interesting idea of konami to use the idea of each stage taking place in a different country some players may find it difficult to finish theres one thing i thought wasn't fair  if you start with 4 lives then go on to stage 2 with 2 lives you use all your lives & then when you get a password then you decided to use it & you find yourself starting exactly with the same number of lives at the stage where you left off (2 lives) i would recommend trying to find a 1up so you have more lives than you originally started with & then use them all up so you can get that password i dod the same exact thing for every level so i would never be short on lives