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U.N. Squadron (Area 88 in Japan), is a shooting/action arcade game by Capcom. It is based on the anime/manga Area 88. Although it doesn't bear any resemblance to the original history, it still uses the many of the characters and place setting.

Gameplay

In this game, the player can choose between three mercenary pilots: Shin Kazama, Mickey Scymmon and Greg Gates. Their mission is to stop a terrorist group known as Project 4.

Before entering the level, the player has the opportunity to purchase special weapons or added defenses in the shop. Your character earns money for this shop by destroying enemy planes and vehicles during levels and, when the level is finished, any unused weapons are converted back into money.

Once the level had been entered, the game is similar to Defender and R-Type in form: the player is viewed side-on, flying right as enemies approach from many directions. Land, sea, and air units are encountered in the various stages. The player's main gun has infinite ammunition and can be upgraded by picking up power-ups. As gun power increases, more power ups are required to reach the next level, similar to the use of experience points (XP) in RPGs. Special weapons, on the other hand, are limited in ammunition and have no ability to upgrade in level. Unlike Raiden, the player's aircraft could take a number of enemy hits before being destroyed but had a brief period of invulnerability after each hit, this was then "repaired" to a lower health level. This made the game a little less frustrating.

Like many shooters, the game was very challenging. Levels frequently included large numbers of enemies atacking at once, with subsequent vast amounts of firepower on screen. The player needed quick reflexes to navigate through all this fire while still attacking their enemies. Only a skilled player was capable of finishing the game with few (or any) continues.

Ports

U.N. Squadron (as well as Area 88 in Japan) was ported to the Super Nintendo Entertainment System in 1991. Differences between the arcade game and the SNES port include:

• Single player only
• Different planes may be used indepedent of the pilot chosen
• More and different power-ups may be bought in the between-level store
• An overhead map is used between levels
• If you die during a level, you restart that level from the beginning

External links

• Area 88 entry on the Killer List of Videogames
• U.N. Squadron entry on the Killer List of Videogames
• GameFAQs information page
• MobyGames information page

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• Capcom games
• Super NES games
• 1989 arcade games
• 1991 computer and video games