5 classic beat ‘em-ups you must play at least once – Reader’s Feature

metro.co.uk:

A reader names his five favourite beat ‘em-ups from the 80s and 90s and hopes that the genre will continue to see a modern resurgence.

When it comes to scrolling beat ‘em-up games there are many that have managed to win the admiration of gamers across the world. The release of Streets Of Rage in 1991 created the standard for these types of games, showing exactly how they should be done, but until recently there have been very few new ones.

In the late 80s early 90s there was an era when these games proved that with the right people and design team you could get a great brawler even on limited hardware.

Here are five classic 2D and 3D beat ‘em-ups that you certainly should try out and at least play once, to see exactly what they have to offer and how they still remain playable today.

If you have played Streets Of Rage, then you are going to love playing this. After the genre began with Renegade and Double Dragon in the mid-80s, Final Fight revamped the concept in 1989 – two years before the first Streets Of Rage. Final Fight still remains playable today and while there hasn’t been a new entry in a while many of the characters have appeared in sister series Street Fighter. The original was never ported to the Mega Drive (although there was a Mega CD version) but it did become a key early title for the SNES, and an important demonstration of its arcade quality graphics.

Another one of the greatest 2D fighting games ever made, the first and second games were masterpieces made by Sega. Although they were very similar to Final Fight in terms of graphics and gameplay they became just as famous for their techno soundtracks as their action. The three Mega Drive games seemed as if they’d be the only entries