UN Squadron - SNES

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Anayo1
Posts: 758
Joined: December 31st, 1969, 7:00 pm

UN Squadron - SNES

Postby Anayo1 » November 18th, 2007, 6:38 pm

UN Squadron is a game released for the Super Nintendo Entertainment system in 1991. The game's premise revolves around mercenary fighter pilots going on missions to blow stuff up. Genre-wise this equates to a horizontal on-rails shooter with airplanes.

The format of the game is laid out in a map showing some war-torn country, landmarked across which are different territories (levels) where you can take your plane. These include Fidel Castro-ish Cuban jungles, blistering deserts, rocky mountains, and submarine ridden water stages. Thrown into the mix are certain “moving” stages, like an enemy air force squadron that “moves” across the map closer to your headquarters, or a submarine that creeps through the ocean in the direction of your base. If you don't confront these and beat them soon enough, they'll close in on your headquarters and you'll be forced to face them.

The graphics are really good – a splendid example of 16-bit graphics done well. In particular I love the crisp, detailed mountain ranges, the smoothly contrasted blue skies, and the blazing hot sky rippling from the heat in the desert level. This game truly showcases the Super Nintendo's expansive color palette. I don't think it would have been possible to pull off something like this with the old Sega Genesis's meager 64 colors. The scenery looks good, the airplanes are sharp, and the explosions convincing. To describe the game's music, it isn't quite anything to make you start pathologically humming along, but it is snazzy, agreeable, and compliments the shooting action nicely.


Enemies come at you in waves, shooting all manner of projectiles in the meantime. Memorizing enemy formations isn't really necessary, but being quick on your feet sure is. Sometimes the screen can get pretty hectic in the heat of the action. I appreciated how before each stage I was taken to a shop (the owner of which bears an unsettling resemblance to Bilbo Baggins) where you can buy bombs, missiles, and other goodies more versatile and diverse than your lousy ol' vulcan cannon.


The game has an RPG-like flair to it with the way you can invest money earned from blowing up enemies into bigger, badder airplanes. However, UN Squadron is also quick and arcade like enough that it doesn't require a huge, multi-hour investment of time to build up. Upgrading your plane manages to work as a compelling and juicy incentive to play while staying quick and arcade like at the same time. The game's difficulty level is pretty high. Sometimes I died as many as five times on the same level before beating it.


All in all, UN Squadron is a solid, good play. It has a quality to it that makes me want to get out my SNES and play it. When you've got software that makes you want to take your hardware our for a spin, that's always a good sign.


Final score: A-


Atarifever1
Posts: 3892
Joined: December 31st, 1969, 7:00 pm

UN Squadron - SNES

Postby Atarifever1 » November 19th, 2007, 6:18 am

I'd never heard of this one, but having seen what you and the critic said about it, I'm almost sad I got rid of my SNES. 


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