gradius II: GOFER no Yabō (also by Konami), looks and behaves almost identically to a Bugger. In fact, the Bugger's sprite in the NES version of Super C is identical to the Maksurion sprite from Gradius II.
See also[]
- Alien (Hard Corps) - Much like the Buggers in Operation C, these enemies are also initially found contained within glass tubes in the background and attack similarly, by breaking out from their containers as the player approaches.
- Alien Skull
- Eggron
- Gomeramos King
References[]
- ↑ Contra: Hard Corps
- ↑ Internal name from Contra: Operation Galuga.