Can we talk about the Japanese version of Contra: Hard Corps for a moment?

Hot take, but I always preferred losing health to losing a whole life when getting hit. Made the game much more bearable for me.

Yes, I beat Contra 4 on hard mode. No, I will never do it again. I greatly prefer the challenge level of JP Hard Corps. But I didn't play the other Contra games in JP so I wouldn't know if the rest of the series does the same.