Go Straight: The Ultimate Guide To Side Scrolling Beat-'Em Ups (Review)

This is not the golden age of Beat-’em ups and brawlers. The years have passed because that would be back in the late 80’s to mid 90’s when developers were limited by technology. Beat-’em ups and brawlers exploded due to the combination of early success of the games like Kung Fu Master and developers being limited by technology of the time. This led to a tinder box for Beat-’em ups and what followed was nearly a decade of pure dominance rivalled by only a few other genres.

The major downfall of the beat-’em ups happened when 3D technology took over the industry. This led to the disappearance of many genres from the mainstream as the masses weren’t interested in playing something that wasn’t pushing the limits of gaming.

Why pay all this money for a new console just to play last generation games. Here is a profound thought, one of the key requirements to a good side scrolling beat-’em up is that it needs to side scroll and not be 3D. Developers were trying to force a square peg into a round hole. This wasn’t realized for decades later that fundamentals of the genre are key and is a major reason for the renaissance of the genre taking place today.

Streets of Page

All of this is documented with precision in Go Straight: The Ultimate Guide to Side Scrolling Beat-’Em Ups written by Dave Cook and published by Bitmap Books, who have been making a name for themselves by trying to the preserve the medium with high quality compendiums on the history of gaming. At 456 pages and over 6 pounds this book is the Mike Hagger of books, the Mayor of BookTown if you will. If there is anything you ever wanted to know about side scrollers, from the inception of the genre in 1984 with Kung Fu Master, all the way to 2020 with the critically acclaimed Streets of Rage 4, it’s in here.

I don’t consider myself the biggest side scrolling beat em up fan, but the more I read Go Straight, the more I realized how much of my gaming identity is linked the genre. Growing up in a time of the 8 bit, 16 bit consoles and arcades meant that by default, exposure to brawlers would be guaranteed.

I remember in 1989 coming back from Disney in a rented RV with my family and for some reason we purchased Double Dragon 2. I don’t remember where it was purchased along the way or why it was purchased because our Nintendo was at home, meaning that we wouldn’t be able to play it for at least three days. However that didn't stop my imagination from staring at all sides of the box, memorizing the instruction manual and even going as far as sleeping with it under my pillow like I was waiting for the tooth fairy.

Then there was the many hours spent in my brothers room in the basement sitting on his waterbed playing all kinds of co-op beat-em ups that we rented from Showbiz Video. Games like Final Fight, Streets of Rage, Golden Axe and TMNT. It wasn’t all warm and fuzzy as Reading Go Straight, I also uncovered many repressed memories of the bad entires too that had been long forgotten.

Go Straight is obviously a great trip down memory lane, but Dave Cook gets to the core of brawlers. Where they started, how they evolved and even how they influenced some of the biggest games today like God of War. Go Straight is not some paperback book with throwaway images and word soup. Its a look at the fundamentals of the genre and what good brawlers need to succeed.

Bit-Mapple

The production of Go Straight does justice to the passion that went into writing it. Go Straight is a very beautiful book. Even the way that the book arrives in the mail makes you feel like you are part of an elite club. The book comes wrapped about 17 different ways to make sure that by the time you open the book, you will feel like you received the white glove treatment. The cardboard box the book comes surrounded in is easily one of the best designed packages I have ever seen. This isn’t a cheap Amazon box thats wrapped with packaging tape.

Opening Go Straight felt like the book equivalent to what opening Apple products feels like. The whole packing system has been thought through and then overthought some more. The box has two easy pull tabs to reveal your piece of gaming history. After the box has been opened you will see your prized possession wrapped in a semi transparent ultra thin foam to ensure the hardcover doesn’t get scratched and finally all four corners of the book are full protected with thick foam.

The reasoning for all of this care and love comes down to how the book is expected to be displayed and that is in the open in perfect condition. At the size and weight of this book, you can’t just put this on an average bookshelf with other paperbacks, instead demands to be treated with love and attention. Go Straight belongs on a coffee table. If guests come over, there is strong odds that at least one person would gravitate towards this book and flip through it.

The layout of the book is exactly how you would want it laid out, chronologically. This way as you flip through the pages, you can see the genre explode, evolve, devolve and eventually see it reinvigorated today. As you flip through, you learn about the game but also what it meant to the author, as it creates the human touch.

Arguably, the crown jewel is that for some of the titans of the genre like Streets of Rage, TMNT, Final Fight, Altered Beast there are four page, full bleed, centrefolds that are magnificent. Each one is unique as well, Altered Beast for example, breaks down many of the different forms that you will take, whereas the Simpsons has a giant picture of Springfield surrounded by the different stages.

If I could make some small constructive criticism towards the book, the font could have been a little bigger, but that might just my eyes after staring at video games since before they put ratings on the game boxes. Also each game in the book gets a few hundred words of actual insight about the game, but it really would have been the complete package if they included the box art. Logistically, there might have been something that got in the way of that happening or would’ve made creating the book a nightmare by trying to track down the boxes IRL or find non copyright photos.

Final Fight….and Thoughts

From the forward with the Double Dragon creator who conceived the game due to his time in High School and dealing with the struggles of life to the realization that Side Scrolling Beat-’Em ups is how many of us escape from the struggles of life for just a few minutes as well. As the author says “the basic gameplay loop can be so utterly satisfying that it taps into something almost primal in our brains. It helps you switch off from the rest of the world for a while”

Before reading Go Straight, I wasn’t expecting it to connect with me as much as it did. As mentioned, I wouldn’t consider myself a connoisseur of side scrollers, but flipping through the decades, I was absolutely amazed how much the book resonated with me.

Go Straight with its quantity of over 200 games, over 450 pages and it’s quality of the hardcover exterior and eye popping pixel interior is truly the defining book of the genre that will not be matched. If you’re a fan of side scrollers, or born in the 80’s or know someone who loves video games in general don’t miss this book.

***Book Provided By Publisher***