It is an interesting conundrum that Sega seem to be in. They have waited decades to give fans a new Streets of Rage title. Then they don’t even work on it, they farm it out to someone else via licensing agreements – who then pawns the work off to someone else to get completed. If you are having trouble understanding my tone, I am very concerned about the direction we are already going with Streets of Rage 4 here. It is not a good road and it is bumpier than than riding an Amish Uber on a dirt road.

First up, the art style. This is not a pixel based graphic fest running in high resolution. No, Streets of Rage 4 appears to have crashed on the streets of Jet Set Radio but minus anything redeeming about such a collaboration.

Graphics aside, we know they don’t make a game on their own, there is concern with Axel. Dude let himself go. Bad. A few people are comparing him to Axl Rose (lead singer of Guns ‘n Roses) and the comparison fits on so many levels that it is not even funny.

Are they attempting to make Axel an “every man” character of sorts? In the original trilogy of Streets of Rage games Axel was fit, obviously able to kick some butt by just looking at him.

Now, Axel appears to have thrown down on a few too many Taco Bell $5 meal boxes over the years. He is severely out of shape and it is not a good image for the lead character in a fighting game.

Blaze is almost guaranteed to be back in Streets of Rage 4 based on the preliminary footage and screenshots released. There is no sign of any other characters though, no Skate, no Kangaroo, etc. Mainstay enemies are coming back as well, at least a few of them.

Streets of Rage 4 will apparently have some kind of animated intro, maybe cutscenes as well, based on the preview video released. There is the off chance that they leave the animated scenes out of the game though.

The reason I bring this up is because of Axel. In the animated scenes, he is much more reminiscent of his 16-bit era adventures. This is quite a contrast to what Axel looks like in the gameplay footage though. Maybe it is a fault of the cell shaded art style they are going with but it looks like Axel suddenly gains a good 80 to 100 pounds and it is not muscle.

We will have to wait just like you to find out more about Streets of Rage 4. At least it is officially coming, unlike the canceled Sega Dreamcast version.

I am still a firm believer that Sega’s woes this century are due to their turning their backs on the games that brought them to the dance in the first place. Streets of Rage 4 is not changing that opinion at the moment, hopefully the final game is amazing even if it will never live up to the dreams of fans that wanted this 20+ years ago.

Source: Streets of Rage website

Carl Williams

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