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The Beat 'em Up Is in Arrested Development (Patreon)

Published:
2026-03-09 15:01:16
Imported:
2026-03

Content

KC Nwosu's latest video essay is on Scott Pilgrim EX, and how the beat'em up genre is in a state of arrested development.

Files

The Beat 'em Up Is in Arrested Development

KC Nwosu's latest video essay is on Scott Pilgrim EX, and how the beat'em up genre is in a state of arrested development. The Scott Pilgrim franchise might be perfectly suited for its adaptations into the beat ‘em up genre—it’s flooded with retro video game references and iconography, and the driving force of its original plot sees Scott fight increasingly dangerous and larger-than-life caricatures of toxic ex-partners in order to date his dream girl Ramona Flowers. But it’s also uniquely attuned to the genre in another thematic way. The actual nuance of the Scott Pilgrim story highlights his refusal to mature into a responsible adult, and similarly, the beat ‘em up genre has stagnated since its height in the ‘80s/‘90s arcade era. Almost every new release of a side-scrolling beat 'em up today is a retro-tinged look back at concepts or franchises from over three decades ago. Double Dragon, TMNT, and Marvel were the big names of that era, and in the last several years, we’ve seen new entries from all of these IPs but little in the way of innovation. Scott Pilgrim the character and the beat ‘em up genre as a whole both seem to suffer from a case of arrested development. Support us on Patreon: https://www.patreon.com/SecondWindGroup Second Wind Merch: https://shop.secondwindgroup.com/

Comments

Thanatos_DTH1

Have you considered the Batman(hork) Arkham series in the light of an updated beat-em-up?

Tim Wilson

Surely beat em ups evolved to become spectacle fighters or games like Yakuza? In terms of side scrollers, I suppose there was only really so much they could do, though we thought that about platformers before Shovel Knight, Super Meatboy etc al so maybe we’re just waiting on the next big reinvention?

William Alexander

Really enjoyed this entry and analysis! Looking forward to more in this series and from KC

KC Nwosu

Yes! I would for sure consider the Arkham games as having Beat 'em Up lineage

Ronny Cook

Th Soul-like genre is very much an evolution of both beat-em-ups and RPGs, and in some cases (like the World Invasions in Demon/Dark Souls) even retains the PVP elements. The BEU genre is fairly narrowly defined, but its DNA is all over the place. The arrested development is partly because most significant changes move the game out of the genre.

DNJ

I wonder if this is because Brawlers are typically designed to be pick up and play with friends, so the design has to maintain a degree of simplicity. And because of that, they also need to keep things moving, so it's a constant sequence of set encounters with minimal down-time in-between, which also dis-incentivizes genre mixing.

Moosevelt

Very observant and well reasoned essay from KC :) I think he is on to something about how gaming has pigeonholed the genre to a historical/technological time period, though I'm not quite sure what could be done about it. Maybe Yakuza has the right mind of it, where you staple another genre to the gameplay loop of combat. Perhaps by fighting you gain resources that help build up your base, you keep fighting until you fall and reset, sort of like a roguelike.

Moosevelt

In Arkham City, there was a DLC combat challenge map that, instead of having the normal arena that Batman jumps around in, Batman moves forward through train cars in a 2D side view, with henchmen coming from both sides, yet retains all of the normal combat rules (dodging certain enemies, needing to stun then attack, gadgets, free-flow combos, etc). It culminated in a final boss fight and you destroying the main control for the train by smashing it. The whole level felt like a nod to how Arkham combat really is an evolution of beat-em-ups, just given that third dimension, a rhythmic pacing, and combo system.