Streets of Rage 3

­

Streets of Rage 3 is the last part of this Beat-Em-Up series, known as Bare Knuckle in Japan. You know, Final Fight alike where you can move to front and rear of the screen and can grab enemies just by moving toward them. It was developed by Sega of Japan, their Sega CS division. I wonder if makers of SoR2, Ancient, were involved as well. It came out in 1994. 24 Megabit ROM.

The game that you have here is nothing more than emulation of Sega Genesis version.
It includes the censored and made harder US and EU version, with latter running 16% slower both in gameplay and music. And it includes original JP version Bare Knuckles 3 too!

Now, technical part about Sega's emulation here:
The Sega Classic games that you purchase on Steam count as DLCs for "Sega Mega Drive & Genesis Classics" game that should appear in your library.
It has Bedroom HUB which is the one with many features yet lags for many and Simply Launcher which lacks Workshop and Online but at least it works just fine for everybody.
However, Simple Launcher has it's fair share of glitches as well. It can crash. And it does the second time you go to main menu, so always quit after saving there so it doesn't crash when you want to save next time!
Emulation itself, mostly sound, isn't that good but it does it's job. Also, yes, emulator supports quick saves.
As alternative, you can use external emulator to run games that you purchased. Sega kindly placed in all games that you purchased in "uncompressed ROMs" folder that program itself doesn't use, just change file extension to ".bin" or so. The file for this one being "STREETS3_.68K".
I also demand you to read digital manual of this game first. You can find it here on store page or go to "manuals" folder of game root and open "SoR3_PC_MG_EFIGS_WW_HR.pdf".

Though you may want to look up some moves in scans of JP ref sheet or on GameFAQs.

Has online (in Bedroom HUB only) and local multiplayer. But for online you can choose only US version!

And it's one of games to use 6 buttons controller, yep.


Next goes US version review as it was the only one available back when I wrote this:

The gameplay core is usual Final Fight style. Move anywhere on battlefield, attack left and right, get close to grab. Use Specials to get yourself out of trouble and for beat down. Streets of Rage 2 was a slow-paced game that focused on making each punch feel meaty. SoR3 goes in a different direction, increasing the pace, complete overdrive. Every character can now dash by tapping direction key two times, enemies zip around.

In order to fit to hectic pace of the composers changed the music style around. It's now upbeat techno while going more weird in more ambient pieces. It's not as melodical as previous two games but fits perfect. Devs also changed the art style around, keeping the big sprites but giving them realistic look. Doesn't look too good in spots. Yea, the night romance is gone. And why did they change the perfect hit sounds of SoR2?

Thanks to 6-button controller, you can pull off backward attack with Z button and the final hits with Y button. You can roll up and down by pressing two times there. Western version actually made it go farther.
Protip: Press Up+Jump when thrown to land onto feet.

Every 400k points you get a star, up to three, – a level up for your F-F-Attack. You lose one star if you die. There is alternative for 6-button controller – if you press X and then input certain motions on D-Pad then you will pull of a certain upgraded version no matter how many stars! However it's so awkward that I prefer making look that this method doesn't exist.

You got 4 characters to play as, all of them have their own playstyle. Axel and Blaze are back. I think Blaze got slightly buffed in western version. While Skate's dash isn't unique to him anymore he is still the fastest character in this game and isn't as pathetic as he was in SoR2. Max, being a slow grabber that wouldn't fit to new pace, got replaced by Dr. Zan, who was made into cyborg by Dr. Dahm, who's main features is the reach of attacks. He also turns all weapons into energy ball and always yells “Powerup!”. I find all of them balanced.

There are unlockable chars, none can use weapons. There is kangaroo. Has no throws but delievers non-stop punches. He was buffed in Western version in both attack and jump. You can get him by not killing him in Stage 2. Now Shiva requires cheat code and feels unfinished. He does have best reach and Z button attack allows for infinite. Ash, miniboss of Stage 1, also requires cheat code but he was cut from Western version due to being homo. He is another unfinished but powerful character.
Protip: When held behind press jump and then attack to throw opponent away.

Weapons are back and, just like in SoR1, you don't drop them when you grab somebody. You can use Z button to throw them or to swap weapons with the one on ground. While keeping “3 knockouts and out” rule for weapons they also added hard-limit use-bar. It sucks but then each character specializes in weapons differently, which is awesome, and some even replace their special attack, so use-bar makes sense.

It's a shame that stages in this game aren't insired until the end of the game. At least one has pits that were missing from SoR2, yay! The game has two different final levels. If you do good on Stage 6 then you go to Jungle Base. You get either totally bad or good ending depending on if you beat final boss that is awful “cheese or die” one.
Otherwise you are going to White House. Oh, sorry, “City Hall” as written on a gate. Did I tell you that Sega of America remade story to plothole-filled one? Shame that this path leads to somewhat-bad ending as it's a cool SoR style final.

SoA in localization also decided to change outfit colors of main heroes to “gender neutral”. Quite ugly. And they covered up enemy women. At least new voice samples aren't so bad and sound engine got fixed.

As for options menu, there are sound test, controls. Amount of lives per continue. And oh boy, difficulty.
SoA not only censored game but also upped each difficulty so BK3 Hard is now SoR3 Normal. They increased the damage on each difficulty that enemies do and gave bosses extra health that drags them out.
They do say that BK3 lacked hard difficulty but yet. Plus, “gamers back then loved hard games” which means “they rented more”. It's too bad that they made Easy mode end after Stage 5, giving you a hacked up ending.

I hated these changes at first and was cursing SoA. Then I played some more and realized that it's a case of public opinion having an impact on me: the game isn't unfair. It's fun, just take some practise like other Genesis games.

Not only SoA take but they also gave. There is a strenght bar that regenerates over time. At full the A button special doesn't take any health away, dropping strenght to zero. But the less you have it the more health it takes and less effective it is. In BK3 at worst it could take almost 1/4 of the health bar! In SoR3 at worst it takes SoR2-like tiny amount, if not less. As a result you should use them often for offensive and always for defensive, when grabbed. Use it!

Ah, there is multiplayer. You can play the game in coop mode. With friendly fire. Good fun. They brought back team attacks from SoR1. Just grab your opponent and either jump over or throw him away for high-damaging air attack.

Well, or you can play Battle Mode against each other. Just a silly bonus, it's not Street Fighter. Catching each other and out-abusing specials. At least the game is fast.

While this is indeed one of the worst localizations ever due to SoA touching more things that it should, gameplay-wise SoR3 is more than valid. Recommended for hyper action!

The 3rd and final installment (not counting Streets of Rage remake) of the Streets of Rage trilogy. This may be the version I played the most when growing up, not because it was the best, but because it was the longest, and most challenging (in my opinion). The Steam PC port is also of lesser quality than the previous two games with a number of glitches not found in the original Sega Megadrive version. Despite the poor port, the game is still very playable and enjoyable with smoother controls and faster paced beat 'em action. In general, the stage locations are less interesting than its predecessor, Streets of Rage 2, but the story does get more ridiculous to the point where you end up fighting an army of robots. Despite the iffy story line and obvious plot holes that come with it, Streets of Rage 3 still provides many challenging hours of fun with a co-op partner or on your own (co-op is definitely harder than single player).

Pros:
+ Smooth and improved controls enabling all characters to run, and roll in the z-plane
+ Faster paced combat
+ special moves with weapons
+ Weapons don't drop when you grab someone
+ Long stages, and challenging game play
+ Local co-op
+ Gamepad support (I used a PS3 controller)
+ Pixel art graphics
+ Multiple endings
+ Special moves more useful now that they have a cooldown so you can use without losing health
+ Throwing enemies no longer can hit your co-op partner
+ A feeling of nostalgia

Cons:
- Weapon have a life bar, so are limited use
- Less interesting stage locations (some get quite tedious like the train locations)
- The second part of the train stage, there really isn't much room for co-op fighting
- Unbalanced life bar, a 3-hit combo from a basic enemy (Donovan) can take away half your life
- Some enemies move ridiculously quickly (most likely a bug, as they were never that fast in the original)
- Story line has gone down hill since the first two games
- The timed sections can be irritating
- Enemies not affected by conveyor belts
- Have to watch out for some enemies falling on you while holding knives or with their legs out
- Enemies hide off screen all the time (even more annoying in the timed stage)
- Still too easy to grab your co-op partner by mistake

My Score: 7/10

This game is awesome, if the bgm doesn't make your ears bleed

Streets of Rage 3 is exactly what you'd expect, it's a fun beat-em-up with a great sense of nostalgia behind it for me, a very great classic and a beloved fighting series