The MegaDrive (as well as the SNES) was known for sporting hundreds of memorable and fun titles, and this is one of them.
As the much improved sequel to the original Streets of Rage, Streets of Rage 2 takes place the year following the "defeat" of Mr. X, the final boss. Apparently, it's vengeance time for him; and in doing so he kidnaps Adam, one of the three playable characters from the original. So now, you get to control returning characters Axel Stone and Blaze Fielding, with new characters like Skate (Adam's younger brother) and Max Thunder (the slow pro wrestler). The graphics look very great, and in some areas look impressive (particularly during the ship portion of the amusement park stage). The music from famed composer Yuzo Koshiro [The Revenge of Shinobi, ActRaiser, Beyond Oasis, Super Adventure Island] sounds great, even better than the original's soundtrack (which also sounded great). Controls have improved, in that the special move no longer requires a policeman five screens away shooting from a bazooka. Instead, you have two special attacks; the standing one (no movement + A) and the movement one (left or right + A). What's cool about this beat'em up is that your characters have differentiating attributes: Blaze and Skate (the only character who can run here) are fast, but weak, while Axel and Max are strong, but slow. Sound effects are lifted from the original Streets of Rage, but they sound just as good. Shiva and Mr. X are epic bosses. A very fun beat'em up, even if easy compared to SoR 1 & 3.
Peace!

I am such a typical, cliched, "outside world's stereotype" of gamer, I always pick Cody, Ryu and yes Axel, as my main characters. I have to consciously dabble more, so that I don't miss out on the different attributes and skills of the characters.
Streets of Rage 2 is a great game, one of the greatest retro, console, side-scrolling brawlers.
Cheers for this @Starboy91, the only tiny bit of controversy I can bring regarding this game, is that I still think that its general pace is too slow. What do you all think? In my eyes it would be even greater if it moved a bit more rapidly, I enjoyed the inclusion of a double-tap run in Streets of Rage 3.

I have this on my Japanese Wii as Bare Knuckle II and it's a really nice beat-em-up; I think I like it better than Final Fight even. There's a limited number of continues, so even though you're on a console it still keeps the challenge up to get through it all. Definitely worth a go.

Unfortunately, once I tried Streets of Rage 2, I never looked back at Streets of Rage 1 the same way again because it was slow compared to 2. Streets of Rage 3, on the other hand, I used to think it was the best, although that may come from the fact that I thought it was faster than Streets of Rage 2. Although, SoR 2 & 3 are good games, even though the latter is hard (Western version).

On a side note I missed the guest star appearance of the ESWAT car in the second game. I like it when games companies have little references between a couple of their titles (Golden Axe characters in the Alien Storm arcade version's TV screens would be another example). You can't beat a good old "press one button to decimate the screen explosion", in a retro game.

My neighbor has 1 and 2 on his Genesis. They are awesome.

What's funny is I've always noticed Axel's vague similarity to Final Fight's Cody.
On a side note, I wonder how Capcom's Final Fight (from the arcade) would've seemed like on the MegaDrive? I'll bet it would've looked close to the arcade game, plus I noticed how SoR 2 & 3 have up to ten enemy characters on screen. I think it would've been possible back then.

I have a feeling that I remember reading a letter, before the SNES was out, in classic retro mag Mean Machines which said that Final Fight was heading to Mega Drive. It was always a SNES exclusive, until the legendary Mega CD conversion.
Don't quote me on that, though, my aging memory could be wrong and it is too late to flick through my mag collection now, at 1.35am!
However, any retro fan should check out the Mean Machines Archive's classic mag scans, it was an awsome publication. You will find review scans of all three MD Streets of Rage games as well as the review of SNES Final Fight, over there.
http://www.meanmachinesmag.co.uk/mean_machines_all_issues.php
The US, Japan and Europe have great mags, but for my nostalgia, I always feel lucky to have such an awesome heritage of classic mags in the UK.
**** Edit. The SNES Final Fight review was in Mean Machines's sister publication, Nintendo Magazine System, which came out later when Mean Machines split into separate Nintendo and Sega mags. The NMS SNES Final Fight review is here.
Also the Streets of Rage 2 and 3 reviews were in their sister mag, Mean Machines Sega.The MMS MD Streets of Rage 2 review is here. Enjoy this legendary gaming magazine****

The great thing about the Virtual Console is now people can see side by side how much better Streets of Rage was over Final Fight. I like Final Fight and all but the SOR series just did everything better and SOR 2 has some of the best parallax scrolling in any 16-bit game.

...as well as Sonic 2, and Ristar, and Akumajou Dracula X Chi no Rondo, and Contra III, and Kirby's Dream Land 3, among others. :3 Parallax scrolling FTW!!!

Mega Drive Thunderforce IV by Technosoft (1992) had such gorgeous parallax. Twas luv-er-ley.
**** Edit. I feel obliged to include a video, I hope that @Starboy91 does not mind, because it is off topic, but the clouds are so lush:
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I have Streets of Rage 2. AWESOME GAME !!!!!!!!!!!!!

That's okay, JamieO, I don't mind at all. Thanks for sharing.

God, I would love to see the Thunderforce series show up on Virtual Console. Is Technosoft still around?

Streets of Rage 2 is definately one of the best side scrollers of all time. Final Fight on the SNES doesn't come close - I think the only 16-bit home side-scroller that beats it is Final Fight CD.

I still love Final Fight though, but I can't bring myself to play it unless it has Guy, the missing stage and the 2 female enemies - it's just not Final Fight without those. I'd love it if the Mega CD version was released on the Virtual Console but I'd settle for the arcade too. In the mean time I'll have to make do with ... well nothing really.

SOR 2 - Good game, but sadly a bit slow in 50Hz regions...

I actually prefer SOR 1 in some ways as was the second Megadrive game I owned, after Sonic.
I got it for Christmas (around 1991, I guess) and managed to wake up the entire house playing Yuzo Koshiro's amazing soundtrack at an insanely loud volume first thing in the morning.

Fond retro memories

come on already streets 4

Maybe someday I should converse about Streets of Rage 3.

Best beatemup, period. Not even Ninja Turtles or the Simpsons beats this one out.

SOR2 FTW!!!!!!!!!

There's something about that boxart that kinda irks me, don't know what. Maybe it's the way Max Thunder looks; maybe it's the fact that Blaze is wearing a blue shirt with skimpy jean shorts (why Sega couldn't have kept it like that I'll never know); or maybe it's the expression on Axel's face.