Beat 'em up

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Action games
Subgenres Action-adventure Metroidvania Battle royale Fighting Beat 'em up Hack and slash Platform fighter Platform Rhythm Action RPG Shooter Artillery Arena First-person Hero Light gun Third-person Tactical Shoot 'em up Bullet hell Twin-stick Sports Racing Stealth Survival Vehicle sim
Topics Capture the flag Cover system First-person shooter engine Free look Quick time event WASD keys
Lists List of battle royale games List of beat 'em ups List of fighting game companies List of fighting games List of first-person shooters List of freeware first-person shooters List of third-person shooters List of survival games List of light gun games List of maze video games List of platform games
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A beat 'em up (also known as brawler and, in some markets, beat 'em all^[1]) is a video game genre featuring hand-to-hand combat against a large number of opponents. Traditional beat 'em ups take place in scrolling, two-dimensional (2D) levels, while a number of modern games feature more open three-dimensional (3D) environments with yet larger numbers of enemies. The gameplay tends to follow arcade genre conventions, such as being simple to learn but difficult to master, and the combat system tends to be more highly developed than other side-scrolling action games. Two-player cooperative gameplay and multiple player characters are also hallmarks of the genre. Most of these games take place in urban settings and feature crime-fighting and revenge-based plots, though some games may employ historical, science fiction or fantasy themes.

The first beat 'em up was 1984's Kung-Fu Master,^[2][3] which was based on Hong Kong martial arts films. 1986's Nekketsu Kōha Kunio-kun introduced the belt scroll format employed extensively by later games, while also popularizing contemporary urban settings, while its Western localized version Renegade further introduced underworld revenge themes. The genre then saw a period of high popularity between the release of Double Dragon in 1987, which defined the two-player cooperative mode and continuous belt scroll format central to classic beat 'em ups, and 1991's Street Fighter II, which drew gamers towards one-on-one fighting games. Games such as Streets of Rage, Final Fight, Golden Axe and Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles are other classics to emerge from this period. In the late 1990s, the genre lost popularity with the emergence of 3D-polygon technology.

In the 2000s, a sub-genre of 3D hack-and-slash games emerged (also known as "character action games"), adapting the beat 'em up formula to utilize large-scale 3D environments, with popular franchises including God Hand, Devil May Cry, Dynasty Warriors, God of War and Bayonetta. Since the 2010s, traditional 2D beat 'em ups have seen a resurgence, with popular titles such as Dungeon Fighter Online, Dragon's Crown, Streets of Rage 4 and Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles: Shredder's Revenge.