STORY
The story is about three ex cops: Adam (The only black adult in the city), Axel (Who belongs in Final Fight) and Blaze (Just...blaze), who are trying to take down a crime syndicate that has taken over the city and even the police service. So yeah it's what you'd expect in a beat em up like it's basically Final Fight only without the girl getting kidnapped and a mayor who is a wrestler on the side. I know that I haven't said that much about the story but that's it that is all there is to know about it but when playing a game like this who cares about the story anyway.
CONTROL
To start the D-pad moves your character up,down,left and right and ABC buttons(the way i have it) are everything else the A button is used for special attack(the back-up), the B button is the one you'll be using the most because it's your attack button you'll be mashing this button until it get lodged into your controller or keyboard in most cases now a days and finally the C button is used to make your character jump use this with the attack button and you can jump kick. The game controls fairly well compared a game that doesn't have good controls *cough* spider-man return of the sinister six *cough*. I mean there is no delay in all the actions you're trying to do.
GAME PLAY
Again it's what you'd expect you pick a character and fight any and everybody that you see, I know that sounds dull and boring but it really isn't it's very fun especially if you have a friend to play with and the two of you just beat people's brains out and proceed to the boss. Another thing I love about this game is that you don't just punch and kick, you can perform a wrestling move, throw, jump kick(as mentioned above), knee them in the head, and call in back-up to help you out in tough situations. Now doesn't that sound awesome I just wish you can kick them in the....never mind moving on. There are several weapons throughout the game that you can use like a steel pipe, a bottle, a bat and a knife they really help out in situations where you have to face a large group of enemies like 8 or 10 at once my personal favorite is the steel pipe since it has the longest range.
DIFFICULTLY
Despite this game being fun it has that classic arcade beat em up difficulty, now don't get me wrong I like a challenge, I mean challenge is a good thing but after the first two levels it goes from easy to slightly difficult and then at level 4 it goes from slightly difficult to "O-M-G W-T-F" I mean I have died so many times on a boss where I fight twins on a boat that dodge everything you throw at them you can't get close to them at all I tried jump kicking and they just jumped over me and kicked me taking a good chunk out of my life bar and then I said "Oh my god screw this I'm calling in back-up" and when I did I thought they were gonna be easier to beat but the back-up did nothing absolutely nothing(damaged them a little but didn't do much) so you know what I did? rage-quit but sometimes with the regular enemies I get surrounded but that's not really a problem at all it's just that one boss battle and everything after that.
Was that all one sentence?
GRAPHICS
Well it's a genesis game so yeah the graphics are good but I'm not saying all genesis games have good graphics i mean some have horrible graphics but most do look good like this one and it's sequels. The attention to detail is actually pretty good(but not that good) like things going on in the background, paper blowing in the wind, the characters and etc. There isn't much i can say on this topic i mean it's not like X-box 360 standards but it was pretty good back then and it still is now.
SOUND
I love the music in this game from the stages, the bosses, the intro and even the character select screen it's all good(well to me at least). I love it that you can go to the options menu and actually listen to the music and even the sound effects like character grunts and glass shattering i mean wow the creators must have loved what they made to include stuff like that.
REPLAY VALUE
If I ever have nothing to do then I would definitely play this even if I did have something to do I would play this game I could play this game so many times after I have beaten it, if you want to play something for a couple of minutes before you have to go somewhere play this game and this game has multiple endings so you know this is a game that you want to play over and over again.
FINAL VERDICT
I love this game a lot I mean this was a part of my childhood but back then I never got past the first stage anyway despite the increasing difficulty I'd say this is a Genesis classic and it is well deserved of that title because everybody and their mum loves this game so I'd have to give it a 9 out of 10. Well that's my review hope you enjoyed it because there is more on the way.