Brawlers, or beat ‘em ups, however one wants to categorize them, is a genre teetering on the edge of extinction. They still release occasionally from indie developers, or smaller big name studios like WayForward. If one hasn’t played their River City Girls yet and like the genre, hop on that game pronto!
But we are not here to sing the praises of modern brawlers. Instead we combed through Capcom’s annals to find the very best beat ‘em ups they ever produced. This may go without saying, but they made a lot. Ranked from “worst” to best, here are ten quality titles from Capcom’s arcade era.
10 Final Fight 👍 🎃
Let’s start with a very basic, but classic brawler, Final Fight. It launched in arcades in 1989 as a two player game starring Cody, Guy, and Haggar. As a fun fact, this began as a sequel to Street Fighter before it eventually became its own thing.
On another weird sequel note, despite it starting in arcades, most of the games were console exclusive after this except for Final Fight Revenge, which was a fighting game.
9 Battle Circuit 🌞
Battle Circuit is a very weird game. At its core, it is about catching criminals in the future as bounty hunters, but the heroes represented are an odd 🎶cast. Cyber Blue and Captain Silver are more normal humans despite some cybernetic parts.
Yellow Iris is a fox girl, Alien Green is a literal plant, and Pink Ostrich is a little girl riding a…pink ostrich. It released in 1997 and remained an arcade exclusive until last year when the Capcom Beat 'Em Up Bundle debuted, which also included a bunch of other games on this🔯 list. It supports up to four players.
8 Knights of the Round ꦫ
Knights of the Round, if the name didn’t give it away, is a take on the classic Arthurian lege♔nd, but as a hack and slash beat ‘em up. Released in 1991 for arcades and later in 1994 for SNES as the first console release, this 3-play𝔉er co-op starred Lancelot, Arthur, and Perceval.
It’s a good spin on the genre with the medieva🌞l twist, but not the best take, as we will𒆙 get to later.
7 ꦑ Cadillacs and Dinosaurs 💦
Cadillacs and Dinosaurs is based on a comic of the same name that started in the 80s. The game launched in arcades only in 1993, but would receive an exclusive sequel on Sega CD called Cadillacs and Dinosaurs: The Second Cataclysm.
While this is a more traditional brawler albeit with lots of guns, cars, and dinosaurs, that game was an on-rails shooter. Besides that there is also a tabletop RPG and even a cartoon. Oh right and this was a 3-play♛er game with Hannah, Jack, Mess, and Mustapha being on the hunt for dinosaur poachers in the year 2513.
6 Warrior▨s of Fate
This was like a predecessor to Dynasty Warriors in theme alone. In fact Warriors of Fate is the sequel to a game with an even more connected name, Dynasty Wars. There are even horses, which not a lot of brawlers contained. Released in 1992 for arcades, it has received many ports to cons♎oles since.
This is also a three-player game, but one stacked with optional fighters including Portor, Kassar, Subutai, Kadan, and Abaka. If one likes Dynasty Warriors this is definitely worth 𝓡seeking out if that wa🌌sn’t already clear.
5 Captain Commando ꦦ
Getting back to a more traditional, but weird beat ‘em up we have Captain Commando. It launched in 1991 for arcades and a SNES port was the first console edition in 1995. This is actually four player compatible meaning every character 🎃can appear onscreen for some brawling action.
These heroes include Baby, Captain, Mummy, and Ninja Commando. This was a one and done game, unfortunately, but Captain Commando has appeared in Marvel vs. Capcom and other crossover games like Project X Zone 2. The legacy lives on in some capa🌟city at least. More Baby Commandos in mechs we say!
4 🐟 Armored Warriors
Speaking of mechs, Armored Warriors is just that: a mech based brawler. Released in 1994 for arcades, it never touched a console until that Capcom collection launched. However, its fighting spinoff, Cyberbots: Full Metal Madness, did grace consoles like the or♍iginal PlayStation.
This supports three players with Rash, Justice, Gray, and Siren being🔥 the optional heroes. Each of them pilots a different robot too. There are tons of Gundam games in this vein, but not a lot of original, pure brawlers with mechs as the stars. Suffice to say we love it.
3 ♉ The Punisher
Also based on comics, we have The Punisher. This game debuted in arcades in 1993 with the only port going to the S♒ega Genesis in 1994. For ෴a change of pace this is actually only a two-player game with the titular star being accompanied by Nick Fury. No, this is not the Samuel L. Jackson version.
It is a great Marvel𒅌 beat ‘em up if not the best of this era. The two commandoes have weapons like guns, but they never pull them out unless a foe also has a gun. They like to fight fair apparently, which is a code we can abid💖e by.
2 Dungeons & Dragons: Shadow Over Mystara 🐷
As teased earlier, Dungeons & Dragons: Shadow Over Mystara is the best fantasy spin on the genre. Releasing in 1996, it is the sequel to Tower of Doom and both received many console ports.
It is four players with six heroes including the Thief, Dwarf, Elf, Fighter, Magic-U, and Cleric. What made this game so good, besides that each class was unique, were its branching 🏅paths. It made the game, as short as it was like most arcade titles, more replayable. It wasn’t the only game to try this,🍬 but among its peers this is the best implementation of the idea.
1 ♛ Alien vs. Predator
Alien vs. Predator is without a doubt the best brawler Capcom ever made. Releasing in 1994, it never 𒅌received a console port. A Sega 32X version was planned, but it eventually got canceled. Anyway this supports up to three players and the heroes av🐎ailable are a Predator Hunter and Warrior along with the two original characters, Linn Kurosawa and D. Schaefer.
Each character has a melee and projectile weapon like a gun, or a lance that shoots lasers. These operate on c𝓰ool downs meaning using them too much causing tꦚhem to overheat. Fighting hordes of aliens never felt and looked so good.