SEGA News Bits: Streets of Rage Turns 25 Years Old

On this SEGA News Bits, George and Barry split a trash can chicken and look back on SEGA’s iconic beat ’em up franchise Streets of Rage. Known as Bare Knuckle in its country of origin, Japan, Streets of Rage was SEGA’s answer to Final Fight. Now, 25 years later, many would argue Streets of Rage completely overshadowed the very franchise it set out to compete against. Enjoy the video, and after watching why not play some Streets of Rage? In the comments below, tell us your favorite franchise memories.

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SEGA Retrospective: Streets of Rage – 25 Years of Beat ‘Em Up Greatness

Streets of Rage 25 yearsHow did SEGA’s Streets of Rage/Bare Knuckle become the big franchise that it came to be? Many people in the West know Streets of Rage as a defining video game franchise for the SEGA Genesis/Mega Drive – and they aren’t wrong – it was one of the greatest trilogies to grace the console. Today we will take a look at the early concepts, changes and history of the first title that came out 25 years ago. That is correct, the first Streets of Rage launched just months after Sonic the Hedgehog back in 1991, which was a huge year for SEGA’s 16-bit machine.

So let’s hit the streets and rage on.

SEGA in the Media: Seinfeld’s “The Comeback” has a great selection of Genesis games at Champagne Video

Senfeld1

Spotting video games on TV’s greatest sitcom Seinfeld is nothing new. Longtime fans of series know all about the Frogger episode as well as Jerry’s video shelf which features NES and SNES games sat next to cinematic classics like “Child’s Play 2”. When it comes to SEGA on Seinfeld, however, you’re going to have to look a bit harder. In the eighth season episode “The Comeback”, which aired January 30th, 1997, one of the plots involved Elaine becoming infatuated with a mysterious video store employee Vincent. Meanwhile, Kramer was more interested in the Gene picks. Champagne Video, a recurring location in the series, was the go-to spot for Jerry, George, Kramer and Elaine when they needed to rent some VHS tapes. Throughout the series, the store evolved to feature what were at the time current videos, and in the episode “The Comeback” the set decorator took things one step further by littering the store with classic SEGA Genesis games.

On this installment of SEGA in the Media, we’re going to see how many SEGA Genesis games we can spot! Start browsing the shelves after the break.

Here are the 17 mobile games SEGA have pulled for a lack of quality

MobilePurge
We talked about it before that SEGA planned to drop older titles that they either weren’t going to update or didn’t fit their quality of standards.
The following titles are no longer available on Google Play or iTunes:

  • After Burner Climax
  • Jet Set Radio
  • Super Monkey Ball 1 & 2 
  • Super Monkey Ball Tip’n’Tilt 1&2 (older phones)
  • Altered Beast
  • Ecco the Dolphin 
  • Golden Axe 1, 2 & 3 
  • Phantasy Star 2 
  • Streets of Rage 1& 3
  • Space Harrier 2
  • Virtua Fighter 2 
  • Zaxxon Escape

After Burner Climax has also been taken down from XBLA and PSN, so it makes sense that the mobile version would also be dropped. As for those Genesis/Mega Drive games, SEGA has been trying to have higher quality versions of them starting with Sonic CD, Sonic 1 & 2. SEGA did say; “Given the right situation, these titles may return in an updated form,” so you never know if we will see some of these return.

If you paid for any of the games, you can still download them at anytime on iTunes or the Play Store.

[Via: Eurogamer]

My Life with SEGA doesn’t need a badge to play Streets of Rage 2 & 3

My Life with SEGA’s Streets of Rage three parter comes to an end in the midst of Streets of Rage week at SEGAbits! In part one we looked back on one of the best beat ’em ups to grace SEGA’s 16-bit machine. In part two, Jimmy Mac and myself tackled two player mode for a 2-Man Scramble. Now we take a look at the sequels that followed, the appropriately named Streets of Rage 2 and Streets of Rage 3. Do the sequels live up to the original, or do they fail to reach the excellence of the first game? Punch the play button to find out!

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Streets Of Rage 2 out now on iOS

From out of seemingly nowhere, Streets Of Rage 2 appears for download on the Apple iPod Touch and iPhone. The game will cost you $2.99/€2.39/£1.79/AU$ 3.99 and includes Bluetooth multiplayer, and the Japanese version, Bare Knuckle 2.

The article also mentions that Golden Axe 2, Golden Axe 3, and Streets Of Rage 3 will be available this spring. Cool beans.

[Source: SEGA]

Streets of Rage Remake released after 8 years

[Promotional image showing original vs. remake]

Fan made remake of Streets of Rage has finally been released by the team that has been working on it for the past 8 years. I remember a long time ago, maybe around 2004, I was looking at the site excited for the release.

Now we are in 2011 and can now play it. The final product is massive with over 93 stages in story mode. You can download it below.

Download Here (218 MB)
[Windows only]

[Source: Project Page]