10 Best Beat 'Em Up Video Games Of All TIme

4. Final Fight

The Warriors
Capcom

One of the best elements of Final Fight was the ease in which players could cause destruction.

Along with a quick grab attack, where you could pretty much walk into a foe and fling him into a dustbin, each character had a special move that would clear multiple baddies in one go. It was mod cons like this that helped Capcom’s title go from contender to console champion pretty quickly, starting a franchise that has spawned numerous sequels and inclusions in shiny Nintendo collections.

Like the majority of games of this ilk, the aim is to rescue a dame in distress by crossing a gauntlet of sleeveless heavies and pipe-wielding bad boys. In true Capcom style Final Fight boasts colourful graphics, three likeable heroes in pretty pals Cody and Guy, plus bare-chested brawler Mike.

Originally intended to be a sequel to Street Fighter – it was bandied around trade shows as Street Fighter ’89 – Capcom producer, Yoshiki Okamoto, took a development u-turn when he was smacked in the face by the popularity of Double Dragon II: The Revenge and the overall rise in the beat ‘em up. The result was Final Fight, one of the most polished games to graze the genre.

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Shaun is a former contributor for a number of Future Publishing titles and more recently worked as a staffer at Imagine Publishing. He can now be found banking in the daytime and writing a variety of articles for What Culture, namely around his favourite topics of film, retro gaming, music, TV and, when he's feeling clever, literature.