Unbeknownst to many, there is a secret lurking inside of the recently released Mr. X Nightmare DLC pack for Streets of Rage 4. While marketing for the expansion focused on its three extra characters, that number is actually incorrect. There are four characters that have just been added, though one comes in the form of a retro fighter.
After a year of fans asking for Roo from Streets of Rage 3 to be added to the game's roster, developers DotEmu, Guard Crush Games, and Lizardcube actually snuck him in without telling anyone. I'm not sure how anyone actually discovered Roo's existence, but he's 100% unlockable and you can even earn an achievement/trophy for using his star move.
Just how do you unlock Roo? It's surprisingly easy and doesn't require any hoops to be jumped through, apart from needing to buy Mr. X Nightmare. Unlike the previous retro characters, you don't need to hit a score threshold before hopping around and boxing fools. You just enter a cheat code on the main menu, then complete a level in story mode.
From the main menu, follow these steps and you'll have Roo added to the roster, bringing the total character count to 21.
- Hold Up and Attack (Square on PlayStation, X on Xbox, Y on Switch)
- Then Press start
- Release all three buttons, then select Story
Choose whichever file and difficulty, then you'll find Roo on the character select screen. From there, simply complete the first level of the game and Roo will be permanently added to the game's roster. If you don't finish the first level, you'll need to re-enter the cheat code each time you boot up Streets of Rage 4 to select Roo.
As for the hidden achievement, it tasks you with having three clowns follow you around. Initially, I thought this referred to the game's survival mode, but summoning a clown is actually Roo's star move. As you can likely deduce, you need to stack three star moves and then summon three clowns at once. Since you need to finish a level to permanently unlock Roo anyway, just stack those stars for the first boss and floor her with your clown army.
With that secret found, it pretty much completes the roster of past Streets of Rage characters within Streets of Rage 4. It would be pretty awesome to see Ash make an appearance, though he hasn't exactly aged all that well. Ash also wasn't playable in the US release of Streets of Rage 3, so that might be part of the reason for his exclusion.
Either way, enjoy bopping fools as Roo now that you know he exists within Mr. X Nightmare!