Streets of Rage series: Part 2

The next game I'm going to review is the second game in the Streets of Rage series. The second game was released in 1992, a year after the first game. The game was also released on the Sega Game Gear and Master System, but those graphics are worse than the Genesis/Mega Drive version.The Game Gear and Master System versions also have different stages and lack the character Max Thunder, so I don’t recommend playing those versions of the game.

The genre is the same as the first game: A sidescrolling beat-em-up. Sega has put in an intro which states the following: One year has passed since Adam, Axel and Blaze took back the streets on the anniversary of their previous victory, the three heroes got together to celebrate, but their happiness was short lived. Adam's younger brother Eddie 'Skate' Hunter contacted Axel shortly afterwards with news that Adam had been kidnapped by a gang of thugs. A photo left in Adam's ransacked house showed a chained Adam at the compound of the crime lord Mr. X. With Mr. X back in town, crime quickly escalated and citizens once again began to fear for their lives. Axel and Blaze must team up once more to defeat Mr. X and rescue Adam. Joining them in the fight is Eddie and Axel's friend, the muscle-bound Max Thunder.

Streets of Rage 2 features much longer levels than the first one, each with multiple settings. It also has weather effects, like rain and mist.
These are the 8 rounds in the game:
--Round 1: Downtown: You start your search in the streets. Trailing them into Barbon's bar, you'll eventually meet Barbon in a back alley, behind the bar.
--Round 2: Bridge Under Construction: Moving across a bridge full of thugs and bikers, you continue your search. The boss Jet, is equipped with a jet-pack and has a few nasty moves up his sleeve.
--Round 3: Amusement Park: Strolling through the park grounds, arcades and the Alien House, where the props explode, and real danger lurks in the fake fog.
--Round 4: Baseball Stadium: You make your way into the baseball stadium, where you find a secret elevator hidden on the baseball pitch which then takes you to an underground fighting ring.
--Round 5: The Ship: Mr X seems to have got himself a private island this time, so you have to take a ship out to it. You fight your way through some cargo decks before emerging on deck to deal with the bikers.
--Round 6: Mr. X's Island: You've landed on Mr. X's island, so you now have to make your way across a beach and then through a jungle with nasty surprises waiting for you that's lurking through the darkness along the way.
--Round 7: Munitions Plant: You make your way across the factory floor, contending with conveyor belts. You then arrive at an elevator, where you make your way up to the roof.
--Round 8: Syndicate Stronghold: As in Streets of Rage, you face all the bosses in the game here. You begin downstairs, then grab an elevator up to Mr. X and then begin the final battle against him.

Just like in the first game, you can play on Easy, Normal and Hard + Hardest. You can also change the amount of lives you have from 1 to 5, so you can make it even harder for yourself.

This time there are 4 characters you can choose from: Alex, Blaze, Max and Eddie, and they all have different specialities except Blaze, because she’s an all-rounder and has 2 of 3 stars on every skill , so she’s average on every skill. There are 5 skills: Power, Speed, Technique, Jump and Stamina. Stamina means how much punishment your character can take.

There are a couple of things that have been changed in this game. First example of this are the graphics, which have been greatly improved compared with the first game. As stated before, rain and mist is added in some stages. Besides that, there are more and better sound effects than in the first game. The soundtracks are edited, though. When you listen carefully you recognise the soundtracks from the first game. But this isn't bad, because they improved the sound so it all sounds nicer than the first game. In this sequel, you even have more weapons at your disposal than in the first game, like a katana or bomb. If you've played the first game, you'll also recognise your enemies. There are some new enemies too, like bikers, kickboxers and robots. Your enemies have names now and there is a health bar added, so you know when they're almost dead. Some enemies got funny names, for example a fat guy who's called Hamburger. What parents would call their son Hamburger? Only when they're pure evil they would do such a thing.

Just like in the first game, you have a special ability. But Sega changed it from the police car to a stronger attack. You can use this ability as much as you like, until the point where your health is almost depleted. Yes, this is the goofiest part of the game. When you use your ability, you lose a little bit of health. I prefer the police car, it's cooler too.

This game just plays like the first one, so if you liked that game, you'll definitely like this one too. Besides the last complaint, I like this game more than the first one. It would've been almost perfect if the police car was still in the game.