genuinely one of the best beat'n up games I ever played, everything oozes polish in almost every single aspect especially on the combat and presentation.

the combat might the best in the series and in the genre as a whole, they incorporated fighting game mechanics to the recipe with wall bounces, juggles and an free-form combo system, the controls are smooth and intuitive making combat an joy throughout.

the presentation is also great, the new art direction is slick and full of style, the music is equally great, maybe not on the level of the second game but still memorable and full of bangers.

the extras are also great, costumes for characters and an good replay-value if you want to beat the campaign with all the characters since all of them has their special unique abilities and traits, there is also an full-fledged training mode in the game which is fantastic to learn it's mechanics and combos thanks to the practice options for each character.

the difficulty is once again tough like in the rest of the series but this is by far the easiest I played coming from 3 harder titles, I found the more fairer difficulty to be welcoming though, the levels are short and well-paced and most of the difficulty was fun to overcome.

overall Streets of Rage 4 is an gold standard for the genre and an example on how to bring back an old IP in my opinion, definitely an must-play.

This took a few patches, playthroughs, a co-op session, and a DLC to really click with me. Once it did, however, this is a very solid beat-em-up that does enough to set itself apart from its predecessors while also keeping a lot of the characters, style, and vibe.

A big change from the original trilogy of games is a far more hardcore focus on combos using special attacks. There's more fighting game style moves where you can launch enemies off the ground, bounce them off walls, and even pass off to another player. This felt really awful to me at first given how sluggish Axel felt on day one, but over time and patches and playing other characters, this system is incredibly tight and benefits playing risky and fast to keep your score going. A very challenging time, but one that once you get to grips with it, is immensely satisfying.

The soundtrack is a massive highlight as well having an all-star line up from Tee Lopes, Motohiro Kawashima, Yoko Shimomura, and many others contributing to a banger after banger soundtrack. The DLC especially includes some of the heaviest songs in the game and add so much fun and flavor to an already diverse soundtrack.

Really my only gripe with this game is the endgame stages tend to drag on for too long with bosses that I'd describe as obnoxious more than anything. However the whole package does a lot to make those complaints fairly minor. Grab a bud or two and give this a swing, it's a rippin' good time.