Discovering Open Beats of Rage
Updated: Feb 8, 2022
Beat-em-ups were one of my favourite genres as a kid. They were always the types of games I was drawn to whenever I went into an arcade. I have many fond memories of playing X-Men, Golden Axe, The Simpsons and the like. Hell, X-Men was the one of the first videogames I ever beat, it cost me a lot of money but I did beat it.
And I don’t know if you’ve noticed, but the genre is sort of making a comeback. Not only are arcade classics more readily available, except for all the ones I just mentioned ironically, but new games are keeping the genre alive and well. Games like River City Girls, Fight n’ Rage and the almighty Streets of Rage 4 were all excellent, and that new Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles game is looking mighty good as well.
Beat-em-ups are back, and it feels good. But here’s the thing, they never really went away. Oh, as far as the mainstream was concerned it was as dead as disco, but the genre was kept alive thanks to the fans. Because where publishers fail, fans pick up the slack.
In 2003, Dutch developer Team Senile released a fan made tribute to the Streets of Rage series which used sprites ripped from the King of Fighters series called Beats of Rage. The game was received well online and would later get an unofficial port to the Dreamcast. However, the most interesting aspect of the game isn’t the game itself, but rather what it spawned.
Due to the modular nature of the games engine this meant that fans could mod the game in a variety of different ways. I mean, mods are common practice in fan games but the engine for Beats of Rage was almost specifically designed for them. The openness of the engine was so promising that a collection of users began developing the engine for use in open-source fan games under the name Open Beats of Rage, or OpenBOR as its commonly referred to.
Since the engine started development in 2006, many online users have used it to create a wide variety of fan games. Most of which are recreations or tributes to classic gaming franchises. And since I'm in a beat-em-up mood lately, I thought it would be fun to have a look at some of the various fan creations made using the engine.
Now there are a lot of OpenBOR games out there and I can go on about them for hours, but I don’t want this to be too long. So, I’ve narrowed it down to the 5 that most caught my attention. Also, I'll be using YouTube embeds for this post, none of the footage is mine and all credit goes to the original creators. I'll provide links to their channels at the end so you can support the original creators, as well as download links for the various games if you want to check them out.
Our first 2 games were developed by a user named ZVitor and both are based on Marvel and DC comic books. He's made a couple of Marvel and DC games but these two are considered the best, at least from what I understand.
The first is Justice League Legacy. What's interesting about this game is that, rather than have a singular story mode, the game instead has 4 different chapters that act as their own mini campaign. And the cool thing is that all 4 are based on a classic DC storyline, from the Death and Return of Superman to Crisis on Infinite Earths. That's pretty cool, it’s like a DC history tour.
One thing about ZVitor’s games is that they have an absurd number of playable characters. If you are a fan of DC comics or any of their associated media, you should get a kick out of all the different characters in this. I mean it’s got everyone, the Justice League, the Justice Society, the Teen Titans and many more. They all play differently and it’s a lot of fun messing around and trying them all out.
The gameplay is also decently varied for a beat-em-up. Aside from the standard belt scrolling sections, you also have side scrolling sections with platforming elements, shooter sections and some bonus stages where you run down enemies for extra points. I'm not the biggest fan of these other sections, especially the platforming which can get really annoying when they bombard you with enemies.
The main combat is fun, and every character has a decent variety of special moves to pull off. My only main criticism is the sporadic difficulty. The second chapter is fairly easy, but the others are tough and have the occasional difficulty spike.
You do get plenty of lives and continues to see you through to the end, but you will need to practice if you plan on doing an all-chapters mode run. This is a fun game for DC fans and should provide a decent amount of replay value with its various modes. If you’re a Marvel fan though...
Marvel Infinity War is essentially the same concept as the last game just with Marvel characters instead of DC. Unlike Legacy, there’s only one main story mode which is inspired by the Infinity Gauntlet storyline. In it you get a selection of stages you can play in any order each with its own cast of playable characters.
And like the last game, you have an absolute metric ton of characters to pick from. In fact, I think there are more characters in here than in Legacy. They aren’t as balanced as in Legacy, in that game every character had a similar amount of moves whereas here it varies, but the sheer number of them makes up for that. There are even summon characters to help you out to add even more to the fan service.
The difficulty is a little bit more balanced this time. It's still a tough game that will take some practice to get through, but it doesn’t have as many difficulty spikes this time. Except the final boss, which was just way too much, they may have gone a bit overboard with that one.
It also isn’t as varied this time. There's not as many side scrolling or shooter parts and no bonus stages to speak off. On the plus side, this game has 4-player co-op as opposed to Legacy’s 2, so I guess it’s a matter of whether you want more variety or players.
The best part of the game though are the other game modes. Why? Because they’re all based on classic Marvel games from the 90’s. There's a mode based on Maximum Carnage, War of the Gems, Captain America the Avengers and X-Men Mutant Apocalypse. Infinity War is a love letter to classic Marvel games and as a fan of those this was a blast to play. ZVitor even threw in one of his older Marvel fan games as a bonus, so there’s a lot of content to sink your teeth into.
Both of the ZVitor games I played are fun times, though I think I like Infinity War a tiny bit more. It's not as varied, but it is a little more consistent in my opinion. Still, both are worth checking out for fans of classic superhero games. I’ll definitely be checking out more of his games in the future.
Let’s switch gears here and look at a game based on an old SNK property. I mean this whole Beats of Rage thing started with ripping sprites from an SNK game so it’s only fitting to look at one here. There are quite a few SNK themed OpenBOR games but the one I'm looking at is World Heroes Supreme Justice Extra.
If you’ve never heard of World Heroes, I don’t blame you. It was one of the many games that tried to ride the success of Street Fighter 2 and it wasn’t exactly a massive success when it came out. It did get a few sequels and updated versions with some of its cast appearing in SNK crossover titles, but it’s one of the more obscure of SNK’s fighters.
They aren’t bad games they just didn’t do enough to stand out from the deluge of other fighters at the time. This beat-em-up based on the series though is great. The game was developed by Magggas and came out in 2013, though the Extra version came out in 2018 and featured more content like a larger cast of characters.
It is lacking when it comes to modes and replay value, especially compared to the other games we’ve looked at so far, but the gameplay is fantastic. This is one of the best feeling OpenBOR games and it’s just super fun to play.
The different characters all have a wide array of special moves to pull off and in keeping with the series roots, they’re pulled off with fighting game style button inputs. They can be a little awkward to pull off, but there are a lot of them per character giving you way more options in combat.
Sadly, there is no move list you can pull up. The only way to view them is through the how to play section on the main menu, which doesn’t include the new characters in the Extra version. They aren’t hard to figure out, but it’s still annoying you can't just look them up whenever you want.
This game is just really fun to play and it’s not too difficult either. It can be challenging but it’s not as bullshit hard as other beat-em-ups can get which makes it easy to pick up and play. It's a good game to try out if you’re not too good at these kinds of games.
I only have one major issue with this game, you can’t see enemy health bars. I don’t know why when most other beat-em-ups in this style do this. They do this for bosses, but not for regular enemies, doesn’t make much sense not to have enemy health bars.
Also, no playable Mudman. Come on he’s one of the most recognizable characters from this series. They included the schoolgirl from Aggressors of Dark Kombat, but they didn’t include Mudman. Whatever, I'm just nitpicking at this point.
The last 2 games I'm going to talk about were both developed by Merso X. And like the first 2 games I talked about, they’re both based on properties that have an intense rivalry with one another, Power Rangers and Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles.
Let's start with the Power Rangers one. It's called Power Rangers Beats of Power, though like the World Heroes game I’m looking at the updated Special Edition version of the game. This game is designed to be tribute to the classic Power Ranger games on the SNES and Mega Drive, and, yeah, that’s basically what this is.
It takes you through season 2 of the show right up until the new Rangers were introduced. The game isn't very long and can beaten in less than an hour but it is a fun ride in the short time that it lasts. It's also fairly easy which makes it a good game for younger players.
You can play as any of the original Power Rangers, including the White and Green Rangers, in both their civilian and Ranger forms. You can also play as the 4 different Megazords in certain levels. Sadly, most of the characters play similarly with the only major differences between them are the special moves. It’s a little disappointing considering the other games we’ve looked at had more characters that all felt different to play.
And why even have the civilian forms. I don’t want to play as them, I want to play as the Power Rangers. I know the older Power Rangers games did it, but it was dumb there too. Also, there isn’t enough of the Megazords, there’s only 4 levels with them and they’re over in 2 minutes. That sucks, the giant robot fights were always the best part of the show.
To be honest, the gameplay here is only just ok. It's not bad, it’s just not that spectacular. The real reason to play this is its presentation. Not only does it use music and sound effects from the actual show, but it also includes Sega CD style Full Motion Video sequences. These are 90’s as all hell and I absolutely love them.
Power Rangers Beats of Rage is the weakest game I played for this. I still had fun with it, but it’s too short and lacks replay value. I can recommend it to fans of the Power Rangers series, but non-fans won’t get much out of this.
Alright, I've saved the best for last. Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles Rescue-Palooza is similar in concept to Beats of Power in that it’s a tribute to the classic Turtles games of the 8 and 16-bit generations, in particular the trilogy of NES games. Not only does its gameplay borrow heavily from them, but it also features every level from those classic games along with some brand-new ones.
The gameplay is simpler to make it more in line with those classic titles, but I honestly don’t mind it here. I mean that’s the entire point. Complaining about the simpler fighting mechanics is like complaining about how spicy a curry is, that’s what it’s supposed to be like. And you still have a decent array of moves to pull off so it’s not like the combat lacks depth.
But here’s the thing, this is not a game you play for the gameplay. Oh, the gameplay is solid and even features a decent amount of variety, but it isn’t the main draw. The draw for this game is the fan service.
This game is a love letter to the 80’s and 90’s era of the Ninja Turtles. If you grew up with the Turtles during this time frame, you’ll get a kick out of all the various callbacks and references. You can tell Merso X is a massive fan of them. I mean the end credits references the frigging Coming out of our Shells Tour for God’s sake.
And as for the playable characters, oh boy. You thought ZVitor’s games had a lot of characters, Rescue-Palooza puts those to shame. There are over 60 characters in this from across the Turtles franchise. You've got your standard picks like the Turtles, Splinter, Casey Jones and April, you’ve got fan favourites like Usagi Yojimbo and the Fugitoid, and then you have super obscure picks like Ace Duck and the Hot-Rod Teenagers from Dimension X. And if you want to play as any of the villains, you can do that too.
The cast in this game is insane. It's honestly worth playing for the characters alone. And despite the sheer number of them, they all play differently. That's, honestly very impressive. The game even has decent variety with belt-scrolling and side-scrolling platforming sections, and the platforming sections don’t suck either.They even have bonus stage between levels, several types of them in fact.
And you can play the levels in any order you want which gives the game more replay value. It's a tough game that will take some practice to get through, but it isn’t too hard that It becomes frustrating. Plus, if you do struggle with it, you can always get some friends together for some 4-player co-op, just like all the best classic Turtles games.
This is one of the best fan games I've ever played. It's obvious a lot of love and care went into this; it really is a great tribute to those classic Ninja Turtles games. If you can only play one of the games in this post, make it Rescue-Palooza. Hell, with Shredder’s Revenge now coming in 2022, this should keep you busy well until then.
So those were all the games I looked at that use the Open Beats of Rage engine. Keep in mind that this is only a small sample of the wide variety of games you can find on it. In fact, I was planning on looking at more games but some of them I couldn’t get working properly so I had to narrow it down to these 5.
If you're interested in checking out more games on the engine there are plenty of websites that have a large list of games, you can find. And because it’s all free there really is no reason not to check some of them out.
Fan made content is always a fascinating part of any form of media. Sure, a lot of it is actually quite terrible, but the good stuff is often just as good, if not better than official releases. Some fan game developers even go on to work on the series in an official capacity, look at Christian Whithead for example, he made Sonic fan games and then went on to make the best Sonic game ever made in Sonic Mania.
Open Beats of Rage is a testament to the creativity that fan communities have. There are a lot of creators still working on it and its obvious the engine has so much more to give. While beat-em-ups are back in the mainstream, it’s comforting to know that, even if they go away again, there’s a place I can go to for classic arcade action.
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