Contra Shattered Soldier Extra Life Research

One of life's greatest mysteries: how exactly does one increase the number of extra default lives you start with in C:SS? I started a brand new save, recording my score and various other statistics for each game (shown below). For simplicity I never used any continues or restarts (this is not a requirement for getting extra lives, however), and all games were one-player on Normal difficulty. Though it is unlikely this matters, I saved after every game, and saved once before the first battle after changing a few settings (specifically, swapping the cancel/confirm buttons and setting 1P to Lucia.)

It would be helpful if someone else could repeat this experiment to give me something to compare this to. :) At the moment all I can compare this to is my original save, which got the extra life at 3:15 after 27 games (I have no other information recorded about this save, but I can tell you my scores are generally significantly better this time around... battles #5 and 16 notwithstanding.)

And yes, I know I suck at this game. :) (Maybe that's a clue as to why I'm getting the first extra life a bit quicker than most people seem to...)

Contra: Shattered Soldier Forum at GameFAQs

(Note: Negative percentages in the table below indicate the percentage I had when I lost my last life and therefore do not reflect any lost life penalties I might have gotten had I managed to not suck enough to finish the stage.)

Battle No:	Score:	Time	Lives Used:	St1	St2	St3	St4	St5	St6	St7	Stage Order
1	9229	0:05	3	-90%							1
2	14774	0:10	3	100%			-44%				14
3	33371	0:18	4	100%		-29%	96%				143
4	10901	0:05	3	96%			-7%				14
5	2400	0:03	3				-24%				4
6	28379	0:14	4	-82%			98%				41
7	9089	0:07	3				-89%				4
8	32906	0:16	4	100%		-23%	98%				413
9	13457	0:07	3	98%		-29%					13
10	18724	0:08	4				-85%				4
11	34674	0:18	4	100%		-42%	100%				413
12	25829	0:11	4	-57%			96%				41
13	33933	0:17	4	100%		-35%	94%				413
14	31472	0:14	4	100%		-11%	96%				413
15	32827	0:16	4	100%		-23%	96%				413
16	3870	0:03	3				-38%				4
17	27775	0:12	4	-76%			96%				41

Default Player Increased!
Total:	363610	3:04	61

18	32053	0:14	5	98%		-17%	93%				143
19	19024	0:06	5				-88%				4
20	33819	0:17	5	100%		-35%	92%				413
21	34196	0:16	5	94%		-40%	100%				413
22	24015	0:10	5	-40%			95%				41
23	3780	0:04	4			-35%					3
24	35348	0:18	6	100%		-49%	98%				413
25	43842	0:21	6	96%	-28%	89%	100%				4132
26	34943	0:18	5	98%		-47%	95%				413
27	44753	0:21	6	98%	-31%	98%	100%				4132
28	48974	0:24	6	98%	-75%	94%	100%				4132
29	47541	0:23	6	100%	-59%	92%	100%				4132

Total:	765898	6:16	125

Last Updated 23 Aug 2003
(C) 2003 Zach Keene