In Streets of Rage three young vigilante police officers, Axel Stone, Blaze Fielding, and Adam Hunter, destroyed the evil Syndicate leader, Mr. X, and saved the city from turning into a ruined warzone. Axel, Blaze, and Adam eventually left the city, but agreed to reunite one year later to celebrate. In that year, Axel became a bodyguard, Blaze opened a dance school, and Adam rejoined the police force, and got an apartment with his kid brother in the city. The three celebrated late into the night, and decided to meet again in a year.

The next day, as Axel and Blaze prepared to leave the city, they received an urgent phone call from Adam's kid brother, Sammy «Skate» Hunter. He had come home from school to find the apartment a wreck, and his brother missing. When Axel and Blaze arrived at the apartment, they found a photograph of Adam, chained up to a wall, with a man they knew all too well standing before him: the evil Mr. X.

Mr. X had somehow returned, and now his deadly grip on the city was far, far worse than before. Gangs attacked in broad daylight. Bikers terrorized the streets and highways, attacking anyone that dares drive on them. Muggings, lootings, and murders were taking place far more frequently, and some far worse than before. It seemed like Mr. X was in complete control.

Now, Axel, Blaze, Sammy, and Axel's good friend Max, a pro wrestler, must head out to stop Mr. X once again… hopefully for good…

Streets of Rage 2 features:

• Classic characters
• New moves
• Deadly new enemies
• Awesome graphics
• Two-player action

Streets of Rage 2 is also known as SOR2 or SOR 2.

These graphics are leaps and bounds over the original. Each character in Streets of Rage 2 is a very large size and have a lot of detail. You can see their faces pretty well, and their frame rate is much larger in this one. You get more frames per move to make them look a bit more realistic. So did the enemies they all have more moves now. Streets of Rage 2 game looks like a darker Final Fight now. The backgrounds got a major over haul especially like the beach stage before the beach stage on the original was consider the best this one is even better. Instead of the luminous backgrounds of old buildings and a New York looking skyline, this one has improved on it, and gave the things in the background more definition and more sharpness to them. The enemies look great as well, the guys from the previous version look better than ever now, they have a high resolution of detail to them, instead of looking flat and plain. You can actually tell the different between them and if you looked close you would see their mouths open when they got hit. The bosses looked pretty good as well, they were still large but they to have more detail than the previous version, Mr. X looks about the same as he did last year which was pretty good then.

Streets of Rage 2 have a wonderful soundtrack that matches the original perfectly, it seamlessly blends in with the rest of the game. Some of the music was just imports from the original while other parts have improved tremendously. Some of the music was remixes and some darker beats were added. The opening them is similar to the original version since it is as well just a remix but fits the theme of this game more. Some of the music like the stage ending music sounds exactly he same to give you an at home feel when you play this. The sound effects were pretty good as well, they were all mostly bone shattering and hard hitting, to make the game more appealing and blend in with the rest of the games music. There was some voices but mostly it was just your characters distinctive karate yells, and so forth. The enemies you wouldn't hear like the bosses say come on once in a while, but other than that you didn't hear too much to make the game voices stand out or noticeable. For the most part the music in this game and the sound effects were pretty good, and did well with the graphics to make it rounded on both ends.

In Streets of Rage 2 You have 4 characters to chose from now and they all have unique abilities. This time Blaze possess the even characteristics that Axel use to have. Axel is a power and speed based character but he can't jump, really and doesn't have much stamina. Max is all power but he is slow, and lacks other skills. Blaze is even and Skate is fast because he is the only character who can run, well skate. You have more moves in this one, considering before all you really had was pretty standard when this one came out.

Streets of Rage 2 is the best beat-em-up game ever. No game has come out since its release to knock it from its throne. Now granted, not too many games that are released these days are beat-em-ups, but this game is still the best one around.