10 ULTRA Hard Video Game Opening Levels That Broke You
3. USA - Double Dragon III: The Sacred Stones
There's bulls**t opening levels and then there's the "USA" level in Double Dragon III: The Sacred Stones.
Though the stage is plenty difficult on its own dubious merits, what really compounds this is the fact you've only got a single life, and there aren't any continues available until you reach the fourth of the game's five stages. Yikes.
USA doesn't suffer fools - or really, anyone - lightly, with simple input errors on the player's part ensuring their health will be quickly whittled away long before they get anywhere close to the end.
Though the original Double Dragon trilogy is very much defined by its difficulty, the third game's opening stage is on a whole other level of abuse entirely.
While a colossal commercial failure at the time of its release - leaving publisher Acclaim with a half-million unsold copies - Double Dragon III endures today as something of a perverse cult classic for those who love their beat 'em ups unfair to the point of insanity.