Rage of the Streets thoughts + SBI ?

[Aluccard]

Okay, so I'm a newbie around here. I really didn't know anything about this whole BOR/DC Emulation universe until about a week and a half ago. I mean, I knew you could emulate games on the DC but I only own a Mac so I just figured it wouldn't work or be far too complicated.

Well, when I was reading the latest PLAY magazine I read the article about the Streets of Rage remake and immediately drove out to my parents house to play it (they have a PC). Streets of Rage 2 has always been my favorite game of all time, so I just HAD to play the remake as I'm sure you can all relate. The game was amazing and I cannot wait until it's released officially for the Dreamcast so I can play it on my own television. Anyway, in all my searching for that game I stumbled across Beats of Rage. I had never heard of this game or any of it's various mods. Needless to say, I was in heaven. Especially when I found out that there was Rage of the Streets.

I know Rage of the Streets came out ages ago and the new version 2.0 is almost here (I sure came on board at the right time!), but it's new to me. Streets of Rage 3 has always been very painful for me. I remember tracking down an import japanese copy when it came out because I couldn't wait for the US release (and then a mega key to play it). I remember how extremely disappointed my best friend and I were when it finally arrived and we played through it. The sound was god awful (there's no sound 1/2 the time or there isn't even noise when you smack or hit people with a pipe!), 80% of the music blew, Axel's new redrawn animation completely sucked, and the graphics and level design were way below SOR2.

Anyway, my whole point is that Rage of the Streets is like the real Streets of Rage 3 we never got. The sound is all fixed and the voices are back to the SOR2 ones, the level designs are way better (no stupid miniature Ed-209 robots or tracking down bombs), and the Music is fantastic (especially level 3 on the boat, that was always my favorite music in SOR1). I also love Level 4...the city with the scrolling background is one of the best I've seen in any of the BOR games. I've played through the game like 6 or 7 times this week, first with every character and then just for fun. I don't know who made this game, the BOR Revolution page says "AxelBlazeAdam", but I know that Christuserloeser has been posting all the stuff on version 2.0. (thanks for all the help with the Gen emu, btw). So, if that's the case, thank you very much. The game is awesome and something I've waited a decade to play. I know it must take an amazing amount of work, but it's greatly appreciated.

Now, that being said, I have a couple gripes. Hey, I'm new so I'm sure all of this was addressed ages ago, but why not. And I'm not trying to be mean, I'm just expressing what I'm dissappointed with.
Axel. I can't stand the SOR3 animation of him. It bugs me so bad that I usually won't even pick him when I play SOR3 (and don't get me started on the yellow and black), so I was so disappointed to see that one being used. I was thrilled that the SOR remake used the Axel model from SOR2. It's weird, because I think the Blaze animation is actually better in 3, but Axel is just awful. Obviously, thats my opinion so I'm curious if you prefer the SOR3 Axel and that is why you used him?
I know Blaze is from SOR3, but Max is from SOR2 so it's obviously possible. Oh how I'd kill to have Axel from SOR2 in it.

Level 1-B seems too similar to SOR2. It would probably be fine if the music was different, but it's pretty much the same enviroment and the same music (never cared much for that tune anyway) and the exact same time during Level 1. BTW, the new redrawn background of this stage looks much better.

The missing moves. I know this is probably unavoidable due to the limitations of the BOR engine, but I miss being able to vault over the enemies or backdrop them. Also when I grab someone (especially with Blaze) I like to to finish off my combo by throwing them to the floor and now she only elbows them. I also think that Blaze's double tap forward move goes a bit too far. It's kindof like a leveled up version from SOR3. However, after playing all the other BOR games I'm thrilled at what moves DID make it in. This is the only one I've played that incorporates more moves for double tapping up and down. When I first starting playing it I was so bummed that Axels flurry was gone until I did it by accident once. I was like "OMG, How did I just do that!?"

So those are my "helpful" criticisms, which are probably way too late since it's coming out in March, but it's worth a shot. If I didn't express it enough before, I'll say it again...I can't wait for version 2.0. Those new backdrops look fantastic, especially 2-B on the Bridge. I think I've gone back and looked at your side by side post about a dozen times this past week.

Now that I've finished my novel there, I have a quick question about SBI's. I've been trying to make a SOR Collection and so far I have all three genesis games and the SMS and SGG ones (wow are those bad!) on one disc, but is there any way to get Rage of the Streets on there also? The only way I see possible is to get an SBI file of it so I can load in multiple SBI's at the beginning.
I've been reading all the turorial files about converting plain files in SBI files, but I don't want a discjuggler or Nero image. I want an SBI file of it like the ones you can download here ("http://dchelp.net/index.php?id=bor"). Is it possible to create those from plain files? And will there be one of these when version 2.0 comes out?

I'm not all that knowledge when it comes to this type of stuff, so I'm amazed I've figured out as much as I have so far and having a mac makes it a bit more complicated. I think I've got most of it figured out now, but the various types of SBI files is still confusing me.

Thanks again for all the help!

[mankrip]

Nice post, wrong section.

Moved from DC Emulation & Homebrew to BOR and AOTB.

[Christuserloeser]

At first I'd like to say that your words are really encouraging me to work harder on the game. Thanks for giving me some more motivation. I've been now working on the game for two years, that's a pretty long time already, so thanks a lot for your inspiration

Okay, so I'm a newbie around here. I really didn't know anything about this whole BOR/DC Emulation universe until about a week and a half ago. I mean, I knew you could emulate games on the DC but I only own a Mac so I just figured it wouldn't work or be far too complicated.

Glad it isn't. Welcome to the scene

Well, when I was reading the latest PLAY magazine I read the article about the Streets of Rage remake and immediately drove out to my parents house to play it (they have a PC). Streets of Rage 2 has always been my favorite game of all time, so I just HAD to play the remake as I'm sure you can all relate. The game was amazing and I cannot wait until it's released officially for the Dreamcast so I can play it on my own television.

Yeah it's a very good game. You can show your support for the Dreamcast version by posting here:

http://kaleth.net/bombergames_forum/viewtopic.php?t=838

I've played SoRR and I think that Rage of the Streets v2 will have quite a few things that are better than in SoRR. Of course, there also are things that always will be better in SoRR, like e.g. the sprite edits.

Anyway, in all my searching for that game I stumbled across Beats of Rage. I had never heard of this game or any of it's various mods. Needless to say, I was in heaven. Especially when I found out that there was Rage of the Streets.

I know Rage of the Streets came out ages ago and the new version 2.0 is almost here (I sure came on board at the right time!), but it's new to me.
Streets of Rage 3 has always been very painful for me. I remember tracking down an import japanese copy when it came out because I couldn't wait for the US release (and then a mega key to play it). I remember how extremely disappointed my best friend and I were when it finally arrived and we played through it. The sound was god awful (there's no sound 1/2 the time or there isn't even noise when you smack or hit people with a pipe!), 80% of the music blew, Axel's new redrawn animation completely sucked, and the graphics and level design were way below SOR2.

I agree with most of your impressions and needless to say I thought the same about Axel and the music back then.

You can consider yourself very lucky not to have played the US version (or as in my case: the slower PAL version). The changes to the original game are way too many to list and ruined the expierence of a new SoR for me even much more than for you.

Anyway, my whole point is that Rage of the Streets is like the real Streets of Rage 3 we never got. The sound is all fixed and the voices are back to the SOR2 ones, the level designs are way better (no stupid miniature Ed-209 robots or tracking down bombs), and the Music is fantastic (especially level 3 on the boat, that was always my favorite music in SOR1).

Hehe, mine too

I also love Level 4...the city with the scrolling background is one of the best I've seen in any of the BOR games. I've played through the game like 6 or 7 times this week, first with every character and then just for fun.

I don't know who made this game, the BOR Revolution page says "AxelBlazeAdam", but I know that Christuserloeser has been posting all the stuff on version 2.0. (thanks for all the help with the Gen emu, btw). So, if that's the case, thank you very much. The game is awesome and something I've waited a decade to play. I know it must take an amazing amount of work, but it's greatly appreciated.

Thank you. The original Rage of the Streets is by AxelBlazeAdam & Albatross. The version included to the Beats of Rage Collection Vol. 2 is slightly edited by me (the sound effects you've mentioned, timing and some minor other stuff). Since then (early 2005) I've been working on Rage of the Streets v2.

Btw, seeing you've mentioned BoR Revolution: This site is abandoned since it's been hacked half a year ago. Try BoRGeneration.com for all your BoR needs.

Now, that being said, I have a couple gripes. Hey, I'm new so I'm sure all of this was addressed ages ago, but why not. And I'm not trying to be mean, I'm just expressing what I'm dissappointed with.
Axel. I can't stand the SOR3 animation of him. It bugs me so bad that I usually won't even pick him when I play SOR3 (and don't get me started on the yellow and black), so I was so disappointed to see that one being used. I was thrilled that the SOR remake used the Axel model from SOR2. It's weird, because I think the Blaze animation is actually better in 3, but Axel is just awful. Obviously, thats my opinion so I'm curious if you prefer the SOR3 Axel and that is why you used him?
I know Blaze is from SOR3, but Max is from SOR2 so it's obviously possible. Oh how I'd kill to have Axel from SOR2 in it.

Well, we actually planned to make the entire SoR2 and SoR1 character cast playable at some point. (Of course one would have to unlocok them). Atm, we still concentrate on improving the original Rage of the Streets with the Bare Knuckle 3 characters though.

I am very happy with AxelBlazeAdam's choice for the characters. The SoR2 cast doesn't represent the latest version featured in an official BK game. BK3 has all moves from the first two games plus some new ones, so it would not make much sense to step back to SoR2's very limited move set and in fact much less detailed characters.

I think to be able to play SoR2 with the BK3 characters is what's really exciting about a SoR fan remake.

Rage of the Streets offers that already to a degree, while Rage of the Streets v2 will have 100% remade characters with all the missing moves on top of that.

This also is a point where I was pretty dissapointed by SoRR because they decided to go with SoR2-Axel yet he plays like BK3-Axel for some odd reason (with many moves missing obviously).

Level 1-B seems too similar to SOR2. It would probably be fine if the music was different, but it's pretty much the same enviroment and the same music (never cared much for that tune anyway) and the exact same time during Level 1. BTW, the new redrawn background of this stage looks much better.

I kinda liked that idea of a new Bar stage similar to SoR2's so I won't touch that.

The missing moves. I know this is probably unavoidable due to the limitations of the BOR engine, but I miss being able to vault over the enemies or backdrop them. Also when I grab someone (especially with Blaze) I like to to finish off my combo by throwing them to the floor and now she only elbows them. I also think that Blaze's double tap forward move goes a bit too far. It's kindof like a leveled up version from SOR3. However, after playing all the other BOR games I'm thrilled at what moves DID make it in. This is the only one I've played that incorporates more moves for double tapping up and down. When I first starting playing it I was so bummed that Axels flurry was gone until I did it by accident once. I was like "OMG, How did I just do that!?"

You would be surprised of what the BoR engine is capable of now... ^^ Read: All the moves are there. I am still working on Weapons, but they'll make it in, as well as custom throws like the one you've mentioned for Blaze

So those are my "helpful" criticisms, which are probably way too late since it's coming out in March, but it's worth a shot. If I didn't express it enough before, I'll say it again...I can't wait for version 2.0. Those new backdrops look fantastic, especially 2-B on the Bridge. I think I've gone back and looked at your side by side post about a dozen times this past week.

Thanks a lot for your comments. I will do my very best to do a release in March. Atm it again doesn't look too good though. There are so many things that need to be taken care of...

Anyway, I am very sure that if you liked the original, you'll love the new one

Now that I've finished my novel there, I have a quick question about SBI's. I've been trying to make a SOR Collection and so far I have all three genesis games and the SMS and SGG ones (wow are those bad!) on one disc, but is there any way to get Rage of the Streets on there also? The only way I see possible is to get an SBI file of it so I can load in multiple SBI's at the beginning.

We've been thinking about a SoR Compilation for DCEvolution. It will contain everything SoR we've collected during the past three years: Music, fanart, patches, etc. This would be the bonus disc for Rage of the Streets.

Regarding the GG/SMS ports: SoR1 is pretty accurately ported to SMS, while the GG version of SoR2 is a billion times better than the SMS port. Still, it's not as good as the SMS port of SoR1.

I've been reading all the turorial files about converting plain files in SBI files, but I don't want a discjuggler or Nero image. I want an SBI file

For Windows there's a tool called SBIBuilder, I don't know if it would work on a Mac with one of those Windows emulators...

Anyway, here's the link: http://sbibuilder.dc-france.com/downloa ... =2&idcat=3

I want an SBI file of it like the ones you can download here ("http://dchelp.net/index.php?id=bor"). Is it possible to create those from plain files? And will there be one of these when version 2.0 comes out?

Rage of the Streets v2 will be a very huge download (about 400-500 Mbyte I would guess), so I doubt it would make sense to release an SBI for it. Anyway, we plan on updating the SBI Repository soon, so there will be a SBI for BoR games - for all of them.

I'm not all that knowledge when it comes to this type of stuff, so I'm amazed I've figured out as much as I have so far and having a mac makes it a bit more complicated. I think I've got most of it figured out now, but the various types of SBI files is still confusing me.

Various types of SBI files ? I am not too sure what you mean exactly. If you could give me more detail, I'll try to help.

[Aluccard]

Hey,

Thanks for you very detailed reponse.
Sorry if I posted this in the wrong spot, I just read that it was for emulators and homebrew games and I saw the BOR folder later. Sorry.

Yeah it's a very good game. You can show your support for the Dreamcast version by posting here:
http://kaleth.net/bombergames_forum/viewtopic.php?t=838
I've played SoRR and I think that Rage of the Streets v2 will have quite a few things that are better than in SoRR. Of course, there also are things that always will be better in SoRR, like e.g. the sprite edits.

I went over there but I'm having problems getting my confirmation password for the forums. The same is true for BorGeneration. Every time I go to BORGeneration to try and download something is says "Forbidden". It always has the top 5 downloads and game selection, but all I get is forbidden. So then I thought maybe I needed to be a member and I've been waiting for my email for over a week. I signed up at Bombergames a few days ago but still no email. I'm bummed...

You can consider yourself very lucky not to have played the US version (or as in my case: the slower PAL version). The changes to the original game are way too many to list and ruined the expierence of a new SoR for me even much more than for you.

Well I bought SOR3 when it finally came out in the US. I had already seen the images of the new colors so I was ready for that. I actually don't mind Blaze's silver color, it's pretty cool. But Axel....I think the color on top of the animation is just torture for my eyes. Back then we didn't have that much game info, so I was hoping a lot of the sound and music problems might get fixed by it's US release. Sadly, it's not true. I think the Japanese version actually played a bit better. All they really did was cover up the girls and take out that gay looking character. I think the character selection images were better on the Japanese version too, but I don't remember. I'll have to pop it in.

Thank you. The original Rage of the Streets is by AxelBlazeAdam & Albatross. The version included to the Beats of Rage Collection Vol. 2 is slightly edited by me (the sound effects you've mentioned, timing and some minor other stuff). Since then (early 2005) I've been working on Rage of the Streets v2.

Btw, seeing you've mentioned BoR Revolution: This site is abandoned since it's been hacked half a year ago. Try BoRGeneration.com for all your BoR needs.

Got it. The BOR vol. 2 is the only one I've played, so that is all I know. I think the sound effects and voices are the main reason the game is so much more playable then SOR3. And it's not quite so fast. Every time I play SOR3 it feels like it's on turbo mode or chipmunk speed or something. Like the game is running too fast and everything can't keep up. And how they managed to totally jack up the voices from SOR2 is crazy. I mean, who at Sega thought those new ones sounded better? It sounds like they are yelling them underwater.

I read about BoR Revolution being hacked, but it's the first site i found with all that stuff so I just kept going back. I would say that 90% of the downloads still work great over there. The bad part is that Rage of the Streets is the one game that downloads perfectly, but then has it's BOR pak missing once it's on my desktop. It figures the one game I want to get on a single CD the most is the one that's corrupted.

Well, we actually planned to make the entire SoR2 and SoR1 character cast playable at some point. (Of course one would have to unlocok them). Atm, we still concentrate on improving the original Rage of the Streets with the Bare Knuckle 3 characters though.
I am very happy with AxelBlazeAdam's choice for the characters. The SoR2 cast doesn't represent the latest version featured in an official BK game. BK3 has all moves from the first two games plus some new ones, so it would not make much sense to step back to SoR2's very limited move set and in fact much less detailed characters.
I think to be able to play SoR2 with the BK3 characters is what's really exciting about a SoR fan remake.
This also is a point where I was pretty dissapointed by SoRR because they decided to go with SoR2-Axel yet he plays like BK3-Axel for some odd reason (with many moves missing obviously).

I've seen you mention the new moves from SOR3 a few times. Which new moves are you talking about? The only new moves that I can think of from SOR3 is the ability to run and the new weapon double tap moves. I guess there was the leveled up moves later on, but none of those were in ROTS. That was one thing I was also disappointed with on SOR3...all the moves were exactly the same with worse animation. I'm sure technically Axel is a more detailed design, but he just looks like they threw a bunch of black on him and made him look beat up. He seems to have lost all personality to me and now he has the whimpiest looking punch ever in a fighting game. And that jump kick? Ack!

I kinda liked that idea of a new Bar stage similar to SoR2's so I won't touch that.

You know what, I played the game again last night (with Axel, yes I suffered!) and I realized that I didn't mind the level and wished I hadn't mentioned it. I kindof like the homage to SOR2. I think it's just that the music never connected with me. Now, my least favorite level is I believe....6? It's the subway station with all the camouflage in the background. I like the pictures of Shiva and Mr.X on the wall though, but the level doesn't look nearly as good as the others. It looks more homemade while a lot of the others look official. Then it follows with the traintrack level (and my most hated level in SOR3, both in design and music) so I was having bad flashes of that.
I was wrong yesterday when I mentioned my favorite level. It's 3-B...the city and water looks fantastic.

You would be surprised of what the BoR engine is capable of now... ^^ Read: All the moves are there. I am still working on Weapons, but they'll make it in, as well as custom throws like the one you've mentioned for Blaze

You don't know how excited I am about this. This is nearly on par with getting a new Axel animation! heh
And that's awesome about the weapons! I never really cared for weapons in SOR2, I used to just throw them off the screen so those sommersaulting ninjas couldn't keep picking them up. But I played SOR3 a couple times yesterday and I was having fun with the weapons. Maybe it's the additional moves with them in that game, but they seemed more useful.

Thanks a lot for your comments. I will do my very best to do a release in March. Atm it again doesn't look too good though. There are so many things that need to be taken care of... Anyway, I am very sure that if you liked the original, you'll love the new one

Hey, it's worth waiting if we get all the moves and now weapons. I am sure I will love the new one. Hell, I've been suffereing through some really bad BOR games lately, so Rage of the Streets already feels miles ahead in comparison. I won't mention the bad ones, but I will say that Dragons of Rage and Final Fight Apocalypse are two of the ones I enjoy the most. They seem to have a better balance of level and enemies. Some of these games barely let you move forward, but throw unlimited enwmies at you nonstop. If you don't feel like you are making much progress, these games get bogged down and repetitive. Oh, and one more thing, I'm not a fan of the unending enemies during the boss fights. My favorite strategy in SOR was to eleminate the little guys and then have the boss to myself. So many of these games just keep pouring the enemies out nonstop, and with so many cheap hits it can get really frustrating.

We've been thinking about a SoR Compilation for DCEvolution. It will contain everything SoR we've collected during the past three years: Music, fanart, patches, etc. This would be the bonus disc for Rage of the Streets.
Regarding the GG/SMS ports: SoR1 is pretty accurately ported to SMS, while the GG version of SoR2 is a billion times better than the SMS port. Still, it's not as good as the SMS port of SoR1.

That sounds awesome. I don't know much about programming, but I am a graphic designer so I've been working on my own packaging for my SOR collection and I've been thinking about ROTS. I'm extremely anal when it come to packaging....and I've been known to buy games on packaging alone! lol
It's sad, every time I get a new mod to work I think "Cool, now I can design packaging for this!" I'm most excited about the SOR ones, I spent hours the other night searching through SOR websites to find all the best art. I wasn't really happy with the packaging on the BOR sites, mostly because they didn't look like official packaging to me. And I still haven't seen anything on ROTS, is there one available anywhere? I'd be happy to submit what I'm working on when it's finished.

For Windows there's a tool called SBIBuilder, I don't know if it would work on a Mac with one of those Windows emulators...
Anyway, here's the link: http://sbibuilder.dc-france.com/downloa ... =2&idcat=3

Thank you. I actually downloaded this last weekend. I'm suddenly making weekly trips to visit my parents now. hehe.
Not only do I get to figure more of this stuff out on PC but I get to play through the Remake again when I'm there. I think I've seen all the various routes the game has at this point.
I didn't really spend much time with SBI Builder, but from what I remember it was only making Discjuggler, Nero, Alchohol images. That's fine, but I still can't find a properly working ROTS plain file download. I'm sure the one at BORGeneration works, but it keeps saying I'm forbidden.

Rage of the Streets v2 will be a very huge download (about 400-500 Mbyte I would guess), so I doubt it would make sense to release an SBI for it. Anyway, we plan on updating the SBI Repository soon, so there will be a SBI for BoR games - for all of them.

Well, it would still make sense for somebody like me who wants to include all the SOR games on one disc. The Genesis, GG, and SMS games take up hardly any meg at all, so they would all easily fit. But I'll take anything I can get. I'd be very happy with a single disc version of V2.

Various types of SBI files ? I am not too sure what you mean exactly. If you could give me more detail, I'll try to help.

Doesn't SBI stand for Self Booting Image? That's what I thought anyway. A lot of the programs I keep trying to use say they create SBI's, but then once I open them they are asking if I want a Discjuggler, Nero, etc. image. Those are still self booting, but on their own. You can't put multiple Discjuggler or Nero images on one disc...at least that I've seen. Or can you?
The only SBI files that I've been able to get multiple ones on a single disc are the types from the Repository.
Am I making any sense here or am I deeply confused?


I went through everything, but I have a couple more questions now.
Is there a copyright infringement on the title choice? Because I see a lot of games like Strider, Final Fight, etc. that keep their original names. But some of the others alter them slightly. Is there a reason that Rage of the Streets is not titled Streets of Rage 4, or Streets of Rage: Subtitle? It just seems like it would feel even more like a true sequel that way.

Also, I have no idea how much work goes into those BOR mods, but I'm guesing a ton. But when a game already exists, do people have to redraw all the animations or is there code or images people can copy. I've seen the tutorials on drawing the character animations and such, but I see so many SNK or Capcom characters appearing in all the games but I don't know if people are doing those themselves or taking them from the original source material. The same thing goes for backgrounds....are they all individually created? Can you take a background from an existing game?
I was playing Final Fight Apocalypse a couple days ago and I noticed that level 3 was directly lifted from Batman Returns on the SNES. So I started wondering they actaully drew that themselves to copy it or they were able to just take it.
So my question is, if they are able to lift backgrounds or characters from a game, has anyone thought of redoing SOR3? By that I mean just fixing the voices, speed and sound effects. I'm sure it's way more complicated then I imagine, but I was just curious.


Again, thanks for your response and all the hard work on ROTS.

[Tyne]

SoR2 Axel looks way better, he looks like a skilled striker fighter while in BK3 it looks like he's trying not to stumble over drunk gah.