U.N. Squadron (Arcade) FAQ v 1.1 By Brian McLean (bmclean84@hotmail.com) Last change: April 3, 2001 ============================================ For more (somewhat related) information: ============================================ For those of you that may be interested, all of this nuttiness is actually based off of anime. There is an OVA titled 'Area 88' that involves pilots in a mercenary squadron that are flying missions for the sake of buying their way back out. I do not know if there's also a manga involved, but the anime is probably the only translated thing you'll find and it's fairly short. ============================================ Table of Contents: ============================================ 1. Revision History 2. Introductory Info 2.1 Planes and abilities 2.2 Vulcan cannon powerups 2.3 Weapons to be bought/found 3. The Missions (1-10 + Special) 4. Pickup Recap 5. Contributor List 6. Legal Copyright Stuff ============================================ 1. Version changes: ============================================ 1.1 – Added better strategies for bosses of 9 and 10. Added astronaut in mission 6, unicorn in 3, preliminary info on astronaut in special mission. Finally did a bit of formatting for easier reading. Numerous minor fixes to details throughout the guide. 1.0 - Preliminary FAQ distributed to participants in the MAME Championships held at the MAME Action Replay Page (http://marp.retrogames.com) ============================================ 2. Introductory Info ============================================ The story so far: It's an arcade shooter, do you actually need a story? Well, all right. There's some fighting going on in a place called Kutal. Project 4 is oppressing people in that region and our heroes Shin, Mickey, and Greg are part of a mercenary group called the U.N. Squadron. The team is dispatched to the area to thwart Project 4 (and grub lots of money). Simple, eh? ----------------- 2.1 - The planes: ----------------- Shin Kazama - F-20 Tigershark. Shin's weapon fires strictly forward and is large when fully powered up. Shin is advertised as the all-around fighter. Mickey Simon - F-14 Tomcat. Mickey's weapon also fires strictly forward and is large. Mickey is supposed to be the air combat expert and as such his shots are larger than Shin's. So what makes Shin desirable in any fashion? Greg Gates - A-10 Thunderbolt. Greg's plane has smaller forward shots but has a second stream of fire that shoots downward at a 45-degree angle from the regular shot. Useful in many situations and a detriment in the one spot you need firepower the most. --------------------- 2.2 - Main gun levels --------------------- As you play through the game, you'll pick up POWs in three colors: Green, blue, and yellow. The blue is worth 1 POW, the green 2, and the yellow adds 4 POWs to your total. As you collect POWs throughout the game, your main gun will be upgraded to be both more powerful and larger. Both your total number of POWs and the number needed for the next level up are displayed in the top left corner while playing. Here is a list of what you must have to get to the next level: Level 1: 0 (You start with it, natch) Level 2: 4 Level 3: 10 Level 4: 20 Level 5: 35 Level 6: 57 Level 7: 91 At 91 POWs, the indicator for how many you need for the next level turns to hearts. Your counter maxes out at 99 POWs, and collecting any more gives you about $200. ------------------ 2.3 - The weapons: ------------------ These weapons are all (aside from the T. Laser) available in the weapons shop that you go to before each mission. The descriptions of each, while somewhat wacky, do accurately describe what the weapon does. Most of these weapons are not terribly helpful, to be honest. You may find Bomb II useful in mission 6 and S. Shell II helpful in the final battle, but there is little that needs to be done that your main gun can't accomplish faster. Bulpup: 'You can launch missiles in a wide range' Bulpup II: 'It has more power than Bulpup' Phoenix: 'It chases enemies.' Falcon: 'It is the strongest homing missile' S. Shell: 'This is a strong piercing weapon.' S. Shell II: 'It has more power than Super Shell.' Bomb II: 'It is stronger than Bomb.' (Er... Where's the original Bomb?) Napalm: 'It burns the ground.' T. Laser: There is no description for this weapon because it only occurs once in the middle of mission 5. It fires a medium-sized laser shot in three directions (Think of a longer S. Shell split three ways, and you'll be close). These three items below are always available when you go to the store, but as you progress through the game their prices go up, all the way to $50K for a Super Shield! Like the weapons themselves, I don't feel any of this stuff is worth the cash (and thus points at end of game) that you have to spend to get it. Extra lifebar: 'It increases vitality!' Shield: 'It recovers damage 3 times!' Super Shield: 'It recovers damage 5 times!' ============================================ 3. The Missions ============================================ ---------- Mission 1: ---------- Mission description: 'The target is the multi-rocket launchers! The most vulnerable target is the radar installation, so avoid the missiles and attack the rader. [sic]' Weapons available: Bulpup ($2,000), Bulpup II ($3,000) Finishing bonus: 10,000 points, $3,000 Finishing quote: 'This is merely the beginning!' You almost can't go wrong in this mission. Flying over an airstrip, you're given nothing but slow helicopters to fight. When you've dealt with most of them there's a line of turrets on the ground which need to be taken down, and then you're at the boss. Good target practice to warm up with and you should pick up enough powerups to get your plane to level 2. The boss itself is also quite easy. It has two attacks: Large missiles that fly straight and smaller ones that home in on you. The larger ones cannot be destroyed, but they fly in a predictable pattern. One shot will be two missiles straight ahead and one off to each side, and the other is one straight ahead and one to each side. There's a glowing ball on the boss that changes colors as you damage it; if you stay relatively level with that, you will find it fairly easy to weave through the missiles and your shots will immediately destroy the smaller missiles as well. A few seconds of fire and it's all over. ---------- Mission 2: ---------- Mission description: 'The target is the invisible Stealth Bomber! It can attack targets without being detected. Homing missiles can't even detect it!' Weapons available: Phoenix ($15,000), Falcon ($20,000) Finishing bonus: 15,000 points, $5,000 Finishing quote: 'The stars seem to be against you!' After that easy opener you're suddenly thrust into a dogfight in a storm. Here you'll have to be a bit more mindful of the enemies that fly in, turn around and shoot homing missiles since there will be more going on around you. In addition, there are blue planes that come in from behind and fire at you as you try to circle around them. I like to keep in the middle (vertically speaking) and a bit forward. They start to move faster and into your line of fire briefly after they've shot at you, so simply keep pulling back to avoid the shots and take them out as they fly out in front. Now you also have bigger planes to deal with, ones that come from the top or bottom in front and hang around to shoot a spread of bullets towards you. About halfway through the stage you'll run into the first group of these, and there's nothing else coming for you. Just hang back and find an open spot as you're shooting them down. At the end of the level you'll come across three more, but this time blue planes come out as well to harass you. If you keep a stream of fire on the big plane, two blue planes should come out before the big one goes down, and as before they're only too happy to jump into your line of fire after their one shot. After the third one (they alternate sides again) the boss comes out... It's a stealth bomber! As it comes down it releases a goodly number of what I call air mines, which are spaced well enough that you should be able to find a path to sneak up between them and behind the bomber. This is its only attack for a little while, so fire away and dodge only when necessary. Right around the time it has two gouts of flame spewing from it, the bomber suddenly adds some fairly quick indestructible missiles to the mix. They move vertically for a second or two, then speed off the screen horizontally. These aren't aimed either, so you'll just have to get in there and finish it off quickly if you're not much for dodging. Greg's plane has a slight advantage here; he can stay above most of the fire and just batter it from the top, though occasionally missiles will still find you up there. Finish up, collect your reward and move on. As a side note, take care to look at the mission description as it's actually useful this time. Both the Phoenix and Falcon missiles are no use to you against the boss unless you're lined up with it, since they can't detect the bomber. On MAME defaults, however, you should be able to destroy it with minimal risk without extra weapons. ---------- Mission 3: ---------- Mission description: 'The target is the forest fortress, equipped with many large gun batteries. Even the surrounding woods are full of weapons. Burn the forest and find out where they are!' Weapons available: S. Shell ($15,000), S. Shell II ($20,000) Finishing bonus: 20,000 points, $6,000 Finishing quote: 'Hey, controller! Am I the best, or what?' It's defoliation time! It's safe to fly down in the trees, so don't worry about that. Only some of them can actually be destroyed, though, so plan on always having your view partially obscured down there. That's a problem this stage, because planes will taxi along the ground and pop up suddenly, hovering in the air and then flying away again after firing. There are also missile-carrying tanks now, but they shouldn't be a problem in general. The elusive unicorn resides here. He'll give you a Shield (used immediately) but to find him you have to destroy all of the trees in this level. To do this, as soon as the mission starts you must IMMEDIATELY fly down and left to catch the very first tree before it scrolls off. After that you shouldn't have much trouble getting the rest, and thus the unicorn right before the boss. Finishing with the shield is worth $6,250, along with a 10K point bonus simply for getting it. During the stage itself, the big thing you're going to have to worry about are the mines at the end of the stage. Unlike the ones released by the bomber last level, you can't destroy them and almost all of them hang nearly stationary in the air. Now you'll find two missile tanks that ARE a problem, because you're going to be in the thick of the minefield before you get a shot at them. The safest path I've found resembles a V, going from the very top to the top of the tree line and back up again. When you get to the bottom of the path. You'll finally have the first of the tanks in your sights. Take it out and grab the fuel tank it drops if you need it (the repair is minimal, though, and remember that you can't see the mines down there for the trees. One hit is crippling!). After that, you arrive at the boss... Sorry, no light at the end of the tunnel. Just a fortress at the end of the forest. Or something. This is the first time you'll get to really take advantage of the fixed turrets in the game. You start off with two turrets firing large missiles, and a bay that launches three fighters at a time between them. You can't destroy the bay, but if you stay just above level with the missile turrets you can shoot them without fear of ever being hit. Stay forward a bit and pull back if you miss some of the planes on their way up so you can hit them without having to change your vertical position. You'll go through another set of turrets and a bay, then the fun really begins. You'll come across a much larger dome with two barrels in it that moves up and down, firing lasers. This thing is a pain if you're not expecting it, and can do serious damage to you. Fire away and stay below its lasers. Stay with it until nearly the last moment, then fly over immediately after it fires. This is a bit hard to put in words, but you'll find the timing for it and it works nearly 100% of the time. Thought you were done with that monstrosity? Not at all, it simply turns around and resumes firing after you pass! You can't touch it now, so just stay out of its way. Finally you come across the core of the fortress, a low dome that opens up and shoots a spread of three bullets to the left and right. If you hang out just above it, both the lasers and its bullets will be unable to reach you. As soon as the lasers stop coming though, pop back up and start firing because there's another double laser dome just ahead. You'll pass right by the core, and for this second dome I recommend flying over it earlier because if you try to wait like with the first one, you may very well find it rising with you and causing severe damage. The problem with this is that you'll put yourself in the line of fire of two more missile turrets as well as the laser cannons for a few precious seconds. Whip out those dodging skills and scramble for safety as soon as you see the edge of the fortress. Once you're below the turrets, nothing more can hit you... Well, until you turn around and run the gauntlet again. Your plane is invincible for a few seconds after you turn around, so take that time to get lined up with the missile turrets and blow them away as before. There's a spot right next to the very last turret of the fortress that can be shot, which reveals a yashichi (a pinwheel-looking thing). Grab it! It's worth 2,000 points and a full refill of your lifebar! Odd that you get it now, because when done properly this pass is all easy cleanup. You should have done enough damage to both double laser turrets to destroy them without much danger to yourself, and the core itself is quite easy to take out. Watch it all go up in flames and move on! A side note: If you didn't destroy the fortress on the second pass, your plane turns around AGAIN and you get one more crack at it! This is a good way to earn a few extra thousand points because of the planes that come out of the bays for you to destroy. If you don't get it the third time, though, the stage ends and you get no bonus! ---------- Mission 4: ---------- Mission description: 'The target is the carrier! It can move around on the ground and its striking power is 4 times greater than a regular carrier. Its weak point is exposed only for a few seconds during attacks. That's the time to hit it!' Weapons available: Bomb II ($15,000), Napalm ($20,000) Finishing bonus: 25,000 points, $8,000 Finishing quote: 'Goodbye! This desert will be your grave!' This stage perhaps belongs a bit later in the game... It has a few nasty surprises! In this desert scene you'll first find the kamikaze planes, which simply fly in extremely fast and try to ram you as the name implies. Greg enjoys another distinct advantage here because the planes come from two levels from the right, and he can train his fire on the top group while the downward shots also eliminate the lower set as they try to come up. Be mindful of the SAM launchers that are on the ground now, and also note the things poking out of the ground that look a bit like radar dishes. As soon as you fly over them, a set of missiles will fly out of the ground straight up. Plan your moves accordingly! Near the end of the first set of those, you can shoot at the top of the screen to get an astronaut to fall from the sky, waving a red flag. Pick him up for some extra points. One more new enemy here is a chopper that fires off several homing missiles and takes a decent amount of punishment. One set of these shows up in the second set of radar dishes, so you'll have your hands full in that area. Just remember to stay well back from them, because if you get too close they also have a damaging flame-thrower in front! After that second set of radar dishes, the boss wastes no time in rolling up... This one is a curious combination of aircraft carrier and missile launcher. There are four bays in the front that missiles fly out of, then a bay on the side that fighters are launched from, then another set of two missile bays, then one more fighter bay. The missiles, if they make it to the top of the screen, explode into a number of air mines (a la the stealth bomber boss) that rain down on you. Keep your plane level with the deck at the beginning and shoot out the first four missile bays. You may have time to get started on the first fighter bay, but the core of the carrier will pop up soon and fire off a spray of bullets both left and right as well as a pattern of missiles before disappearing again. Don't worry about it too much yet, just slide up above the missiles and be wary of the bullets until it goes down again. Take out the first fighter bay and the other two missile bays after it stops, and after the next burst of bullets/missiles the last fighter bay should fall easily, leaving you with just the core to contend with. With that left, the boss becomes fairly easy. The missiles always alternate between two horizontal missiles that are spaced far enough apart to fly through, and two that are tight together and in the area between the two previous missiles. This means you'll have to do some weaving if you want to keep your gun trained on the core. The bullets aren't aimed and shoot in a fixed pattern so they shouldn't be a problem, just keep an eye on the one closest to you. Also, don't aim too low when you're firing or you'll hit the cannons spraying bullets rather than the missile core, which apparently doesn't hurt the boss. A few times through that routine and you should finish it off, leaving you with the bonus and the satisfaction of finishing one of the more hectic stages. ---------- Mission 5: ---------- Mission description: 'The target is a bomber called Bayson! This huge bomber carries a fighter inside and the fighter can take off in the air. Don't get distracted by the fighter's attack. Aim at the bomber!' Weapons available: Bulpup ($15,000), Bulpup II ($20,000), T. Laser (found) Finishing bonus: 30,000 points, $10,000 Finishing quote: 'No one survived my attack?' Another aerial battle, this one takes place in a canyon. This fact will be rather obvious to you when you see big pillars of rock headed your way at a high velocity. Destroy the tops of all of them as you pass. The whole battle is fairly fast paced, and the big planes from stage 2 make a comeback here. They rise from the bottom and make life difficult while blue planes streak by from behind, with a helping of missile fighters thrown in. There's a minor bonus available right at the end of the stage, which can be seen by the set of several big planes where the last one comes with no less than eight blue planes (four on top, for on the bottom). Be sure you have enough room to back off and then dodge what the big plane shoots! Right around that time, if you've destroyed all of the rock pillars there will be an astronaut that pops out into the air. It drops off the screen if you don't catch it, so be quick! If you grab it, you'll be awarded with the T. Laser weapon. This is the only time this weapon shows up in the game, and frankly I think it's in an unusual spot. It fires out three lasers in different directions and you get 50 of them, but it doesn't strike me as well suited towards the boss. Speaking of... The boss flies up, a bomber as advertised that looks a bit more like a modified chopper with its fighter bay and two tailguns. This is the first boss that is actually a threat in my book, because both tailguns fire five-bullet spreads that are difficult to dodge if they're close enough to each other. Just hang back as far as you can and eliminate the fighters as they get close. If you pull too far forward, the boss may pull back and hang around the left side of the screen instead which forces you to do a slow loop around him (and potentially a very close fly-by of the tailguns) before you get behind again. If you're looking for points, this is definitely a boss you don't want to kill right away! Do a fair bit of damage to him, but STOP before you take him out and fly low, just above the rock columns that speed by. As time goes on the boss releases more and more fighters in groups of three until you hardly have time to destroy them all before the next set is coming out. As you're flying around and dodging things, though, count the number of groups it releases. Once 40 groups or so have been released, that's your cue to finish things off. My experience is that right around 50, the stage ends abruptly and you get no bonus. ---------- Mission 6: ---------- Mission description: 'The objective of the operation is to destroy the missile launcher located at the end of the cave. The inside of the cave is very narrow. Watch out for rocks!' Weapons available: Bomb II ($20,000), Napalm ($25,000) Finishing bonus: 35,000 points, $15,000 Finishing quote: 'Don't underestimate the U.N. Squadron's pilots!' This stage takes place in a cavern, and as one would expect there's limited room to maneuver in there. For the most part this is compensated by the enemies coming in easy patterns, but there are a few things of note here. There are guns mounted on the ceiling that fire slow bullets, but you will always have enough room to fly up next to the first in a row and take them all out. Right in the thick of that section, you'll see a group of six missile bays embedded on the ground, then another later on. These do the same thing as the boss in stage four, essentially, so take them out if possible. You may be forced to let them go and instead just destroy the missiles that fly up. Immediately after the second set of missile bays there's a large ground turret that fires faster bullets. With Greg it is possible (though slightly dangerous) to take out the bays and turret from above, but with the other two you're forced to get down next to the missile bays to take everything out. After this section the stage splits into two paths, top and bottom. The bottom is the easier to get to and is fairly simple to navigate. Be careful where you fire here; if your bullets get too close to the top of the passage it'll bring down a cave-in in certain spots and force you to blast through a pile of rubble, wasting precious seconds and leaving you worse off positionally speaking when you get through it. There will be several ground units as you go through the tunnel and a few fighters; by now your weapon should be powerful enough that you can nearly wipe them all out without even moving. Careful of the set of fighters that rolls up from behind about halfway through, though. The top path, however, holds a secret: An astronaut! Squeeze through the narrow opening to get started on this path and shoot at the ground. He should pop out of the ground after a moment, and is worth 10K to your cause. If you're playing for points, squeeze BACK through the opening again and take the lower path; there's more to destroy. If you choose to stay up top, though, you should have an easy cruise to the end of the stage so long as you keep firing. You'll be greeted with three sets of fighters that drop blue powerups when you get out of this area, but don't be hasty to pick them up; as soon as you get out a few planes will cruise by and drop napalm on the ground. Make sure you're at least halfway up the screen to avoid it. Snag those powerups, and then your next foe rolls up... This looks eerily similar to the fight in mission 4. A carrier rolls up with four regular gun turrets and four missiles mounted on the deck. You should be able to take out all of the deck-mounted weapons with ease before much fire at all gets out (the missiles won't even react!) Fighters will fly by and drop napalm on the deck from time to time, so if you're busy blasting away your best bet is usually to slip forward to lure it to drop the napalm, then fly back quickly to avoid the resulting fire. When the core appears on screen, it fires a spread of bullets from time to time, but that's it. You'll be left with only the occasional fire and an easy spread to dodge, and the fight should be over within seconds. Move right along and get ready, it starts to get trickier now... ---------- Mission 7: ---------- Mission description: 'The target is a bomber called Bullhead! We expect a certain amount of damage, but we know you will do your best. Good Luck!' Weapons available: Phoenix ($20,000), Falcon ($25,000) Finishing bonus: 40,000 points, $20,000 Finishing quote: 'Go to hell!' (Short and to the point!) The beginning of this mission reminds me of the leftovers of the boss fight you just got out of, plus a healthy dose of mission 1 all over again. You're on another airstrip and you'll be dealing with minor fighters once more, just with kamikaze planes and napalm fighters mixed in. Be mindful of the kamikaze planes that come from the rear; one set in particular shows up while you're taking care of a few napalm fighters and is almost guaranteed to hit you unless you're watching for it. Soon the similarities end, though, and you start to travel faster along the strip. Now there are only gun turrets, and a total of six powerups can be had before you lift away and take to the skies. The big planes are back with a vengeance, and they've brought friends this time! There are planes that sneak up from behind and fire off quick bursts of either machine gun fire or missiles, always trying to line themselves up with you. If you fly to the far left of the screen, they'll inch forward and then break away, giving you your chance to eliminate them. After the first few big planes, you then have to deal with a new type of big plane. This one drops bombs as it flies overhead and also has a tailgun that basically covers its entire rear, preventing most attacks while it's firing. These are harder to kill, but if the plane is steady or moving upward, you can stay slightly above and hit its tail fin. Just remember not to get caught by the big guns when you make your way back underneath it! A few of these planes come from behind, so never stay fully to the left in this area. If you have Mickey, this fight gets a little easier. His wide shot deals with these new large planes just as handily from the bottom as from the top, which keeps you from flying through the line of fire unnecessarily just to get a shot off. Shortly into this fight, a set of red planes flies by and has a fuel tank, which will refill about 25% of your lifebar. Mighty handy if you got a plane up your tailpipe by mistake. Once you've dispatched all of the big planes, the boss finally appears. It looks a bit like a large transport flanked by two rather large fighter planes. The transport comes up from behind first, then the top plane slides in, and finally the bottom plane shows up. You can get some shots in on the transport before the first plane comes in, and if you're anticipating it you can sit directly underneath the spot it shows up at and hit it as it flies overhead. These fighter planes are weak and go down after only a couple seconds of fire, leaving you with just the boss. (If you take too long with these planes, however, they will both start firing missiles a la the stealth bomber in mission 2) The boss itself is fairly easy; it only fires several bursts of two bullets at a time from various points, which is much easier than it sounds. Just get your shots in where you can, and it'll go down quickly. ---------- Mission 8: ---------- Mission description: 'The target is a battleship called Minks! This heavily armed ship carries a main cannon, a secondary cannon, a launcher, etc. Its striking power is tremendous! If you're not carefull [sic], you'll be turned into a human torch!' Weapons available: Bomb II ($25,000), Napalm ($30,000 or found) Finishing bonus: 45,000 points, $25,000 Finishing quote: 'Our objective was attained! We'll return to base!' This is another short and furious mission, this time out on the sea. You'll notice now that there are boats that fire missiles straight upwards, but most of them come from the rear. Fly behind them while fairly high, then dip down again and eliminate them. Shortly into the level there's a formation of four green planes that fly towards you, turn at the left edge of the screen, and fly away again while shooting. If you fly up to the top and shoot, an astronaut will drop down and wade in the water for a minor bonus. A miniboss of sorts shows up soon after in the form of a submarine. It fires missiles upward and is covered by fighters, but it goes down fairly quickly and should leave you without damage unless you're careless. Another group of fighters follows, and one LARGE group of about 15 planes flies towards you from the front, taking up the full screen. Clear a path for yourself as they pass by, then dodge behind them on the return trip and take out what you can. Then you meet up with the toughest boss yet... A battleship with guns aplenty greets you, occasionally covered by kamikaze fighters. You'll be able to take out the small turrets with only a few shots, but soon after the start you'll see a larger battery up ahead, then another. When both of these are on the screen, your skill in plane placement will be put to a more serious test. It is still possible to position yourself so that the bottom of your gun hits the first battery while both guns will miss you, but it may take a few tries to get the elevation right. Done correctly, though, you'll wipe out both batteries and not have much trouble obliterating the small missile launcher and turrets behind it. Half your troubles are over... Keep blasting away at the control tower and eliminate what you can of it before you're forced to move on. As with the fortress, the second part of the battleship is harder than the first. Note the red turret right next to the control tower; if you're hurting for life, it holds another yashichi (lifebar refill) but you'll have to brave the rest of the ship's guns to get to it. At this point, I like to stay above the first large battery of the second set and fire away with Greg's downward shot. You can stay out of everything's fire and still hit the second battery, damaging it before you finally get to the edge of the ship. Take out the two small turrets (one holds a weapons rack with napalm) and duck down to wait for the return trip. Careful when you wait, a kamikaze plane can still hit you from time to time! After you turn around, your job is simple. Hit both guns using the same elevation trick you did at the start, and clean up any remaining launchers/turrets you missed the first time through. If all the guns are gone, the battleship self-destructs and you get your reward anyway (better than blasting away at the control tower more and waiting!). ---------- Mission 9: ---------- Mission description: 'The target is the arsenal! The objective is to destroy the arsenal and stop the operation! We expect the enemy to fight back with many of their newly developed weapons. Give it everything you've got!' Weapons available: Napalm ($30,000), Napalm II ($35,000) Finishing bonus: 50,000 points, $30,000 Finishing quote: 'This is it! My blood is tingling!' The last full mission! You'll get a few planes at the start and are then immediately greeted by the mission 1 boss! He fires a bit faster and takes more hits than before so be careful while you're taking him on. He shouldn't be tough, though... Once that's done you'll have a full-on battery of pretty much every minor plane while you fly over a conveyor belt that cranks out ground- based weapons that spew flames and missiles. Destroy what you can as you move on, only to discover another conveyor. This one has robotic arms and seems to be assembling the pieces to the boss you fought in mission 4! You'll deal with each piece separately, first the front part with the missile launchers, then the part with the fighter bays, then finally the core itself. Each one can be destroyed as you fly by, but the core itself is trickier than the other two parts. Your best chance to get rid of this part is to stay low and to the left, firing at the side of the core. If you don't manage to destroy it, get by its sprays and move along, you're almost done! You'll get a small lifebar refill before the boss shows up. Of all things, you're essentially faced with a wall of laser cannons. This fight can be easy or rather difficult depending on the approach you take to this boss. I feel the best way to handle it is to fly low so that you're positioned between the two lowest lasers on the column. There's enough room to squeeze between them, so doing so immediately eliminates your danger of being hit by the rather deadly beams. This does restrict your movement, of course, but this turns out to be no problem either. Hang back to the left a bit and fire at the planes that fly up from the bottom as well as the missile launchers that are left on the conveyor. With those threats eliminated as well all you have to deal with are the missiles that the column itself fires. Fly forward when the missiles are close enough to be able to turn and hit you, then slip back again to your original position. This alone should be enough to finish off the boss, but if you're playing for points this is a prime opportunity to increase your score. Just spend your time dodging everything and take out the planes and missile launchers as they come up. As time progresses you'll notice that the planes stop coming out from in front and change type; now they're the white ones that fly up from behind the column and either fly away where you can't hit them or directly towards you in a kamikaze assault. These aren't any harder, but you should take note that there are now also missile launchers directly mounted on the conveyor. They take longer to destroy, but are worth more points! After a while the planes change once more and are back to the original set. When this happens, destroy the boss quickly or the stage will end! ----------- Mission 10: ----------- Mission description: 'This is the last battle! The U.N. Squadron will begin its attack on the Project 4 fortress.' Weapons available: S. Shell ($35,000), S. Shell II ($40,000 or found) Finishing bonus: 500,000(!) points, $50,000. In addition, all cash is converted to points in a 1:1 ratio. Finishing quote: 'This is my last visit! I shall never return!' The grand finale! R-Type fans rejoice, the infamous level 3 is re-enacted U.N. Squadron style! You fly in and immediately turn around, only to nearly get rammed by a gigantic airship. Take out what you can (you should be able to get a missile launcher, turret, and part of its engine before you have to pull away) and just dodge the rest. You turn around again and come in from behind. This ship is bristling with guns and there's barely enough time to take them all out. Start with the double laser dome that greets you, then the missile dome just beneath it. You'll skip forward a bit to four missile bays in the ship's hull itself, which can be taken out either just before or while you're hitting the next double laser dome. One more missile dome and you're done with the top side. If you have Greg, as you fly to the front of the ship you can use his downward shot to hit the nose, which will spare you a bit of time and possible headache as you turn around again and slip down to the bottom of the ship. Now you're greeted with another small turret, a fighter bay, and a missile dome. Take them out one by one. If you're feeling ballsy, that small turret holds a weapons rack with S. Shell II inside, useful for the final battle! It can be hard to get without taking severe damage, though, and flies away quickly. Once you've destroyed everything, you have to take out another part of the engine while a double laser dome, a missile dome and a small turret are gunning for you, not to mention the air mines being dropped from four bays up above! Nobody said this job would be easy... That other small turret holds a yellow fuel tank, worth half of your lifebar! That turret is hard to hit when you're flying backwards, though, and you may have to wait until you turn around again. Eventually you do turn around and are presented with the ship's main thrusters. Now there are two more missile launchers that can't be hit at present. Fire away at the thrusters, preferably taking out the side ones first (especially the bottom!). They fall away after they take enough damage, but you only get the points and money for them if you keep your guns on them until they are totally destroyed. When the middle section breaks off, a small passage is revealed. Now you can hit those turrets! Fire away at them, eventually they'll be destroyed (along with any side boosters you didn't get before, which are quite dangerous when you're not expecting them). Another large chunk of the ship breaks off and falls away and you have no choice but to destroy it before it hits you. The passage goes deeper into the ship, and the final battle commences! On any difficulty level, this battle is pure psychosis. Like mission 9, you're facing a wall of laser cannons, and the ship's core is directly behind that. You can't help but hit the core whenever you fire, so the real challenge is staying alive long enough to do the job! The ship moves up and down as you're fighting, and so do the lasers! This makes little real sense, but is what makes the battle so intensely difficult. Small turrets pop up next to the cannons and fire on you when they get the chance. They're constantly regenerated, so you'll never be rid of them. Just plug away and unload your special weapon into the core if you have one... There is a better way, though, and it is also the key to the ridiculous scores seen in the Twin Galaxies book and elsewhere. The strategy is really fairly simple, but is not quite as easy to actually do. As you make your approach to the core, stay in the very center between the middle lasers and shoot out the gun turrets without damaging the core. When you're as close to the core as you'll get and the ship starts to move, find the nearest opening through the lasers to duck out and through(!) the ship either up or down on the left edge of the screen. While you're in these safe spots the lasers won't be able to hit you, but your movement is extremely limited and the gun turrets will still be able to take a shot at you. When the ship stops moving you have to get back into position quickly or be damaged by parts of the ship you can't fly through. You'll back away from the core, then fly in again and repeat the pattern. This stage doesn't end until you've destroyed the core, so you can keep dodging lasers and taking out turrets for as long as your reflexes and nerves will hold out. If you've finished toying with the enemy and need to wrap things up, just blast away on the sections where you're pulling away from the core and then flying towards it again. This is all lateral movement and presents essentially zero risk to you. ---------------- Mission Special: ---------------- Mission Description: (It's in Japanese, sorry...) Weapons Available: None Finishing Bonus: $30K, points vary depending on time Finishing Quote: (In Japanese) This mission shows up only if you're playing the Japanese romset of this game (Area 88). I have seen it after either missions 3-5, and do not know the criteria for making it come earlier or later in the game. Basically there's an airliner with bombs planted on it, and it's your job to keep the plane from getting blown up or shot down. There's no weapon shop in this mission; you're just thrown right into it! This is actually a very easy mission. You'll destroy three groups of fighters, and as the fourth set flies onscreen the airliner itself drops down, glowing bombs attached to it. Shortly thereafter a timer pops up with 60 seconds, counting down immediately. You have to be careful to hit only the bombs and not the plane itself, as each hit to the plane actually decreases YOUR lifebar! If that's not bad enough, you also lose cash with each hit to the plane. You can't kill yourself by shooting the plane, but you can bring yourself down to the point where one hit will take you out. If you shoot the plane enough, it will eventually go down in flames (sadist!) and you'll get no bonus. There's little else to say about this mission. Just take out the bombs immediately and even if you take a few hits in the process, it shouldn't be enough to down you. There are reports of yet another astronaut in this mission that rides a rocket, but it's not clear yet how to get him to appear. ------- Ending: ------- The plane of your choice flies through the core, blowing stuff up and looking all dramatic. The next scene shows all three planes flying home together with the following dialogue: 'Thus, Project 4's plot was thwarted and peace was brought back to Kutal.' 'That was a brutal war.' 'Ah, we can finally live in peace.' 'Even the sun is shining brighter today.' 'Our mission is finally complete.' 'Now, we can go home!' 'Goodbye, U.N. SQUADRON!' This is followed by a credits roll and the obligatory 'Thanks for playing!' screen by Capcom. There's a small scene that happens at this screen, though, and I've seen only three that I can remember: 1) A unicorn runs to the left, chased by hundreds of little astronauts. 2) A bunch of little astronauts assemble at the top of the screen to spell out 'THANKS' 3) A big astronaut and a little one are walking across the screen and the smaller one falls down. The big one runs back, grabs the small one by the hand, and runs off with it. ============================================ 4. Pickup Recap ============================================ Mission 3: Unicorn (Shield) by destroying all trees on the level, and a yashichi at the very end of the fortress hidden around the last turret. Also a green fuel tank (12.5% lifebar refill) midway through the second set of air mines. Mission 4: Astronaut on the ground near the end of the first set of hidden SAM launchers. Mission 5: Astronaut that pops into the air if all rock pillars are destroyed. It gives you the T. Laser weapon. Mission 6: A blue fuel tank (25%) right before the split in paths, and an astronaut hiding in the ground at the beginning of the upper path. Mission 7: A blue fuel tank awarded in the middle of the dogfight with the big planes and a weapons rack with Phoenix missiles near the end of the same fight. Mission 8: Astronaut near the beginning of the level hidden up at the top of the screen; drops down and wades in the water. A yashichi is also hidden on the boss itself in the second red turret. A weapons rack with napalm is hidden in the third red turret. Mission 9: A blue fuel tank is given by the red tank just before the boss of the level. Mission 10: A weapons rack with S. Shell II is given by the first red turret you come across on the underside. The second one holds a yellow fuel tank (50%). Mission Special: An astronaut riding a rocket? Need more info. ============================================ 5. Contributors ============================================ Sportsdude for pointing out the difference in guns between Shin and Mickey. BBH (lordbbh@aol.com) for information about the unicorn in mission 3, the astronaut in 6 and a correction about how to get the astronaut in 5. #marp on EFNet for various corrections, additions, and other edits. In addition, I'd like to thank Capcom for being the company that they were in the late '80s and through the '90s. They gave us a lot of sweet games, fighter and shooter alike. If you would like to make a contribution to this FAQ, just let me know if you want credit and what information you want shown on this list. ============================================ 6. Copyright Stuff ============================================ Copyright 2001 Brian McLean (bmclean84@hotmail.com). Reproduction for personal use is allowed; any other reproduction without permission is expressly prohibited. E-mail me about requests to host this FAQ.