The Beat ‘Em Up Collection is a collection of several underrated games that came out on the SNES and the Genesis. Because these games are arcade style games, I won’t be going through each story of each game. I mean are you really playing a beat em up brawler game for the story? I know I don’t play these games for the story line. Even if you did, they are typically really hard to follow.
The seven games included in this collection are Iron Command, Legend, First Samurai, Second Samurai, Water Margin, Gourmet Warriors, and Sword of Sudan. All of these games were released on the SNES with the exceptions being Second Samurai, Water Margin, and Sword of Sudan, which were released on the Sega Genesis.
This review will be an over-all review of all the games included in this collection. This collection was played on an Xbox Series X.
Gameplay:
Iron Commando has you choosing to play between either a solider named Jack or a kung-fu master named Chang Li. Once you pick a character, you’re tasked with making it through a total of ten stages, with the end goal being to save the world. You can pick up weapons like guns and grenades to help take out the numerous enemies and bosses that you encounter.
Legend is a medieval themed hack and slash beat em up game that has you playing as either Kaor or Igor. The goal of the game is to get through each of the 6 stages, 7 if you include the hidden stage and ultimately defeat the corrupt Prince Clovis before he is able to conquer the land of Sellech. The hidden seventh stage can only be accessed if you’re caught by enemies during a boss fight. You are tossed into the dungeon themed stage and you have to fight your way out.
Each character has their own move sets and magic they can use to dispatch enemies and can even block attacks with their shield and can even use counter attacks. The game also features bonus stages that can be used to get additional points to obtain items that can then be used during stages.
First Samurai on the SNES is a unique beat ’em up that features platforming elements. The game has you playing as a samurai that starts out as a hermit and gets more powerful as the game progresses.
The objective of each level is to collect a set of four items that are used to gain access to the level’s boss area. Magic pots are used for checkpoints with the bell being rung in the stage removing an obstacle in the stage which will allow you to progress through the stage, take out the boss, and move on to the next stage.
Second Samurai on the Genesis is very similar to the First Samurai in the way that it plays but with a slight difference. The differences being that instead of losing a life by falling in a pit and being attacked by an enemy, you lose one point from your health bar. The other difference is there is a nod to the first game on SNES. When you lose a life, the Demon King from the first game will come up on black screen and taunt you.
Water Margin, also known as Water Margin: A Tale of Clouds and Wind, is a very fun and colorful beat ’em up. The game has you choosing from one of three outlaws to play as. One cool aspect of the game is that it features multiple endings. The ending you get will depend not only on the character you play as but also the difficulty you set the game to.
Gourmet Warriors is a side-scrolling beat ’em up that is a bit different on the SNES. So you play as one of three characters and play across six stages. The game has you fighting the secret organization of Bath. They are determined to cause havoc on the city of Zeus, one of the surviving cities since World War III happened.
The unique mechanic found in Gourmet Warriors is that you use the food ingredients that drop from defeated enemies and create food dishes. At the end of each stage, all of the food you collected is shown in a list. You select two ingredients from the list and a dish is created from those chosen ingredients. Once consumed, you may get a stat buff or some HP restored. Writing down or keeping track of the best ones that fit your play style are suggested as you aren’t told what you get until it’s eaten.
Sword of Sudan is a hack and slash beat em up on the Sega Genesis and the Amiga. This collection features the Genesis version of the game, arguably the harder of the two versions. Is this game you play as either Brodan or his twin sister Shardan. Once you pick your character, a map is displayed that shows your progress and this map is shown after each stage to show your progress through the game.
Your character can use their sword to dispatch enemies and can gather potions. These potions can be used in combinations to either give you a flame element to your weapon, a magic attack that kills all enemies but bosses, can replenish your life, or even poison you, which will take away some of your life bar. There is even a combination which does nothing which is extremely hectic when this happens and you’re up against a group of enemies or in the heat of a boss fight.
The reason the Genesis version is arguably the more difficult over the Amiga port is because enemies come from both directions in this version whereas on the Amiga, the enemies come from just a single direction. In addition to coming from both directions, there are more enemies that come at you on screen at once on the Genesis version which doesn’t happen in the Amiga port.
All of the games offered in this collection are 16-bit games on the Sega Genesis and the SNES. They look really good and scaled well. Even when having the image fit full screen, the character sprites look good. They don’t look screwed or stretched like you would think they would be as it’s well outside their original aspect ratio. The option is available to keep the original aspect ratio with a border if you feel like doing so. I am really happy that we have the graphic options we have with this collection. There really is something for everyone with these options.
Performance wise, I mean these are SNES and Genesis games being emulated on a modern platform. Both of these emulated consoles are 2DE 16-bit power houses. The Xbox Series X of which these games are being played on runs these games with zero issues. There isn’t any slowdown, no trace of flickering or screen tearing. Now if these were, say something harder to emulate like Sega Saturn or N64, I could see the possibility of there being some issues with performance, even with something as powerful as the Xbox Series X.
When it comes to sound, the Beat ‘Em Up Collection sounds great. I mean yes the music is dated and the sound effects can sound…well just garbage at times. But this is not the fault of the emulation. This is the way they would sound when playing on the SNES or Genesis. Now between the two, the SNES games sound a lot better than the Genesis games. At least with the games offered here in this collection. This is due to the fact that the SNES has a better sound processor than the Genesis so developers could do a lot with the sound when taking advantage of the more powerful audio quality of the SNES.
While the sound in the SNES games sound really good, the Genesis games in this collection sound a tad on the muffled side. But again, this is in part due to the sound chip of the original Genesis. There are some games that sound really really good on the Genesis, but the games in this collection aren’t any of those.
So when it comes to sound, good or bad, the Xbox Series X makes the sound in these games sound as crystal clear as it can. It does a good job of making the sound in the games crisp, even if some of the games’ sounds and music sound like they were stuffed into a duffle bag and tossed in a car.
Beat ‘Em Up Collection is a great series of some lesser known brawlers that is nice to see on modern platforms. I have covered some of these games on this site separately on the Switch and I much prefer them on the Xbox Series X; so I am glad they are offered in this collection.
The reason I prefer these games on the Xbox Series X is due to the Xbox controller being superior to the Joy Cons of the OG Switch and the built in controls of the Switch Lite. Another reason I prefer playing on the Xbox Series X is because I really like to unlock achievements and the ones offered here are not too difficult to obtain and make for an easy 1K to add to your overall gamer score.
Regardless of which platform you choose to play these games on, this is definitely a collection. worth picking up. You get to experience a nice set of lesser known beat em up games that were really great back when they originally released. I would definitely recommend checking out this collection if you’re a fan of beat ’em ups or SNES/Genesis titles!
In addition to writing articles, Ryan Byers also creates content for his YouTube channel called "Obscure Games and Consoles", collects video games, and dabbles in video game development.