I wanted Gaiares so bad when I saw it in magazines back in the day. Renovation knew exactly how to market that one. I remember there being a "gaming" segment on the weekend news back then and they featured Gaiares there, they had a stern warning for parents about the difficulty, not to let the great graphics trick them into thinking it was a push over.

Watching the game in action I believe I was in a stupor of sorts for a period. Lol.

Contra: Hard Corps was definitely named right. I grabbed that one and Castlevania Bloodlines from a local EB store as a package deal (they were literally the last two used Genesis games they had (and they were not taking them in anymore). They just wanted the shelf space at that point, I think I got them for about $20 each in todays money (not sure if that was a deal or not - I have not priced games in years).

I remember playing it and absolutely hating it, I kept going back to Castlevania when Contra inevitably made me mad. 😂 Graphically stupidly impressive game but man, not many of us got to see those later levels and the graphical power they held.