Line #72 ThatOneLevel/ShootEmUps


1	[[quoteright:256:[[VideoGame/{{Gradius}} https://static.tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pub/images/gradius2-11.png]]]]
2	[[caption-width-right:256: Good luck. You'll need it.]]
3
4	->'''General Pepper:''' What are you doing? It's too dangerous there!\
5	'''Fox:''' I can't leave Slippy hanging!
6	-->-- ''The pre-level dialogue for Titania from ''VideoGame/StarFox64''''
7
8
9	Expect to credit-feed your way past some of [[ThatOneLevel these shmup levels]].
10	----
11	[[AC:Scrolling]]
12	* Level 4 of ''VideoGame/{{Axelay}}'' (Very Hard Difficulty), "Silence" features a partially underwater cave, in which you must avoid organic, and highly mobile enemies. It would not be so absurdly difficult if it weren't for little, monstrous triangular blobs that clung to your ship and dragged it into walls. [[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=glzFfIfXf4Y This is not an example of very hard, by the way.]] Try beating this without losing a life. Arms installation is complete, good luck!
13	* ''VideoGame/EnemyMind'' has the asteroid level. For several screens you get no spaceships to commandeer - all you can do is hop from one asteroid to another. You are completely unable to maneuver, you can only jump in a cross, several asteroids are moving so you need to time your jumps right, and at some point anti-jump fields start making things even harder. Needless to say it's an AutoScrollingLevel, so you can't time your jumps carefully, and if you get it wrong you have to redo most of the level. Compared to the shootfest you've been doing up to that point it's a slow, boring, frustrating slog you'll be glad you never have to repeat again.
14	* Although the ''VideoGame/{{Galaga}}'' series of games is practically well known for [[NintendoHard being very aggressive when it comes to level design]], ''Galaga Arrangement'' takes the cake by putting the most infuriating stages in an ''entire area'', the Space Flower Zone. Nearly endless swarms of bugs coming from every corner, and since every one shoots the minute they spawn, there's an [[BulletHell equally large amount of bullets,]] which means you will be waving goodbye to your triple shot in a matter of seconds.
15	* In the ''VideoGame/{{Gradius}}'' series, if a stage involves crystals, you will most likely hate it. ''Gradius II'' 's third stage (fourth in the Famicom version) is a crystal stage that, at one point, throw a storm of large blocks of crystals at you, which break into smaller blocks when shot enough times. If you die in this stage, consider your remaining lives gone too. And then the arcade version of ''Gradius III'' has a stage where, near the end, cubes fly toward the left side of the screen and will randomly change direction and/or speed up; many a life has been lost here. In fact, on the [=PlayStation=] 2 version, there is a "Cube Attack" mode which lets you practice this part.
16	** The Lava Stage, where you are bombarded with lava bombs which burst into indestructible shrapnel when shot, as well as GoddamnedBats and a narrow tunnel near the end where the fireballs can spawn right on top of you; getting past this part is a LuckBasedMission.
17	** If a stage is a mechanical fortress, it's going to be a DeathCourse, especially in ''Gradius III'' (arcade/[=PS2=] version). Swarms of Zubs, aka GoddamnedBats teleport in to assault the Vic Viper, then there's MalevolentArchitecture in the form of flying ceiling tiles, followed by ships that leave behind indestructible wrecks when killed, miniature DegradedBoss versions of the invincible spider mecha from ''Gradius II'', a LaserHallway, SmashingHallwayTrapsOfDoom, as well as a MiniBoss that must be fought while dodging those, and an invincible giant blue spider mecha boss where you must navigate through the legs. At the entrance to Bacterion's lair, you must blast through Regenerating Walls that have organic SmashingHallwayTrapsOfDoom in between. After you defeat the AntiClimaxBoss, you have to escape through a narrow turbo tunnel, better have an extra speed-up or two.
18	*** The original Stage 7 High Speed Zone from SNES ''Gradius III''. It doesn't help the music intentionally throws you off before suddenly speeding up along with the auto scrolling....often into the wall. The Diagonal Climb section in the first part will leave you in tears if you don't have at least three speed ups and even then requires precise moving to keep from smashing into the wall or ceiling ''and'' possibly dodge fire from turrets. What's worst is this level has the first appearance of Beacon ''and'' the next stage is both a Cube attack and BossRush.
19	*** The fortress in ''Gradius V'', Stage 7 incorporates the obligatory High-Speed Zone into its first half, which includes a diagonal climb through dozens of closely-placed gates, followed by Beacon, ThatOneBoss. The first half of Stage 6, with the green slime spigots and tilting environment, is also an infamous Scrappy Level. Doesn't get much easier in the second half, where the screen ''scrolls backwards'', then you fight a BossRush of [[ThatOneBoss Those Several Bosses]] (Rolling Core, Circle Core, Big Core MKIII, Covered Core Mk. II)
20	*** Even ''Gradius Gaiden'', which is one of the easiest games in the series, has a very difficult mechanical fortress final stage. It opens up with a high speed section (which is [[UnintentionallyUnwinnable near-impossible to recover in]] if you foolishly put Speed Up on anything beyond the 2nd slot), which also happens to incorporate enemies that come from behind. Vic Viper, Jade Knight, and Falchion Beta all have weapons that can fire backwards to take care of these assholes, but Lord British, having no such weapons, is almost certainly going to bend over. The next part makes you deal with moving floors and ceilings, which at point point completely close up and [[UnwinnableByDesign will cost you a life]] unless you are in front of it or have a Limit shield. ''Then'' you face Gunner Wall, who can be somewhat of a ThatOneBoss due to the various guns and {{Mook Maker}} forcing you to keep moving around, followed by [[ThatOneBoss Heavy]] [[GiantMook Ducker]], a section where pieces of the floor and ceiling [[MalevolentArchitecture fly out]] and [[EverythingTryingToKillYou try to kill you]], and a giant penultimate boss that is invulnerable to your weapons and must be [[HoldTheLine timed out]] while enemy walkers on the floor and ceiling make sure you cannot. Only after this almost-BossRush can you finally [[ZeroEffortBoss relax]].
21	** The ''first stage'' of the Famicom version of ''Gradius II''. After the first portion of the stage -- the mini-suns from the arcade version -- the stage continues, now with larger suns and the [[MalevolentArchitecture #$%@ing solar prominences]] from Stage 3 of ''Life Force''/''Salamander''. On top of having to carefully navigate these, you have to deal with more [[GoddamnedBats Goddamned]] [[strike:Bats]] [[GoddamnedBats Birds]] and those orb-like things that take several hits to kill. From here, the game gets easier for a bit, though the difficulty goes back up for Stages 3 and 4.
22	** ''Gradius [=ReBirth=]'', Stage 4. Skeletons of Dinosaur-like creatures with ribcages that scatter into indestructible shrapnel (similar to the aforementioned ''Gradius III'' arcade lava stage) when shot, and worm-like creatures that jump out of the sand to surprise you, followed by a corridor of said creatures that jump around in arc paths that are impossible to predict the first time around. Although you can destroy them, they take a good number of shots before they die.
23	*** For that matter,''any level'' after the first loop, but special mention goes to the Bio and Moai levels. Bio levels will leave you screaming because of the regenerating walls that love to speed up while your trying to get though them while being shot at. Moai level is....well Moai, not to mention at the end has both That One Boss and Miniboss combo.
24	** ''Gradius IV'''s Stage 3 combines the ice level of ''Gradius II'' with the bubble stage of ''Gradius III'' to make one of the most difficult level in the entire franchise. The bubbles have [[IncrediblyDurableEnemies ton of health]] at maximum [[DynamicDifficulty rank]] and have deeply unwelcome MercyInvincibility while splitting. The ice blocks are indestructible and have poorly thought-out physics, getting stopped dead in their tracks when hit by the smallest bubbles and pinballing at seemingly random, often coming from offscreen into the player's rear.
25	* The Tutorial mode levels in ''VideoGame/BangaiO Spirits''. You know you're in for a NintendoHard experience when you die many times ''in the tutorial levels''.
26	* ''Franchise/TouhouProject'':
27	** Hell Stage 18 in ''Highly Responsive to Prayers'': it's a stage where all the tiles on left side and the right side is filled with bumpers... while also divided by a wall that only opens up on bottom (and of course on [[HarderThanHard Lunatic]] you will also have to avoid the revenge bullets). Just getting the ball out of the bumpers can take forever, and of course it can just get stuck again. While obviously you can just bomb your way through this nightmare, this is the one stage in the game that is noticeably way harder on a No Bomb playthrough.
28	** Even the most ardent PC-98 fans aren't willing to defend the fourth stage of ''Mystic Square'', for one simple reason. [[http://images3.wikia.nocookie.net/__cb20051028024222/touhou/images/b/b4/Th05stage4title.jpg This is what the background looks like.]] Most of the bullets in this stage are light blue so they don't really pop out against the background.
29	** ''Perfect Cherry Blossom'''s Stage 4 is also a supreme pain in the ass. Not only is it one of the longest stages of the entire series, but there are many enemies of the stage, particularly in the second half, that like to throw some pretty damned dense danmaku your way, particularly the lines of orbs, which explode in a ton of bullets aimed at you when they die. And if you manage to get past all of that, you still have to face the Prismriver Sisters, [[ThatOneBoss Those Three Bosses]].
30	** ''Shoot the Bullet'':
31	*** Scene 7-5, ''Void "Inflation Square"''. Sakuya constantly [[TimeStandsStill freezes time]], causing red kunai to appear around the player, which forces you to shoot at them immediately or die. After that, you have to contend with the blue daggers filling the screen and flying in every direction, which get [[TurnsRed denser and faster]] as you take more pictures. The hitboxes on them are ''horrible'', the paths (or indeed, [[LuckBasedMission whether there is a path at all]]) that you need to take are random, and if at any point you need to speed up to get through them? You have just stopped charging your camera to do so, which means you can't shoot at the red kunai in time - in other words, you are already dead. Then there's how Sakuya herself moves when she freezes time - which can result in [[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=r7rzpyeR_M0 this]]. Cue RageQuit.
32	*** Scene 7-2 ''Devil Sign "All the World in Nightmares"'' has this nasty tendency of becoming harder the more photos you take. Every other spellcard in the game becomes harder only after each ''successful'' shot, but this one will become harder if you so much shoot defensively, which is exactly what you're expected to be doing up until the 30 second mark because Remilia is fully impervious to photographing until then. Since the fan of bullets becomes wider and faster as you take photos, shooting before Remilia becomes vulnerable guarantees you're gonna have to go unfocused just to survive on the latter stages of the card, which would be otherwise not advised since there's also a dense barrage of slow-moving red shots radiating from Remilia herself.
33	*** Scene 8-3, ''Secret Sign "Hierarch's Arcanum"'', also from Shoot the Bullet. Walls of purple amulets come from both sides of the screen. Their lengths are random. You are going to get walled - if not at the beginning, then when Ran starts firing slow, aimed bullets that can cut off your escape route. No wonder Touhou Wiki states that this is "one of the hardest scenes in the game."
34	*** Scene 8-7, ''Superman "Soaring En no Ozuno"'' is another fun little gift from Ran. Streaming attacks usually are pretty easy, but let's combine an incredibly fast and constant charging attack by Ran with the necessity to be at full power by the time you've reached the side of the screen. Then, mix in an enormous amount of butterfly bullets moving in a random formation that will almost certainly spell out doom for you, especially since they can go out of the screen and then return when you least expect them to. Need to move up at all to dodge a bullet during the last 2 photos, which you almost certainly will? Don't worry; Ran will be right there to bulldoze you into the failure screen. Of course, when you've finally charged the camera completely, she will drop below the bottom of the screen faster than you can shoot, leading to an uncanny amount of failures on the last photo.
35	*** Scene 10-6, ''Judgment "Guilty or Not Guilty"''. Dodging through an endless barrage of enormous bubble bullets that make reading ahead extremely difficult is hard enough without Eiki Shiki shooting a huge laser at you the entire time. The real problem is the HitboxDissonance - that laser's hitbox is actually ''bigger than its sprite'', and by no small margin, which for a Touhou game is practically unheard of. For some idea of how bad this is, see [[http://i941.photobucket.com/albums/ad256/Malkyrian/th0952012-05-0915-51-26-35.png here]]; that white dot just under the laser is the already dead player's hitbox. To cap it all, the bubble bullets get [[TurnsRed denser with each picture you take]], making what could be a safe route for the second picture a guaranteed deathtrap for the third.
36	*** Scene 9-6, ''New Impossible Request "Seamless Ceiling of Kinkaku-ji"'' is typically considered the single worst scene in Shoot the Bullet, which is saying something. Perhaps the best showcase of Kaguya's tendency to wall your character, and there are seven pictures, which get [[TurnsRed progressively tougher]].
37	** ''Mountain of Faith's'' Stage 4. Filled with ambushing tengu who put up extended bullet mazes while also sniping you.
38	** Stage 5 in ''[[VideoGame/TouhouChireidenSubterraneanAnimism Subterranean Animism]]''. It is filled with spirits who explode in tiny bullets when killed, making navigating though the fairy bullet patterns a nightmare if they are not managed correctly. Not to mention it's [[ThatOneBoss Rin's stage]].
39	** The fifth stage in ''Undefined Fantastic Object'' is another nasty one. It utterly floods the screen with powerups, which sounds like it would be a good thing until you realize that there are so many powerups that it's hard to see the bullets, resulting in many a "WTF just hit me?" reaction from the player. Even without this complication, the stage is still quite obnoxious at many points, most notably the orb clusters that ''actively hunt you down'' while shooting the whole time - and not just at you, either, so streaming is right out. And the bosses are nightmarish, introducing ''curving lasers'', which tend to throw even expert players for a loop.
40	** Stage five of ''Legacy of Lunatic Kingdom'' is a ''Difficulty Gut Stab'' in a game full of [[DifficultySpike Difficulty Spikes]]. Not only is most of the screen often filled with bullets in patterns designed to box you in, but Clownpiece comes in and ''speeds up the fairies'', making them fire faster. The middle part is the most infamous due to dodging slow firing laser lances to wall you off while spamming small hard to dodge star bullets. You will have to do it again and again in Point Device mode. Oh and you must fight [[ThatOneBoss/TouhouProject Clownpiece]] as well.
41	** ''Double Spoiler'':
42	*** Kinkaku-ji returns to haunt us, and here it starts at max level. Beating it requires godly reflexes or a prayer to the RandomNumberGod. Of all the cards from Shoot The Bullet ZUN could have brought back, why the hell did he choose that one? And it's brought to you by ThatOneBoss from ''Subterranean Animism'', no less! Thankfully, many of the bullets are smaller than they were in the original, and you only have to take 3 photos of it. But that's the only concession this card will give you.
43	*** Scene 3-4, "Small Thread - Kandata's Rope" is the first scene that is unilaterally loathed by players. It's relatively simple in comparison to anything in stage 12, but it is an absolute [[DifficultySpike brick wall in terms of difficulty]].
44	* ''Touhou'' fangames aren't immune to this either. Zone 5 of ''Phantasmagoria Trues'' has you navigating a maze of auto-scrolling blocks, which kill you if you get walled by them, and some of which have enemies appearing out of them with practically no warning. When you get an extra life in this stage, it'll appear in the middle of the screen just like it always does - which is usually right in the middle of the blocks, making it impossible to get to. Once you get through the maze, you face the midboss. Who you face is different depending on the difficulty, but somehow ''all of them'' manage to be ThatOneBoss ''anyway''. Thankfully the actual boss of the place, Suika, is very well designed and vastly more fun to play. [[spoiler:Unless you're playing [[HarderThanHard Unlimited]], where you face [[PhysicalGod Eiki Shiki]] instead, who will just annihilate you without a hint of mercy.]]
45	** The Terminus stage also earns some infamy among the game's fans; while it may be a BrutalBonusLevel, one thing about it stands out as completely ridiculous even by the standards of such levels in the Touhou series: it takes MarathonLevel to an absurd extreme. To put this in perspective: the longest normal stage in the standard Touhou games lasts four minutes, and is considered ThatOneLevel in no small part because of this. The longest Extra stage in the standard Touhou games lasts five and a half minutes. The Terminus stage lasts ''FOURTEEN'' minutes, and that's assuming you do everything right. And the boss at the end is a PuzzleBoss with all the difficulty expected of a bonus-level boss, meaning you ''will'' have to face her again and again and again, going through 14 minutes of hell all over again every time.
46	* ''VideoGame/RType'':
47	** Stage 6 in ''R-Type Delta'', especially the part where you fight Capsulon. The mini-boss essentially splits the screen in half and the space left to dodge enemies and bullets would make a BulletHell game proud.
48	** Try the end of the fourth stage in ''R-Type III'', which features a maze that molten metal flows through periodically. Which way it goes depends on what openings are in fact open at the time, and some of them open or close partway through a metal stream, totally changing its path! The metal is ridiculously fast, meaning that if you aren't ''exactly'' where you need to be beforehand, [[TrialAndErrorGameplay you're screwed.]] Then you fight a midboss, and then you have to ''go through the goddamned maze again, BACKWARDS!'' In a game in which, without the Force device ([[ContinuingIsPainful which you WILL lose when you die]]), your ship cannot fire backwards. [[NintendoHard ARRRRRGH!]]
49	* In a [[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GRHJMf_jY8A#t=39m12 Google Tech Talk video]], Jeff Minter had a discussion about his games created at Llamasoft. He discussed ''[[VideoGame/{{Tempest}} SpaceGiraffe]]'', where he designated level 64 "Flumm Ox" as that one level. "If you get to level 64, I guarantee the first time you get there you would just go 'What the smeg is going on there' and you'll die." The developer then plays through the level, showing an InterfaceScrew with unusual colors, CameraScrew, numerous danger alerts, and general chaos.
50	* ''VideoGame/SpaceMegaforce'' has twelve levels. Level eight, which seems to take takes place in some kind of ship's graveyard, is the hardest one. In that level, shooting the walls will cause pieces to break off and become dangerous projectiles. Most of your weapons have bullet patterns that will cause you to hit the walls constantly, and most enemies are objects, such as gun turrets, mounted on the walls in places that are hard to hit. It's hard.
51	* ''VideoGame/ThunderForce III'', Stage 4 (Haides). Moving terrain, rotating rock poles that can corner and kill you if you aren't careful, a high-speed section with suddenly-popping-out rock poles, and a section full of rocks that jump up and can catch you off guard. There's also Stage 2 (Gorgon), which has laser ships that can kill you easily if you don't opt to stop moving vertically when they appear, rocks that burst into pieces and can swarm you, and lava pillars that can make life miserable; while most of them eventually stop, one in particular will start up and ''never stop''; guaranteed life or shield loss if you get stranded behind it.
52	* For many ''VideoGame/BattleGaregga'' players, Stage 6 is a glass wall to climb. Part of your odds of making it through this level without emptying your lives hinges on how you managed the DynamicDifficulty in the first five stages. Didn't do that right? Well, Achievement Unlocked: 0G - {{Unwinnable}}.
53	* ''VideoGame/InTheHunt'' had the "Deep Dark Sea". If the multiple lava vents that spewed out fireballs didn't kill you, then the [[DemonicSpiders never-ending, annoying swarms of gray, futuristic submarines that fired indestructible aimed shots]] will. The boss of the stage was a three headed [[OurDragonsAreDifferent dragon-whelk]], with SIX of those lava vents in the area. You had to dodge the boss' attacks as well as the lava balls that were periodically shot out by those vents, making it ThatOneBoss.
54	* ''VideoGame/{{Tyrian}}'''s first episode has the ungodly bonus level Soh Jin. It's tempered by having a LOT of points and some ''very'' nice equipment available, but it gets to be in here because it has one thing that virtually no other level has: ''WALLS''. Did I mention all the enemies in this level are turrets which fire shots which knock you physically halfway across the screen? Yeah.
55	** If Soh Jin doesn't end up as ThatOneLevel for you, then the first bonus level of episode 3 probably will. What's so bad about it? Mainly the fact it's riddled with DemonicSpiders. Remember those frustratingly tough ships from Deliani? They're back, and they've brought friends which are armed with the sonic wave which appear from the bottom of the screen and which shoot at you from behind a column of indestructible balls. The computer is right when it tells you "Good Luck".
56	* ''VideoGame/MushihimeSama Futari'' [[DifficultySpike stage 3]], mostly for the second half. A LOT more aimed bullets, very large hordes of enemies, some of which don't appear until they're already on the lower half of the screen, spread patterns that force you to move through streams, and {{That One Boss}} at the end of it. This is at its worst on Original, where [[NonIndicativeDifficulty some parts of the level are harder than the same parts on]] '''''[[HarderThanHard ULTRA]].'''''
57	** Stage '''1''' on Ultra. The #1 hazard of this stage? The falling rocks, which spit out explosions of suicide bullets upon defeat. And you'll most likely need to shoot them to get through. There are players who have gotten down the 2nd through 4th stages who [[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yb7UR0nEH9o find the rocks to be the most annoying part of Ultra]].
58	* ''VideoGame/DeathSmiles''[='=]s extra stage, the Gorge. In normal stages, if you pick Level 3 difficulty five times, you trigger Death Mode and suicide bullets will start to appear. So if you master scooping up and/or evading suicide bullets, the Gorge should be a high-scoring stage, right? ''Wrong.'' The Gorge is what the North American version's manual calls "Death level 2", in which there are far more suicide bullets than normal. It says something about this stage's difficulty when even otherwise-hardened high-scoring players choke on this stage; in fact, playing this stage for score is strongly discouraged unless you can complete it, as you will score ''lower'' than if you just go straight to the final stage and finish it.
59	* ''VideoGame/SpyHunter2001'' (for the [=PS2/GC/Xbox=]) has ''quite'' a few.
60	** Double Vision pits you against a stage-long MirrorBoss who knows how to use the secondary weapons (smoke screen and oil slick) better than you, shoots you if you get ahead, and speeds off once you do enough damage to it. And once you beat it, you still have to deal with the electric mines (which do heavy damage and temporarily disable your weapons) if you accidentally tripped them, and helicopters, which can't be dealt with if you don't have any missiles, which may be likely. You also have to beat it before the end of the level, or you lose. And the worst part of the level? ''The Weapons Van is disabled'', meaning you can't restock and heal. Also, the "no civilian casualties" mission is easy to fail, since there are bikers which are small and hard to see, which means you'll easily plow through them.
61	** German Blitz has the absolutely nasty first part of the level, where you can't get the Interceptor, so you have to drive a civilian vehicle. A very slow civilian vehicle that turns slowly. Through a warehouse filled with difficult jumps and sharp turns. In 50 seconds. Basically, if you miss a jump or a turn, you can just restart. But after that, the level gets easier.
62	** Locked Keys has the ruined highway section. You're assaulted by a number of strong enemies, but that's not the evil part. If you fall into the water, welcome to ''Hell.'' Hell, in this instance, is filled to the brim with electric mines that deal horrible damage and disable most of your systems. You're guaranteed to be down to the last of your health by the end, and it's a good thing the Weapons Van isn't long after this nightmare.
63	** Venetian Blind has That One Secondary Mission, in destroying the scout submarines. They all hide unless you've gone through an invisibility powerup, which means you'll have to go off the normal path to find the powerup and destroy the submarine in the very short time before it vanishes. One submarine in particular is brutal to destroy; you have to be able to go through the stealth powerup, boost over a ramp, ''lock on to it and shoot it, blind, with no room for error.''
64	** But the level in ''Spy Hunter'' that takes the trophy in terms of absolute {{Nintendo Hard}}-ness is the final level, [[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DY5vyjNG9-0 Eye of the Storm.]] You get ''nine minutes'' to complete it, but you ''will'' need most of it. The beginning has a secret area that lets you take out one of the secondary objectives, but getting into it takes a quick turn to reach a stealth powerup that you can easily miss. After that, you have to go through a canyon filled with normal enemies and [[DemonicSpiders electric turrets]], which do heavy damage and disable your weapons temporarily. Then you have to go through a watery part, dealing with water enemies. You get to use the Weapons Van at last- ''two-fifths into the level''. Next, you go through a small town, but there's a fake wall that you can go through to reach another secondary mission- destroying the SCUD missiles. There are four, but you get only a second to destroy each of them, and you have to have enough boost energy to reach the last two. Next, you have to travel through an amphitheater, destroying power boxes or else getting zapped by lasers at the end. In the next area is a pit which you can easily fall into with lasers in it, dealing extremely high amounts of damage before you can get out. You can avoid it, but you [[TrialAndErrorGameplay won't figure that out the first time]]. Then you have to go through "the gauntlet", an obstacle course consisting of lasers and moving walls in water. ''Finally'', you get to your main objective, disabling the Four Horsemen missiles. You have to drive all around the area, destroying posts to open up power units that you have to destroy, all the while being harassed by enemies, in a ''very'' large area you have to drive all across to find all of them. Finally, you get to the Four Horsemen, and you just use EMP to shut them down. Hard to pass with just the essential objectives cleared, ''Hell'' to 100-percent, '''nightmarish''' to 100-percent while still maintaining the car form, '''''nigh impossible''''' to 100-percent in 5:10.
65	*** Basically, the only way you really had a chance getting the unlock from the mission without better muscle memory than required to [[VideoGame/GoldenEye1997 speedily find Dr. Doak]] was to unlock the Super Spy cheat (which prevents you from dying and gives you infinite boost), which is unlocked by... beating every mission with all objectives cleared.
66	* Pretty much all of the desert levels in ''VideoGame/BulletHeaven''. Level 12 has you facing a seemingly neverending barrage of falling rocks, which constantly split into smaller rocks when you shoot them, and alongside them are the [[DemonicSpiders Slingers]] who shoot a very nasty large orb that also splits into smaller orbs, seemingly when you're least expecting it to do so. Level 13 is probably the worst, in that not only do the Slingers return, but the Monoliths are introduced. Monoliths were [[BossInMookClothing incredibly overpowered enemies]] in ''VideoGame/EpicBattleFantasy3'', and they really don't disappoint here either, especially when they come in a group of '''four''', or when a pair of them charges straight at you. The fact that the creator seems outright out to get you here does not help.[[note]] For one thing, the tip at the beginning tells you to save your bombs for the midboss, despite how he's vastly easier than the stage itself, and for another, there are two sections in which it is possible to lose a life through absolutely no fault of your own; granted you can avoid both of these on your second run through, but you'd have to know they were there beforehand.[[/note]] Level 14 gives little breathing room, as it is filled with enemies that shoot at you when they die, in patterns that make simply not shooting at them not an option.
67	** And if you thought Level 14 was bad during normal gameplay? Try it during a [[SelfImposedChallenge no upgrade run]]. By the time you reached the desert levels - hell, even before that, during the later aquatic levels - your basic weapon strength isn't strong enough to kill enemies at any reasonable pace, basically making it a pseudo-PacifistRun. In level 12 pacifism is actually a decent strategy for the rocks, while level 13 can be brute-forced through TrialAndErrorGameplay once you work out the Ancient Monolith's bullet pattern. Level 14 does not roll this way. It is filled with cacti that you will grow to hate for two reasons: they shoot needles at random (so TrialAndErrorGameplay doesn't work), and they are '''everywhere'''. Couple this with the Ancient Eyes, which have the feel of {{Wolfpack Boss}}es every time they come in groups of four (and once they even come in a group of ''[[OhCrap six]]''), and we have a recipe for much prayer to the RandomNumberGod and infinite frustration.
68	* Stage 5 of ''[[VideoGame/DonPachi DoDonPachi DaiFukkatsu]]''. Not for [[BulletHell obvious reasons]], no. What makes it exceptionally hard is the existence of these circular groups of pods that continuously shoot out either bullets or [[BeamSpam lasers]]. In the case of the lasers, you're forced to fire your own laser and use the laser and the aurora covering your ship to block the lasers. Firing your laser reduces your movement speed and your spread, unless you're using Type A, which has little spread to begin with, or playing Black Label, which allows you to fire your shot and laser simultaneously at the expense of raising your [[DynamicDifficulty Red Gauge]]. And '''[[InvincibleMinorMinion they can't be destroyed]]''', unless you're playing Arrange A in the 360 port.
69	* Stage 6 of [=Gun.Smoke=] is flatly unbelieveable even by the standards of an [[NintendoHard already-hairpulling arcade version]], mostly because of its length compared to the rest of the stages before and after it. Also, the stage tends to pause to show a preview of the boss on his horse, twice, just to drag it out further. When you finally get to [[GoddamnedBoss Wolf Chief]], the aforementioned boss, he's bad enough with his firing pattern taking some getting used-to, but his flunkies will more often cause you deaths during the battle than the boss himself does. [[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lsSim9CIiiE watch hiropooooong take on this nightmare-of-a-stage.]]
70	* ''VideoGame/{{HELLSINKER}}'':
71	** The Shrine of Farewell, a special BossBonanza stage that you get to by completing Segment 7 or running out of Terra meter and then completing the current stage, whichever comes first. It falls under this trope not necessarily because it's hard--you get unlimited lives for this stage--but because when you enter the stage, you lose all of your [[ScoringPoints Spirits]] and have to get them back by fighting the bosses competently and within a time limit that carries over from boss to boss, and while it's possible to get all of your Spirits back or even gain more than what you entered with, if you play poorly you will have LESS Spirits when the stage ends. If you want to hold onto your score, but don't feel confident with this stage, it may be better to quit the game at this point!
72	** Segment 6 already has [[ThatOneBoss Those]] [[DualBoss Two Bosses]], but what makes it into this trope is that after the bosses are destroyed, you still have a considerable chunk of stage left. Said chunk of stage features a lot of enemies that throw patterns even more brutal than the bosses'!
73	* The final stage of ''[[VideoGame/AeroFighters Aero Fighters 2]]'', a MarathonLevel which pits you against ''two'' bosses and a horde of tough, bullet-spewing enemies, and unlike every other stage in the game, using a continue kicks you right back to the beginning of the stage.
74	* Stage 3 (Areas 12 through 15) of ''VideoGame/{{Eschatos}}''. The whole stage is [[LevelInBossClothing a long fight against a space station]], there's a tricky segment involving spinning crystals and [[CameraScrew depth perception in an otherwise 2D-gameplay game]], and unlike the surrounding stages which are fairly generous with [[OneUp 1-ups]], there are ''[[DroughtLevelOfDoom none of them]]'' in this stage.
75	* Several levels from ''VideoGame/{{Heavy Weapon}}'':
76	** Mission 6 introduces the infamous [[DemonicSpiders Havanski Atomic Bombers]] that drop [[NukeEm a-bombs]] periodically, which will [[OneHitKill instantly destroy you]] regardless of shielding if it touches anywhere on the ground. The boss at the end ([[GiantEyeofDoom Eyebot]]) is also difficult where it shoots out energy orbs and then blasts you with its lighting combat tentacles.
77	** Mission 9 introduces two more demonic spiders, [[KillSat Romanov Attack Satellites]] and [[AdvancingBossofDoom Shovak Bulldozers]]. The former will fry you instantly with it's [[DeathRay death ray]] if it goes above you while firing it, while the latter will crush you if they so much were to brush against you. The two appear but in separate combinations, where the satellite will be paired with the enemy tanks, and the bulldozer will be paired with the heavy carpet bomber and the ICBM's. These two combinations can screw up the player if they don't focus on them enough. The boss at the end ([[HoppingMachine X-Bot]]) will [[GoddamnedBoss constantly follow you, forcing you to move left and right to avoid it's one-hit kill crushing attack]].
78	** Mission 12 is where you face the bulldozers paired with tanks/ICBM's, and then again with the [[GoddamnedBats cruise missiles]].
79	** Mission 15 has the Atomic Bomber/Satellite combination, forcing you to juggle between destroying the atomic bomber and avoiding the satellite's laser.
80	** There are levels where you have to deal with the [[GiantMook blimp]] combinations with [[DemonicSpiders demonic spiders]], such as blimps and satellites in Mission 12, blimps and atomic bombers in Mission 17, and lastly blimps and bulldozers in Mission 18.
81	** The last level (Mission 19) is where you are thrown everything at you. It is very long and has several waves that are filled to the brim with [[DemonicSpiders demonic spiders]] (the satellite enemies are one of them) and [[GoddamnedBats goddamned bats]] combinations that are out to screw you badly. The final boss, (Secret Weapon) is also [[ThatOneBoss extremely tough even for final boss standards]].
82	** [[BossRush Boss Blitz Mode]] is where you must destroy all 19 bosses (including the rematches from 10-18) one after another, with only ''one'' life to do so. You'll obtain power ups after defeating a boss, but not ''when'' you start out. Because you won't get any power ups the first time you start, this makes [[WarmUpBoss Twinblade]] much more threatening as an EarlyBirdBoss thanks to this. This only gets harder when you fight the plethora of bosses with OneHitKill attacks and lethal CollisionDamage that spell Game Over if any of those hit.
83
84	[[AC:RailShooter]]
85	* ''VideoGame/StarFox64'' gives us Sector Z. This level isn't hard to just clear, but it is, by far, the most difficult to [[OneHundredPercentCompletion earn a medal on]]. The only way to have a prayer of getting the medal is to shoot down all the missiles that are being fired at the Great Fox. Your wingmen will constantly be shooting at the missiles to damage them, but this actually works against you; if your wingman destroys a missile instead of you, you don't earn the points towards the medal! On top of that, if you went to Zoness beforehand, Katt will show up to also shoot at the missiles, which makes it even more difficult to get in that final shot. And don't think you can just take out your wingmen, or ignore their cries for help when they're set upon by the enemies; all three of your wingmen have to be alive to earn the medal. Couple that with smaller enemies that constantly swarm you with some of the best [=AI=] in the game, and it's an exercise in frustration.
86	** And if you come from Sector X to avoid the extra AnnoyingVideoGameHelper of Kat, getting through the warp is nearly impossible without losing a wing, and your upgraded lasers with it.
87	** Speaking of Zoness, that level has searchlights that all need to be destroyed to continue on the same path, and some of them are quite hard to hit due to obstacles. You also pretty much need to destroy them all for the medal, as they give good points. Some of your allies will destroy the searchlights for you, however.
88	** And before that we have Aquas, the only underwater level in the game, using a submarine that functions a bit differently compared to the Arwing and Landmaster. You can't charge up shots, and you use an infinite supply of torpedoes instead of bombs. They also provide some light, which is very much needed to see anything. And pretty much every enemy you encounter down there qualifies as GoddamnedBats.
89	*** And if you've been spamming torpedoes and barrel rolls to BS through Aquas, [[DamnYouMuscleMemory expect to accidentally waste a few bombs when you get to Zoness.]]
90	** Venom is actually ''easier'' on the "hard" route (from Area 6) than on the "easy" route (from Bolse), at least on Expert. Venom 2 merely has you fighting the upgraded Star Wolf team, whereas Venom 1 takes you on a run through a narrow canyon that can sometimes become even narrower [[MalevolentArchitecture rather suddenly]] filled to the brim with [[BulletHell waves and waves of enemy fighters each firing at a much higher rate than they ever did before]].
91	** Solar is basically LethalLavaLand converted into a rail shooter level, but with the added bonus of the heat constantly draining your shield gauge. It has the lowest number of enemies of any rail level in ''64'', and going to it pretty much means your chance at a high score is shot because of how little points you're going to score.
92	*** At least your score is shot if you don't abuse a [[GoodBadBugs glitch]] that lets you ''cap out your score'', seen [[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=m6g6EZjUvpY here]]. The problem is that this glitch is absurdly tedious, to the point where the linked video is 7 minutes long despite skipping over roughly 685/700 points. If anything, this just [[SanitySlippage makes matters worse]] than a mere low score...
93	** There are two levels in the game that have you pilot the Landmaster tank, and where Macbeth is generally considered a BestLevelEver, the other is Titania, a ShiftingSandLand with annoying obstacles, [[DemonicSpiders annoying enemies]], [[ThatOneBoss an annoying boss]] and nothing particularly interesting about it. There are ''two'' factors that make it even worse: firstly, going to Titania means [[EarnYourBadEnding you're locked into going to Bolse and Venom 1]], and secondly Titania is a rescue mission to save [[TheScrappy Slippy]], who in the story only ended up stranded there [[LeeroyJenkins due to his own idiocy in jumping into the Sector X boss fight]]. [[LampshadeHanging General Pepper had a point when he said Titania was too dangerous]].
94	* The original ''VideoGame/StarFox'' has Sector Z--take Sector X, add wireframe beams, and add a section where you have to dodge rotating wireframe beams, and you have yourself an asshole of a level.
95	** If you hit the retros constantly, it's possible to get through Sector Z without ever getting hit by those beams.
96	* ''VideoGame/SinAndPunishment'' has Stage 3-2, which [[UnexpectedGameplayChange changes the game from a rail shooter to a sidescrolling platformer]]. It's very awkward to play.
97	* ''VideoGame/SinAndPunishmentStarSuccessor'':
98	** Stage 5, the highway stage. Nonstop enemies, curves that make moving sideways harder, you can't use your jetpack, and [[FakeDifficulty if you touch one of the railings, you are stunned and unable to move or fire for a few seconds]].
99	** Don't let your guard down after that particular stage, because after that comes Stage 6, the longest stage in the entire game at over ''thirty minutes'' (to put it this way: many arcade-length shmups can be played from start to finish in that period of time or less), featuring no less than four major bosses, two of which can cause an instant NonStandardGameOver regardless of health (one kills you if you stay in the air for too long, the other [[spoiler:has your partner captured and dumped into the lava if you can't keep up]]), one of which has three phases and [[spoiler:turns into a fighting game for the final phase]], and outside of the bosses, there are countless ways to get hurt.
100	* Terminator T2 The Arcade Game has that truck level in which John Connor must survive while driving to Skynet among running golden T-800s and flying Hunter-Killer "planes", and the level after Cyberdyne in which the T-1000 in a police helicopter [[strike:tries to ram into]] rams into the protagonists in a SWAT van.
101	** Oh god, this level. The only way to realistically play this level on the SNES without access to a light-gun peripheral is to use the limited edition SNES mouse. Then comes the big issues: Can you shoot the Terminator units on the ground? Is there friendly-fire on the vehicle or were you not fast enough shooting the Terminators? should you spend any time trying to hit those fast-flying ones? Are the flying ones even a target or a threat? Dangit, John, stop crashing that truck!
102	*** The level is pretty much a GuideDangIt, as the hunter-killers attack in a set pattern, making it relatively manageable on any version if you know it (or write it down). As long as you've saved up some rockets to SpamAttack the helicopters and have lives to tank the golden T-800's. Of course, the fact you need to prepare for it is enough to make it ThatOneLevel in itself.
103	* The forest/swamp/ruins level in ''VideoGame/SilentScope 2''. Targets are extremely far away and well-camouflaged, and midway through the level, you get stuck with a useless night vision scope. On top of that, it's also [[MarathonLevel very long]].
104	* As any seasoned ''VideoGame/PointBlank1994'' player knows, shooting a bomb in any stage costs 1 life, ''per bomb shot''. But, one stage of ''Point Blank 2'' has you shooting parachutes to drop bombs into your respective mascot's basket. And yes, shooting bombs in this stage still takes away lives. And because there are so many bombs on the screen at once parachuting down, it's perfectly possible to lose all of your lives for a GameOver afterwards even if you clear the stage. Ultimately, the strategy for this stage if you're not feeling confident boils down to going in with at least 2 lives left and just ''not doing anything''; losing 1 life because of a failed quota is better than losing 3 (or 5, or [[EpicFail enough to make two lines of MISS tallies]]) due to bombs.
105	* The Shinjuku Station Square in ''VideoGame/Police9111''. Not only will there be more [[DemonicSpiders machine gun wielding enemies]] present, but also [[TooDumbToLive innocent bystanders who will run in circles instead of running for their lives]].
106	* Stage 5 of ''VideoGame/LuckyAndWild'' is arguably the hardest stage in the entire game. The suspect, Bear, is also ThatOneBoss, and can [[DamageSpongeBoss take a helluva lot of punishment to go down]], not to mention it's also [[MarathonLevel the longest stage in the game]], and there are a ton of obstacles to go through, including rocks, trains, and [[ExplosiveBarrel Explosive Barrels]], not to mention the stage throws [[GiantMook monster trucks]] at you, and [[DemonicSpider they are quite possibly the toughest enemies in the game]]. By the end of the stage, you'll probably have barely enough time left before Bear will escape.

Context ThatOneLevel / ShootEmUps