Bad Export for You: 3. Not necessarily because of the inflated difficulty itself, but because the lowest difficulty setting in the overseas versions, Easy, includes Easy-Mode Mockery that cuts out the last two stages of the game, while the Japanese version's equivalent difficulty level, Normal, lets you play to the very end. In other words, you're punished for playing a non-Japanese version. Also, the Japanese version's Easy difficulty, which still lets you complete the entire game and would've been the overseas versions' Easier Than Easy difficulty, is removed altogether. The story was also completely rewritten and overhauled, turning the Rakushin bombs into just generic bombs, removing the city bombing intro, and sliding in a robot duplicate plot that replaced the Syndicate's attempts to Take Over the World with the Rakushin.
Blooper: In the first game, Mr. X refers to the player's character as a "man", even if they're playing as Blaze, the sole female player character.
B-Team Sequel: The first three games were made by Sega while the fourth was made by Lizardcube.
Colbert Bump: The second game's soundtrack, in particular Stage 3's main theme "Dreamer", saw a brief upsurge in interest thanks to Smooth McGroove covering it.
Content Leak: One of the final trailers for 4 revealed Y Island in the Battle Mode, which was actually meant to be a secret that's exposed when progressing in the Story Mode.
The first game started its development as a spin-off of ESWAT: City Under Siege originally given the development title of DSWAT. This explains the appearance of the police car from ESWAT when using the game's special move.
Streets of Rage being made specifically for a console worked out better as far as not having to downgrade anything, as was common for arcade ports. SoR1 was all right. The second game was great; some have even called it a masterpiece. Final Fight invented the formula, but SoR2 perfected it. It has a great balance of stage space and character definition. Capcom fans may appreciate the Street Fighter II homage/ripoff in the form of "Zamza." (That's Blanka. And Vega. It's Blanka-Vega.) Their decision to go back to the smaller characters with SoR3 was a little mystifying, though. The English release was changed for the worse with the added difficulty, and it had a more experimental soundtrack widely considered to be weaker.
4 had one with Battletoads (2020). Both games were long-awaited sequels to classic beat 'em ups by new studios released in 2020, featuring bright, cartoonish, high-definition 2D graphics. There was also a minor one with The TakeOver, another SOR-inspired urban beat 'em up using pre-rendered 3D models. Overall, 4 was better-received, though The TakeOver clearly paying homage to SOR (to the point of getting Yuzo Koshiro himself on board to compose the Stage 1 theme) and being in development long before 4 was officially announced* while the final release date of The TakeOver (November 2019) was only a few months before that of Streets of Rage 4 (April 2020), its earliest builds date back to 2016 whereas SOR4 was first revealed in August 2018 meant most who played it and SOR4ultimately enjoyed both games.
Dummied Out: Data for the cut motorcycle level in the third game was left on the cartridge close enough to finished state that you can skip to that level using a device like Game Genie, but only for Bare Knuckle 3. The data is completely corrupted in Streets of Rage 3 and is not playable under any circumstances.
Executive Meddling: For the release of Streets of Rage 4 on GOG.com, the game lacks the 2-player online feature (although 4-player co-op is included). When disappointed fans asked Lizardcube about it, they replied that the decision was not theirs, but the game publisher Dotemu. They added that fans should write to Dotemu to convince them to make the feature available to them. Multiplaying was allowed later, but only between GOG Galaxy clients.
Screwed by the Lawyers: Word of God states licensing issues is the reason why the retro soundtrack option in the fourth game does not have any music from the third game.
Sequel Gap: Streets of Rage 4 came out over 26 years after Streets of Rage 3. note To be more specific, SOR3 first released mid-March in 1994 for the U.S. and Japan, with other regions receiving it a few months later in June. The fourth game didn't release until the tail end of April 2020.
Shown Their Work: Skate's special move is an actual breakdancing move called the power windmill.
The unlockable concept art for Streets of Rage 4 shows that several returning enemies and bosses were ultimately left on the cutting room floor, including the Fog bikers, Electra, Mona & Lisa, as well as non-pixel versions of Jack II, Abadede, and R. Bear. All of them would eventually return in the Mr. X Nightmare DLC as retro enemies in Survival mode.
The same set of art for the heroes showed two different playable characters were planned before the final version gave us Cherry and Floyd. The first was what appeared to be a version of Cherry wearing rollerblades, likely as a plan to make her a Skate expy before retooling her into something more unique. The second was a young lad with bangs and used Bruce Lee-esque martial arts judging by his stance, and who also had an alternate costume heavily resembling the Great Saiyaman.
Floyd was originally a much older-looking African American man with the surname Harper instead of Iraia.
Earlier concepts for Dylan show he was going to look like either a Japanese Delinquent (with a schoolboy uniform), an expy of Space☆Dandy, or a Yakuza thug who fought with hands in his pockets. Delinquent Hair included. There were even female Yakuza enemies as well. All were scrapped and Dylan became the final concept to fit the tone of the game better.
Lizardcube toyed with the idea implementing running in the fourth game, but removed it during playtests because the game became a running fest and reduced challenge. Therefore, only Cherry can run (while Adam and Shiva can dash).
Lizardcube had access to the design documents of past games. They thought of implementing the motorcycle level mentioned above. However, the amount of work, animation, and sprites needed for just one level prompted them to replace the motorcycle level with a cutscene.
The fourth game had plans to use the third game's soundtrack as a part of the retro soundtrack feature, but licensing issues prevented the developers from using it.
Dotemu repeatedly lobbied Sega for Joe Musashi's inclusion in 4, but were firmly turned down. His appearance on a graffiti mural in one of the levels is a nod to this.
Word of God: For the series' 30th anniversary in 2021, Yuzo Koshiro posted on Twitter that Axel's uppercut move is supposed to be named Ground Upper, not Grand Upper as often assumed and spelled in the old American manuals, for how he drags his fist along the ground (something made clearer by the fourth game's reveal trailer showing Axel grind his fist against the ground when rushing in to attack Diva, causing it togo ablaze). Sonic Gems Collection actually had it spelled right. With the Mr. X Nightmare DLC in 4 introducing alternate special moves for the cast and providing names for the standard ones, however, it appears that the official spelling is still Grand Upper.
Write What You Know: Estel's haircut comes from a real-life French policewoman one of the fourth game's development team members encountered years earlier.
Other:
There was a comic book based on the second game written by Mark Millar.
that they had played fan games of the series, even specifically acknowledging Streets of Rage Remake.
