Amagon is an absolutely balls hard game that plays kinda like Contra if Bill Rizer had limited ammo, jumped like a Pong paddle and was constantly under attack by squadrons of pissed off wildlife.

One hit deaths, no continues until the fourth stage and the most random and erratic patterns for common enemies. You'll never know what a specifically placed enemy is gonna do until you actually encounter it. Sometimes birds will just hang out at the top of the screen and not be a bother, sometimes they'll hover a bit then swoop down to catch you in a jump and sometimes they'll just fly across the screen so fucking fast that you need the luck and reflexes of Buddha to get the fuck out of the way or shoot the bastard in time.

On the flip side, at least it avoids my favorite pet peeve of NES era gaming and lets the protagonist shoot while crouching and not be immediately met with enemies dry humping the ground. The music is also cool enough at times to make it to my playlist and I love the creepy forest stage and aliens suddenly being a thing in the final stage.

Just sucks the game is so hard most players won't experience any of that without youtube. I could rate this game much lower, but there's just something about it man.