Contra ReBirth SPEED RUN in

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Published in March 2011
Auhor's comments:
Plissken is a different beast than Bill or Yagyu. I don't mean that because he's a salamander alien. But because he's bigger and faster than the other two. Something I realized late in the running process, which I found ironic, he's harder to speedrun more because of his speed not his size. This becomes most apparent in stage 5, but is present in stage 1. Aside from size and speed, there is one other difference with Plissken. It's gun position. He typically holds his gun closer to his body. Possibly implying something sexual, but let's not go there. That's reserved for Contra 3. He also holds his gun in front of him slightly when he shoots up, not in the middle of his body. This gives him an advantage against the final boss.
I'm only going to go over differences between runs here. Most of what needs to be discussed has been in my Yagyu notes.
Stage 1:
Those green worm things in the middle of the stage end a lot of runs with Plissken. His speed actually makes him run into them most of the time. At least it's early so it's not a big time waster. The boss gives the worst pattern for killing him quickly.
Stage 2:
Nothing different. This is where you can tell Plissken is faster than the other characters. I'm outrunning bullets and the birds don't even leave the trashcans, except the last one.
Stage 3:
The Ninja mid-boss could have been a little better, but it's passable. My pride got wounded here because I didn't destroy all the llama heads. It's actually hard to do with Plissken.
Stage 4:
Notice how quickly the mid-boss dies and how quickly the screen fades to the next part. This was ideal.
Stage 5:
Not the best of boss fights, but was about average for what I would accept. Those two laser shots didn't go where I wanted and caused the fight to be a tad longer than I wanted.
Final Boss:
Plissken makes this fight easier when you get the right pattern. Notice how I have little fear of trying to use the laser method here. That's because of how Plissken shoots upward. Faster is possible, but difficult and would be based mostly on luck really. If I switched to the spread right before the end there I probably would have killed him sooner. Hindsight is always 20/20 though.
Overall:
Plissken definitely had the most attempts to get this run. Somewhere between 1500 to 2000. If my timing is correct this comes to around 13:03. If that is correct, sub 13 minutes is possible, but will take a lot of luck manipulation.