Eh. Not the best list in the world.
Contra I could beat almost on a single life when I was a kid.
Mega Man had a few rough spots, but on the whole it wasn't *that* bad. Mostly just bad in a couple spots.
Devil May Cry 3's difficulty is vastly overrated in my experience, though I quit playing it before I beat it so maybe it gets worse later. The exact same thing can be said of Shinobi for me. Not as hard as everybody said, but I didn't play to the end, so perhaps it gets much worse.
Battletoads... yeah, that was hard. Mostly just that fucking motorcycle level, though.
I don't actually remember R-Type being that rough. But it's been *years* now, so I could just be misremembering.
I don't know... it just seems like there are other games I'd have put on there. Ecco the Dolphin should have been front and fucking center, both the original game and the PS2 game (still haven't really played the 2nd Genesis one, but I assume that's rough too). Ikaruga also, most definitely. Unlimited continues don't count. That game will crush your soul. And I was just thinking of another one, and then Ecco popped into my head and completely removed it. Damn it. I was thinking Viewtiful Joe, also, but I never really played that one. I just sort of fiddled with it for a minute. I've really been meaning to give it a good go... but supposedly it's a bitch.
I think my main beef is with the Contra thing. I could totally own the first game every time I played it. I wonder if I'd suck now, though. I got the GBA version of the SNES game, and I couldn't get past the second level.
Maybe the list is better than I'm giving it credit for, but I still say Ecco is the hardest game series in the history of the universe.