<I am 100 percent aware that there's a page for Bare Knuckle III. However, I'm sharing the review here since I imagine "Streets of Rage 3" is what most people are going to put in the search bar and I wanted to encourage people to try out the JP version before dismissing the game>

Your experience with this game is going to hinge on whether or not you're playing the American or Japanese version. I think a lot of the hate stems from the fact that this game got outright butchered in North America.

They got rid of one mini-boss due to (probably) homophobia and decided to up the difficulty in ways that are far worse than what was seen in Dynamite Headdy and Contra Hard Corps. Not only is damage scaled higher (like Dynamite Headdy's localization), but the speed of the enemies is also shot way the fuck up- it reminded me of what happened when I tried playing a PAL ROM of Power Strike II on NTSC hardware. It just felt broken and I'd originally shelved the game years ago before even making it beyond the junkyard.

Then I booted up an English patched rom of the original version (Bare Knuckle III) on my everdrive and what a difference. Everything clicked and made sense. Pacing was on par with something modern like Fight 'n Rage (a game I love btw) and not once did it feel unfair.

If I had any real gripes outside of the usual monotony that the genre is prone to, it's that the star system is kinda silly. Essentially, you'll gain more moves if you break a certain points threshold without dying and these can be especially powerful. Die, however, and you lose a star. This would be a great risk/reward system if it weren't for the fact that the six button controller allows you to perform these at will. If you hold the X button down and perform a circular motion (at least with Blaze) you'll be able to do them, and even as a non 1v1 fighting game player, these were piss easy to pull off and always take a considerable chunk of life away from enemies. I'm guessing Sega may have done this as a way to peddle more six button pads back in the day.

Some also point to the music as being lackluster compared to SOR1 and 2, and I unfortunately have to agree. There are a few decent tracks here, but even the best don't nail the vibe of the first two entries.

Still, I think the improved pacing (as well as the ability to run and roll about) is what helps Bare Knuckle III stand out in a good way. The star system was a nice touch, but is ultimately trivialized just by going with a six button setup. If Sega hadn't fumbled in localizing it so badly, I think it'd have a better reputation these days.

This is a surprising amount of fun and has had me hooked for a good five days now; there's genuinely a lot to do on the daily checklist and, even without money, you can genuinely feel your character gets stronger in real time.

Then today's event came out and, attached to it, is an active incentive to spend money that isn't just consumbales that level up specific areas of a character for min-maxing. This is, for the next 48 hours, a wheel that gives you an entirely RNG multiplier on real money you invest in it as cashback in virtual currency.

I just watched a guy spend 50 euros on this wheel in real time, get 3 times his money back as payout, spend 90% of it on hammers to raise his power level by 2-3 MILLION, brag about it in the world chat, spend 5 minutes in chat with the number 1 in server (a terminally online user who he's still 1 million away - each stat level up costs exponentially more than the previous one - from despite just spending the equivalent of 150 EUROS, imagine how much money this guy spends for the ego boost to stay number 1) fellating each other, then spending the remaining money on a limited event mount (that is usually a 0.15% pull on an another RNG wheel) so he can then post the stats of it in the same chat for ass pats for a secondary fellating endorphin session.

Good game if you're able to switch off from any competitive play and admit you're never getting in the top 50 if you don't have 50-150 euros lying around every single season. I've been dropping 99 cents here and there just for the spirit of the whole thing (3 times, mostly on little frivolous packs that give an extra dungeon key for example) but I think this puts me off even doing that now unfortunately.

Oh, also conversion isn't calculated based on currency either, so expect to spend more if your currency is stronger and less if it's weaker than the dollar. It's frustrating because some of these gacha games are genuinely fun to the point where they do get pretty addictive, but they really only serve to stimulate the primitive conditioning to be the best at something and that's where they achieve their predatory success - from people like the little 50 euro hero of my story.