The passage of time hasn't been kind to Streets of Rage, reducing much of the appeal to its atmosphere and excellent soundtrack. This is true of a lot of early Genesis games, which were altogether a lot more rough than what Nintendo launched with on the SNES, but they still have their own undeniable charm.

Streets combat is fairly bare bones. You'll see others compare it to Final Fight, usually despairingly, and they aren't exactly wrong. Gameplay is a lot more shallow and enemies are fairly repetitive. The difficulty ramps up in a pretty harsh way that doesn't feel great, too. And yet, I just keep coming back to this thing. The music is phenomenal and probably the single biggest stand out feature of the game. These tracks hold up, it's a soundtrack you can easily throw on and just listen to, and it perfectly captures the mood of the dirty neon lit streets you brawl your way through.

As with any brawler, I'd suggest playing with a friend. This is especially true if you want to enjoy the twist ending, which I won't spoil in the off chance that you aren't already aware.