‘Streets of Rage 4’ Knocks Into 2019 With New Screenshots

One of this year’s biggest surprises was the announcement of a new Streets of Rage game, being worked on in a partnership between DotEmu and Sega. It promises to be a fun addition to the beat-em-up series, even though we’re still waiting for platforms to be confirmed. (Switch, please?)
That said, DotEmu decided to ring in the New Year with a nice one-two punch, as it’s debuted a handful of new screenshots for the game along with a small bit of footage provided in the tweet below. It really gives you an idea of the hand-drawn aesthetic that the developers at LizardCube are going for, though the brawling action still looks entertaining.

Let’s check out each of the screenshots below!

The Streets Are Back

In this shot, we get a good look at Axel hammering away at a few punks. Some of them might be quite familiar, like the punk that initially appeared in Streets of Rage 2 back in the 90’s. But the art design of the level is quite different, showing beautiful shadowing and even some stuff that looks like you can bash open, revealing some healing food or even a helpful weapon to take down foes. Dibs on the lead pipe!

In the Dark

And here’s yet another great screen in a much darker setting, as Axel prepares to take on a plethora of goons with some help of Blaze. This confirms that the game will once again have two-player co-op, just as the previous Streets titles did. No word yet if “friendly fire” will be turned off or not, so maybe watch where you land your punches there, yeah? Save ’em for the bad guys.

How’d You Get In Here?

It looks like Blaze has herself in an interesting predicament here, investigating the inside of an apartment while coming across an officer with a neon riot shield. More than likely, one of her special moves should make quick work of that shield; and then she can move in and finish off her opponent with a combo or a suplex. We’ll have to see what new moves she has in her arsenal when Streets of Rage 4 rolls around. Is her fireball coming back?

A Boss Character?

In this scene, we get a look at a female opponent who looks to be just as tough as Axel. No word yet if this is a boss or just another one of the thugs you’ll face as you make your way across the city, but you’ll want to prepare for a fight either way. Hopefully we’ll see a mixture of diverse bosses in Streets 4, just as Streets of Rage 2 and 3 provided. Hey, is there a good chance we’ll see Roo the boxing kangaroo again? Because he’d certainly be fun to watch.

A Juggling Act!

Last but not least, a quick snippet of gameplay went up on IGN’s Twitter account over the weekend, giving us a few precious seconds of in-game action. Streets looks great thus far; and there’s an interesting new component here as you can apparently juggle thugs in the air between your two characters. This could make for some great team-up attacks especially when you’re going up against bosses. We can’t wait to give this a shot.

Streets of Rage 4 is due sometime in 2019, though platforms haven’t been confirmed yet.