One of the most exciting things about Streets of Rage 4 is the ability to play as classic characters. Not only do they have an abridged move set, they’re also sprites and remain true to their original games. However, unlike the basic four characters and the one additional you get from story progression, you need to unlock these characters. Thankfully it isn’t too hard but it might take a while.
How to Unlock Classic Characters
To unlock classic characters you need to achieve specific lifetime point goals. These can be seen whenever you finish a level and will unlock a new character each time you hit one of the markers. Unfortunately, you’ll need to go in order of Streets of Rage, Streets of Rage 2, and finally Streets of Rage 3, meaning certain characters will take much longer to unlock than others.
How to Maximize Points
There are three ways to maximize your points. For starters, higher difficulties will offer more enemies, which in turn have a higher potential for points. Even if you’re not the best, hard is fairly manageable and should be done once you get a good feel of things.
From there, focus on earning and maintaining combos. This is going to be the difference between an 8,000 point run and a 26,000 point run. The best tip I can give is when in doubt, hit barrels or throw weapons. Hitting either will count as a hit and reset the timer.
Finally, depending on your skill, eating food with max health will give you additional points. Often times I’ll eat both meals during a boss fight for points and provided I don’t do too bad, it will yield more points in Streets of Rage 4. You just got to be smart and not be afraid of planning accordingly. Like if you’re critical and see a turkey dinner and the apple, eat the turkey for max health and then snag the apple for points. The opposite is also an extremely smart play, assuming you gauge it correctly.
