I loved the SNES game as a kid, one of my favorites, although I had never beaten it. When I revisited the game in my teen years and beat it, I wondered more about the real story behind the game and took a closer look.
I thought, "why the hell is Shin so happy that he killed a bunch of people?"
I learned that U.N. Squadron derives from Area 88, originally a manga series. I kept digging deeper into each incarnation of the story.
The manga, the anime, the arcade game, the 2004 anime remake. Shin’s character and situation just fascinates me. As you might guess, the story in the game doesn’t quite do justice to the manga.
Spoiler
The real Shin is a tragic hero. He has many feelings about being contractually obligated to kill people. Happiness isn’t one of those feelings. Crazy as it sounds, sometimes I feel trapped like he does in Area 88. He got dealt kind of a crappy hand in life.
The Area 88 OVA is great. As of this post, you can find it on YouTube if you’ve never seen it.