My sister, while playing beat 'em ups with me, was always picking up women characters. Guess what? She liked their appearances too and didn't cry about sexism or other stuff people object about nowadays
It's something that you can't have in a real world, I'm picking Billy in DD because I want to rock his appearance, you know blue attire and kicking a bad guys, but if I do that in real world maybe I'll just get stabbed in a minute
Can't agree more with you, lol... I'm always think that they are more hot than the one we must rescue (Like Poison and Roxy against Jessica, from Final Fight). Alas, I even think that Dynamite throwing girl (Heard She's been named as Dynamite Ribbon) from Sunset Riders are prettier than the girls we help.
How many damsels in distress can anyone even remember? Jessica, Marian, Madonna....yeah, that's it for me. Also, it was a sin that the Black Queen didn't rate a final boss battle in Battletoads.
For some of these games, when you got to play as the faster female characters, it was a game changer, because you needed that speed to get off combos and defeat some bosses. Cool video!
Also add: - Knife wielders (I don't remember their names) in Final Fight 2 (japanese version). - May (Final Fight 3) - Nameless knife wielder and martial artist (Sonic Blast Man, japanese version) - Dual sword wielder (Ninja Warriors, SNES version). But she returned in the remake for the PS4 and Nintendo Switch As for playable female characters: - Dora the Kentauride (Golden Axe: The Return of Death Adder) - Princess Lisa (Arabian Magic) - Ramaya (Arabian Fight) - Wendy Milan (Brawl Brothers) - Maki Genryusai (Final Fight) - Sahra Burn (Golden Axe 3) - Lucia Morgan (Final Fight 3) - Yellow Iris (Battle Circuit) - Kurenai and Okuni (Sengoku 3) - Misako and Kyoko (River City Girls) - Kunoichi and Yaskawa (Ninja Warriors: Once Again)
Just want to add, Knife wielder from Final Fight 2 name are Mary and Eliza. While the female Ninja enemy at Ninja Warrior Again, usually just been called Kunoichi (But yeah, kinda been confusing since the female Main character been named Kunoichi either... Lol).
@@excelfate1602 Kunoichi is just an archaic word for "woman", that became associated with women who learned ninjitsu. Historically, that just meant women who were spies. But the word ninja itself was generally used for something closer to government intelligence, and any ninja assassins would simply disguise themselves by wearing ordinary clothing. The modern uniform we associate with the ninja came from a theater meta joke, where the stagehands dressed up in all black to discretely move the set around in a night scene would suddenly kill a character. Because the ninja could be anyone, anywhere! Basically, Deadpool's an older archetype than the trope he's parodying. The modern kunoichi wouldn't exist until 1964, with a movie and novel named Ninpō Hakkenden. Unfortunately, it's difficult to quickly find any information about it in English; it shares a name with a classic work of Japanese literature that can be blamed for every "find the crystals/dragonballs" plot ever since. And also every work of serial fiction that's so long that someone else has to finish the creator's original vision. But the TL, DR: Taito was too lazy to think up names for the characters, and got lucky that the word wasn't better known in English before they brought it over.
@@juststatedtheobvious9633 Ahaha, you're right about Taito been Lucky that English isn't know much about Kunoichi though, so they can use that as a name. And yes, your explanation is right too.
Blaze Fielding is one of my favorite female video game characters of all time. Of all the playable characters from Streets of Rage, she became the most balanced of them all (even more so than Axel). Her throws, and extra knife slashes just make her a great pick, and I always love playing as her because of that.
Agreed, and I would consistently pick her throughout the series for the gameplay, but I loved her design on SOR 1 with a passion too, she looked so cool. Honorable mention to the female twin bosses in the games, with the pair from the first game obviously looking as cool as Blaze herself.
@@SRC267 I never got to play the GBA version but I did watch play thrus. Did they? Oh wow lol. I hope we get a FF collection with 1, 2, 3, FF Guy, FF mini for GB, FF GBA, FF 3d one I forget the name but the bad one lol 😆 and of course the arcade port of FF 1 American and Japanese versions. I think it would sell make them all online too.
@@MKF30 On versions outside of Japan, all versions of "Final Fight 1" (save for the original arcade, and Sega Saturn port), and "Final Fight 2" replaced all of the female thugs with androgynous male thugs, in order to avoid backlash from 90's feminists, whose influence in western mainstream media was growing at that time point. Funny enough, "Final Fight 3" retained their female thugs in all regional releases worldwide.
I’ve only heard of like, five to six of the games shown here. Had no idea there were so many Beat ‘Em Ups I never knew about. Like holy crap, freakin’ Bucky O’Hare has a beat ‘em up?
Fun Fact : The Bucky O'Hare show was coming to an end and not being renewed, so they made the arcade game the canon series ending. It's one of the few cartoons of the era to give it's fans closure.
WOW, you left off the Godfather of this genre as most of these games wouldn't exist without it, and that's "Renegade". To my knowledge it is one of the only Beat 'Em Ups(maybe the only) to have an entire level with only women as the enemy, as well as the boss(level 3).
I wanted to include it, but I couldn't get past the first screen... 🤣 and I found it more relevant to start with Double Dragon (from the same developer). But agree with you, Renegade is clearly the pioneer.
@@BitsBeats LOL, fair enough, as it can be hard to play due to it's left/right play mechanic, as no other game has really used that style before or since. There is a learning curve for sure, but once your dialed in, it's probably my favorite controls in the genre. Being able to attack in one direction, and then attack behind you as well is just next level. If you ever decided to try it again, just watch some YT clips, as you'll learn the ins and outs pretty quick that way. And it was still a great video, even without Renegade.
Those Sailor Moon beat-em ups often have stages with all women as the enemy and the boss. Two Final Fight clones on SNES, one of which made it to Mega Drive, a very simple one on Game Gear with a bit of platforming, and the one in arcades having some of the best pixel art in a beat-em up.
@@labelledamedumanor4876 Cyborg Justice let you make a character from scratch. It had over 200 combinations and you had a bunch of moves as well. Old Sega Genesis gem. :)
I noticed some interesting design choices for women in fighting games. 1. If the story takes place in an urban slum, the woman will usually fight with a whip(0:15)(0:57)(1:37). 2. If the enemy mook is an asian chick, then she is still pretty and graceful(0:35)(4:36)(8:36). 3. Enemy female mooks are given some feature are given something to make them undesirable if they do not use a whip. She could be given huge muscles(2:35), an ugly face(5:55)(6:15)(7:55) (8:15), or be inhuman(3:16)(5:16). 4. Female player characters are always beautiful(0:15)(3:35)(4:55)(8:17).
I think the whip thing is that the dominatrix archetype both codes as female as well as violent. Remember that Capcom had to come up with some story about Poison being a transsexual so that it would be ok for the players to beat her up. So even if American Poison coded female, he was not really, so beating him up wouldn't be an ungallant thing to do, or something. With female protagonist characters, this wasn't a concern because she was not the one getting beat up (unless one sucks at the game). She just needed to be pretty and or sexy as well as strong so that her character would be a power fantasy for the player just like the male PCs. The female coding still needed to be applied, but the question of whether violence would be appropriate to inflict on her no longer mattered- beating up a woman is the kind of thing a bad guy would do. Ironically, if Capcom were to re-release Final Fight (yet again) in the West today, I suspect that Poison would be a woman again so as to avoid accusations of "transphobia." I think that a lot of why female characters often wear skirts, or leotards, and/or heels and/or have a cup size far into the Alphabet is because the developers needed to code these characters as female with a limited number of pixels and colors. The character design itself needs to tell a story. That is why that fat thug in comically obese rather than just overweight. This is also why only the bad guys get strange haircuts - it is to give a player the visual cue of "anti-social." Particular features need to be exaggerated to get the story across in a glance.
@@hanng1242 Not sure why you're pretending Capcom ever stopped making Poison trans? Or that her fans would ever forgive them, if they did? You don't play many fighting games, do you? What other lies, do you believe? Since you're so desperate to misgender Poison, and you didn't have any other reason to write your post, except to pretend other people are as fragile as a Trump supporter?
I decided not to be offended by Golden Axe's female protagonist wearing a bikini since one of the male protagonists is a dude wearing a loin cloth and no shirt.
@@AkiraHDR50 Nah, some of us picked Tyris because she had the most magic power, and unleashing the dragon stole the show. Did anyone pick Ax Battler, if you had other options?
Gotta love it when people who sit here and say with a straight face that their particular ideal of gender equality goes only about as far as who you wanna see get punched in the face. Like, it's amazing that people like you think that's an actual, real, legitimate point to make. As if there's not any more to consider than that. I swear to god, it's like people just watch a 3 minute Bill Burr sketch and think "Oh man, that's great, i'm gonna have to use that one."
I think we've been represented pretty damned well all things considered. Some of my favorite, most badass beat em up characters are girls. See Hannah from Cadillacs And Dinosaurs.
exactly, not all women look like these women the same way not all men have enormous biceps and six packs. I don't know what this video is complaining about.
@@happyjonn9242 He's not "complaining" about anything in his vid, Puddin'. He's actually showcasing how bad ass we are in these types of games. Scantily clad or not. 💜
Thank you...you seem like someone who gets it...I mean I grew up in the 80s and people always assume the women were just damsels in distress in movies and video games but some of my biggest heroes in movies were woman such as Ripley from aliens, Sarah Connor, Nancy from a nightmare on elm Street, and Samus just to name a few...women have been badass forever if you ask me lol
The women that say that an outfit is not provocative and they should dress however they want without men being turned on, are the same that complain about the outfits of videogame characters coz they’re provocative and appeal to the ‘male fantasy’ lol
Wow I can't believe women were portrayed as badass skull-crushing characters instead of overly sexualized weaklings like Sarkeesian, A. et al. said in 2016.
Just checked it. Has some nice „moments“ 😁 Gameplay looks great too. I think it’s called Ikki Tousen. Have to check if it’s also covered in Bitmap‘s Go straight.
If I'm not mistaken, the full title is "Ikkitousen Cross Impact". Yeah, I guess not a lot of people know about this game, since it's been released in Japan only. For me, basically it's kinda like Dynasty Warrior games, but 2D, and the setting is like modern Japan (Well, like the story itself). If you defeat the enemies (Both Male and Female) with Desperate Moves, their outfit will be torn... Lol...
Most of the female characters are featured mostly as gang members or as part of an army in some way. The few hero characters that were shown didn't sport anything revealing attire,so what's being implied here
Oh yeah... cause all the guys depected on these games are totally accurate for the time, in the 80's men were all bodybuilders in spandex, Mad Max punks or ninjas... You can't win a chess game only watching your pieces.
Just think, if ladies can tank a few hits from the main protagonists with hardly any clothing, just imagine how tough they'd be with armor on lol. They also seem to make guys out to be basically hulking knuckle dragging morons or ninjas that fight with the grace of a bunch of hobos huffing glue.
Let's be fair and honest, the title of this video could just as easily be replaced with "The depiction of men in video games - jacked up shirtless & arms as muscular as Arnold Schwarzenegger" ?
Yeah, a lot of people ignore that part when they complain about portrayal of female characters, they're quite happy to see the male characters all turned into these super-buff topless guys with ridiculously over-sized biceps, that's totally fine. But make a female character look even remotely attractive and people lose their minds. :D
Could it really have been though? And to be fair, I actually do think it IS a problem how many times men in video games, especially retro games were always depicted as buff, stupid, jingoistic, military men with gun three sizes bigger than them with Ameirca flags practically tatto'd on their biceps and have to be a bad enough dude to save the president and take out a million ninjas without breaking a sweat. To the point where for a while every video game had to have characters like Bill and Lance from Contra who were really just bad rip-offs of Schwarzenegger and Stallone (at least on the cover art). Finally culminating in Duke Nukem, one of the worst and most embarrassing artifacts from that time, that mountains of bad characters in gaming were all leading to. Even though he did lug around that giant sword, I always identified more towards heroes like Cloud from FF7 or Cecil Harvey from Final Fantasy 4. Complex individuals with identity and self-doubt issues that are far more than they merely appear to be on the outside.
@@the-NightStar But then you have Shigeru Miyamoto protagonists. A short fat man & a tall skinny brother with confidence issues. A strong female lead, unheard of in videogames at the time and an underappreciated youngster who's name doesn't even take centre stage on his own game franchise and is instead left to the head strong female counterpart. Nintendo still leads the way to innovation even to this very day.
Instead of being a princess to be saved, the chicks here fight just as well as the guys, and are their equal in ability and status, sorta like Vasquez in Aliens They don't complain about the men oppressing them or try to overtake them as punishment for "patriarchy", they fight alongside them to help and do greater good. Save the innocent, beat the bad guy, win the day.. It shows both genders can be brave, heroic, skilled, strong and cool. Yeah the chicks dress light and have tight bods, but the guys are big beefy dudes who also wear tight outfits. These characters look good and are often idealized versions of what we'd like to be, like Conan or Barbie. These games were just fun and had enjoyable characters who we could use more of today, instead of wiener kids crying in the wind and having breakdowns because someone they just met didn't think there style was good (Like Yuya in Yugioh ARC -)
Has anyone played Shredders Revenge? I think it's great. One RUclips reviewer said why weren't the graphics more "old school" since that's what it's so desperately trying to be. I bought Streets of Rage 4 at the exact same time and TMNT is DEFINITELY old school. They also said it was way too easy and beat it first time. I'm stuck on Technodrome Redux. I'm having a lot of fun with both games though.
@@BitsBeats I've just gotten to Super Shredder but was beaten at the last moment so I'm having a break from it to watch the end of your video which was great by the way. I'm pleased to see that you included Gaia Crusader's, one of the best beat em ups of all time. Thanks for the reply 👍
Take a look at Tough Turf (1989) which upends the 'damsel in distress' angle by making the woman you save inexplicably into the final boss. Depiction wise she is still similar to other tropes in this video but at least that little twist at the end was interesting.
I don't understand why whenever it comes to women, the comments section is always full of frustrated and always annoying people. This is a chill video, stop whining.
As a kid I liked female characters and I'm a guy not because of sex but because some of them were bad ass like the one in Streets of Rage. Blaze is one of my all time favorites. One of my favorite female fighters is Epon from the game Tobal on Playstation 1. She doesn't wear anything revealing at all. Just a jump suit almost or so .
I played Combatribes in my local amusement arcade years ago, never got to the end fight. Recently when I watched a youtube video & saw that the final boss was female I was surprised, she was the only female character in the game, even if she was a robot. Thinking back on it now, they should have included a playable female character as well. The arcade closed down years ago & I moved house to another town.
*Woman is in a skimpy revealing outfit* Woketards: "That's sexiest, objectifies women and sets completely unrealistic beauty and body standards for women! 🤬" *Man is literally shirtless, half naked, in painted on jeans, looks like He-Man on massive amounts of steroids* Woketards: *silence*
Haz cambiado de horario? Buenoooo... Desayunemos con Bits & Beats 😊🍳🥞🧇 Me alegra que los juegos que te mencioné estén en la lista. Y puedes creer que de todo lo que te sugerí se me pasó por alto un beat tan importante como Sailor Moon D: Esa es una super Sayayin 2:04 xDDDD Violent Storm es uno de los best em up favoritos de un chero que tengo xDDDD en mi caso mi favorito sería peace keepers, growl, aliens vs predator y night slashers. "Lógica" de los videojuegos entre menos ropa más "protegido" estás jajajajajajajaja... Solo mira Golden Axe 😂😂😂🤣🤣🤣 🪓 y lo más gracioso es que ni el chero se salva, casi anda en pelota xDDDD Cuando era niña no le di demasiadas vueltas a la cabeza en cuanto a atuendo de las chicas, se que es bastante estereotipada, pero supongo que son cuestiones de épocas. Lo que si me molesta un poco es que ahora que los personajes femeninos si parecen guerreras decentes, no sean del agrado del público masculino y estén jode y jode porque quieren ver strippers 🙄🙄🙄🙄 como dije son cuestiones de épocas y van cambiando y no solo hombres juegan.
@@BitsBeats No les duelen los batasos, los cuchillos el fuego y demás, pero a la playa si nos da pena y nos ponemos más ropa Jajajajajajajajajajajaja... xDDDD Si se te ocurre hacer un vídeo de mujeres protagonista de otros géneros (de preferencia plataforma) chécate a Yuko Asou de la franquicia de Valis, su "armadura" es para cagarse de risa 😂😂😂🤣🤣🤣👌 es literalmente un bikini xDDDD
Awwww. Your Growl clip doesn't include when the player grabs a woman by the hair and punches her in the face three times. My friends and I used to say "Where's my money, bitch?" when that happened. We were/are awful people.
Some of these characters get really outlandish and fantastic, but I'm still not over the women in business suits who are also poaching lions in Growl. Kinda hot, but the animal trafficking is a real turn off
As a (now) man and then boy to young man, MANY of my favorite characters (comics and videos games) were females. This is why I get so upset when I hear those false narratives (LIES) about sexism in these mediums. In fact, as a SOR fan, I picked Blaze more than anyone else and Chun Li, Pia Mai and Ivy more in those franchises. Didn't hurt that they were. . . well, you know 😏😉😜
yes they are made to look appealing but they are not there just to be objectified. The damsels are (they are literally just a goal), but not the main characters in comics or the playable characters in games.
My sister, while playing beat 'em ups with me, was always picking up women characters. Guess what? She liked their appearances too and didn't cry about sexism or other stuff people object about nowadays
She was a child.
only woketards cry about that stuff
@@SteveAyanami Aged 16 back then. I was 12.
It's something that you can't have in a real world, I'm picking Billy in DD because I want to rock his appearance, you know blue attire and kicking a bad guys, but if I do that in real world maybe I'll just get stabbed in a minute
you 'ra right, this is clear proof that sexism can absolutely come from a girl
Not gonna lie beat em up women were hot (the protagonists and antagonists.. i did not care about the damsel in distress)
Can't agree more with you, lol... I'm always think that they are more hot than the one we must rescue (Like Poison and Roxy against Jessica, from Final Fight).
Alas, I even think that Dynamite throwing girl (Heard She's been named as Dynamite Ribbon) from Sunset Riders are prettier than the girls we help.
How many damsels in distress can anyone even remember? Jessica, Marian, Madonna....yeah, that's it for me.
Also, it was a sin that the Black Queen didn't rate a final boss battle in Battletoads.
Linda from Double Dragon was a pioneer for female enemies in Beat-em-ups who carry whips.
Carol and Brenda of Captain Commando was a pioneer for female enemies of beat-em ups in stripperric outfits.
No she wasn't; there were females way before her.
The real one
God I love the fidelity of these videos. They're so sharp, even when u do the crop and zoom in (which is v cool to see). A winner is you!
Brahs!
The enemy cast in beat 'em ups is not complete without dominatrix and whips
For some of these games, when you got to play as the faster female characters, it was a game changer, because you needed that speed to get off combos and defeat some bosses. Cool video!
Also add:
- Knife wielders (I don't remember their names) in Final Fight 2 (japanese version).
- May (Final Fight 3)
- Nameless knife wielder and martial artist (Sonic Blast Man, japanese version)
- Dual sword wielder (Ninja Warriors, SNES version). But she returned in the remake for the PS4 and Nintendo Switch
As for playable female characters:
- Dora the Kentauride (Golden Axe: The Return of Death Adder)
- Princess Lisa (Arabian Magic)
- Ramaya (Arabian Fight)
- Wendy Milan (Brawl Brothers)
- Maki Genryusai (Final Fight)
- Sahra Burn (Golden Axe 3)
- Lucia Morgan (Final Fight 3)
- Yellow Iris (Battle Circuit)
- Kurenai and Okuni (Sengoku 3)
- Misako and Kyoko (River City Girls)
- Kunoichi and Yaskawa (Ninja Warriors: Once Again)
Just want to add, Knife wielder from Final Fight 2 name are Mary and Eliza. While the female Ninja enemy at Ninja Warrior Again, usually just been called Kunoichi (But yeah, kinda been confusing since the female Main character been named Kunoichi either... Lol).
@@excelfate1602
Kunoichi is just an archaic word for "woman", that became associated with women who learned ninjitsu. Historically, that just meant women who were spies. But the word ninja itself was generally used for something closer to government intelligence, and any ninja assassins would simply disguise themselves by wearing ordinary clothing.
The modern uniform we associate with the ninja came from a theater meta joke, where the stagehands dressed up in all black to discretely move the set around in a night scene would suddenly kill a character. Because the ninja could be anyone, anywhere!
Basically, Deadpool's an older archetype than the trope he's parodying.
The modern kunoichi wouldn't exist until 1964, with a movie and novel named Ninpō Hakkenden. Unfortunately, it's difficult to quickly find any information about it in English; it shares a name with a classic work of Japanese literature that can be blamed for every "find the crystals/dragonballs" plot ever since. And also every work of serial fiction that's so long that someone else has to finish the creator's original vision.
But the TL, DR: Taito was too lazy to think up names for the characters, and got lucky that the word wasn't better known in English before they brought it over.
@@juststatedtheobvious9633 Ahaha, you're right about Taito been Lucky that English isn't know much about Kunoichi though, so they can use that as a name. And yes, your explanation is right too.
Blaze Fielding is one of my favorite female video game characters of all time. Of all the playable characters from Streets of Rage, she became the most balanced of them all (even more so than Axel). Her throws, and extra knife slashes just make her a great pick, and I always love playing as her because of that.
Agreed, and I would consistently pick her throughout the series for the gameplay, but I loved her design on SOR 1 with a passion too, she looked so cool. Honorable mention to the female twin bosses in the games, with the pair from the first game obviously looking as cool as Blaze herself.
Alien vs Predator is a must play beat em' up. You are doing yourself a disservice by not playing it.
Most Women in Beat Em Ups always carry whips, for kinky reasons.
Hate how Nintendo replaced Poison & Roxy with Billy & Sid in Final Fight One on the GBA. Luckily you can restore them with a ROM hack.
They also replaced them on the snes version but if memory serves FF2 or FF3 they had sexier women back in one of them.
or play the Japanese version
@@MKF30 they also made the thugs like Doug lighter skin color on GBA
@@SRC267 I never got to play the GBA version but I did watch play thrus. Did they? Oh wow lol. I hope we get a FF collection with 1, 2, 3, FF Guy, FF mini for GB, FF GBA, FF 3d one I forget the name but the bad one lol 😆 and of course the arcade port of FF 1 American and Japanese versions. I think it would sell make them all online too.
@@MKF30 On versions outside of Japan, all versions of "Final Fight 1" (save for the original arcade, and Sega Saturn port), and "Final Fight 2" replaced all of the female thugs with androgynous male thugs, in order to avoid backlash from 90's feminists, whose influence in western mainstream media was growing at that time point. Funny enough, "Final Fight 3" retained their female thugs in all regional releases worldwide.
I’ve only heard of like, five to six of the games shown here. Had no idea there were so many Beat ‘Em Ups I never knew about. Like holy crap, freakin’ Bucky O’Hare has a beat ‘em up?
I have beaten all of this games!
Fun Fact : The Bucky O'Hare show was coming to an end and not being renewed, so they made the arcade game the canon series ending. It's one of the few cartoons of the era to give it's fans closure.
There were a LOT of dominatrix's back in the day.
I had a feeling the first one was going to be Marian getting tummy punched and carried away, iconic scene. That soft "oooh" really sells it
Equal rights (and lefts) for women!
Except men and women are built differently, dummy. That would be pretty weak of some guy that is supposed to be alpha to beat up a woman.
@@bryna7 I hope she sees this bro.
Who hurt you?
🙄
Honourable mention:
*Mighty Final Fight* - enemy females are dressed as waitresses, apt at slaps and somesaults.
WOW, you left off the Godfather of this genre as most of these games wouldn't exist without it, and that's "Renegade". To my knowledge it is one of the only Beat 'Em Ups(maybe the only) to have an entire level with only women as the enemy, as well as the boss(level 3).
I wanted to include it, but I couldn't get past the first screen... 🤣 and I found it more relevant to start with Double Dragon (from the same developer). But agree with you, Renegade is clearly the pioneer.
@@BitsBeats LOL, fair enough, as it can be hard to play due to it's left/right play mechanic, as no other game has really used that style before or since. There is a learning curve for sure, but once your dialed in, it's probably my favorite controls in the genre. Being able to attack in one direction, and then attack behind you as well is just next level. If you ever decided to try it again, just watch some YT clips, as you'll learn the ins and outs pretty quick that way. And it was still a great video, even without Renegade.
Those Sailor Moon beat-em ups often have stages with all women as the enemy and the boss. Two Final Fight clones on SNES, one of which made it to Mega Drive, a very simple one on Game Gear with a bit of platforming, and the one in arcades having some of the best pixel art in a beat-em up.
@@BitsBeats I can relate.
They need to make more games like this again.
Beat em ups have seen a resurgence recently. Final Vendetta, Shredders Revenge, River City Girls, and Streets of Rage 4 are just a few.
Why not do beat em up games where you can design your own character?
@@labelledamedumanor4876 Cyborg Justice let you make a character from scratch. It had over 200 combinations and you had a bunch of moves as well. Old Sega Genesis gem. :)
Final fight was such a good game.
Most companies wont because the second they do some snot nosed egotistical overly pampered patronizing Feminazi or soy boy will cry foul.
I noticed some interesting design choices for women in fighting games.
1. If the story takes place in an urban slum, the woman will usually fight with a whip(0:15)(0:57)(1:37).
2. If the enemy mook is an asian chick, then she is still pretty and graceful(0:35)(4:36)(8:36).
3. Enemy female mooks are given some feature are given something to make them undesirable if they do not use a whip. She could be given huge muscles(2:35), an ugly face(5:55)(6:15)(7:55) (8:15), or be inhuman(3:16)(5:16).
4. Female player characters are always beautiful(0:15)(3:35)(4:55)(8:17).
I think the whip thing is that the dominatrix archetype both codes as female as well as violent. Remember that Capcom had to come up with some story about Poison being a transsexual so that it would be ok for the players to beat her up. So even if American Poison coded female, he was not really, so beating him up wouldn't be an ungallant thing to do, or something. With female protagonist characters, this wasn't a concern because she was not the one getting beat up (unless one sucks at the game). She just needed to be pretty and or sexy as well as strong so that her character would be a power fantasy for the player just like the male PCs. The female coding still needed to be applied, but the question of whether violence would be appropriate to inflict on her no longer mattered- beating up a woman is the kind of thing a bad guy would do.
Ironically, if Capcom were to re-release Final Fight (yet again) in the West today, I suspect that Poison would be a woman again so as to avoid accusations of "transphobia."
I think that a lot of why female characters often wear skirts, or leotards, and/or heels and/or have a cup size far into the Alphabet is because the developers needed to code these characters as female with a limited number of pixels and colors. The character design itself needs to tell a story. That is why that fat thug in comically obese rather than just overweight. This is also why only the bad guys get strange haircuts - it is to give a player the visual cue of "anti-social." Particular features need to be exaggerated to get the story across in a glance.
⚡The two comments, immediately above this one, deserve A LOT of likes ~ nice one...! 🎮👊😎🌈💖
Great, now analyse the men.
@@hanng1242
Not sure why you're pretending Capcom ever stopped making Poison trans? Or that her fans would ever forgive them, if they did?
You don't play many fighting games, do you?
What other lies, do you believe? Since you're so desperate to misgender Poison, and you didn't have any other reason to write your post, except to pretend other people are as fragile as a Trump supporter?
@@juststatedtheobvious9633 It sounds to me like you have an opinion on this.
4:19
You gotta love a chick swinging a big metal rod
I favor games like these. I too pick female characters. 💛💜⭐️☀️🌹🕊
Guess it is true that the sleazier a female enemy is dressed, the more problems they'll give the heroes of the game. 😏
Sorry Mario, the Princess is in another castle
I decided not to be offended by Golden Axe's female protagonist wearing a bikini since one of the male protagonists is a dude wearing a loin cloth and no shirt.
They're both skimpily dressed, so everything is fair.
Even if it was only the woman that had a skimpy outfit, you still shouldn't be offended.
@@themonsterunderyourbed9408 And even then they're body builders. Tyris wears a thong in the home console port but she's also very muscular.
Yet everyone picked the dwarf.
@@AkiraHDR50
Nah, some of us picked Tyris because she had the most magic power, and unleashing the dragon stole the show.
Did anyone pick Ax Battler, if you had other options?
Fighting force and pirates of dark water were some of my favorites.
Rule n°1 for being a woman in a beat´em up game: never cover your legs
that is literally 0.66 of the sprite area. Need to create that distinction somehow !
I feel like at least 50 games are missing lol. Maybe you're planning a part 2 down the line. Definitely thought I'd see X Men or The Simpsons on here.
wheter man or woman they where punchable and can also kick ass when they have to.. Gender equality was real back then..
Gotta love it when people who sit here and say with a straight face that their particular ideal of gender equality goes only about as far as who you wanna see get punched in the face. Like, it's amazing that people like you think that's an actual, real, legitimate point to make. As if there's not any more to consider than that.
I swear to god, it's like people just watch a 3 minute Bill Burr sketch and think "Oh man, that's great, i'm gonna have to use that one."
I think we've been represented pretty damned well all things considered. Some of my favorite, most badass beat em up characters are girls. See Hannah from Cadillacs And Dinosaurs.
exactly, not all women look like these women the same way not all men have enormous biceps and six packs. I don't know what this video is complaining about.
@@happyjonn9242 He's not "complaining" about anything in his vid, Puddin'. He's actually showcasing how bad ass we are in these types of games. Scantily clad or not. 💜
Thank you...you seem like someone who gets it...I mean I grew up in the 80s and people always assume the women were just damsels in distress in movies and video games but some of my biggest heroes in movies were woman such as Ripley from aliens, Sarah Connor, Nancy from a nightmare on elm Street, and Samus just to name a few...women have been badass forever if you ask me lol
@@copekillzz 👍💜👍
That Groul game just damn! I really love it, still in 2022. But no more than my beloved DD and DD2
The women that say that an outfit is not provocative and they should dress however they want without men being turned on, are the same that complain about the outfits of videogame characters coz they’re provocative and appeal to the ‘male fantasy’ lol
Two things can be true simultaneously.
Such a great selection of beautiful games, many of which I never played. I have to try them out someday.
I am a big fan of Double Dragon though!
Wow I can't believe women were portrayed as badass skull-crushing characters instead of overly sexualized weaklings like Sarkeesian, A. et al. said in 2016.
Sarky-Sleazian is incapable of telling the truth, probably.
If you ever heard of it, Ikki Taisen on the PSP. It's a beat 'em up of basically nothing but high school girls.
There's a psp game? I'll have to look into that.
Where can I exactly find it? Asking for a friend
Just checked it. Has some nice „moments“ 😁 Gameplay looks great too. I think it’s called Ikki Tousen. Have to check if it’s also covered in Bitmap‘s Go straight.
If I'm not mistaken, the full title is "Ikkitousen Cross Impact". Yeah, I guess not a lot of people know about this game, since it's been released in Japan only. For me, basically it's kinda like Dynasty Warrior games, but 2D, and the setting is like modern Japan (Well, like the story itself). If you defeat the enemies (Both Male and Female) with Desperate Moves, their outfit will be torn... Lol...
@@excelfate1602 there were two, Cross impact and Elegant Fist. Based on a fan service heavy anime series about rival schools fighting for domination.
Most of the female characters are featured mostly as gang members or as part of an army in some way. The few hero characters that were shown didn't sport anything revealing attire,so what's being implied here
All the male and female characters are designed to appeal to both men and women.
Oh yeah... cause all the guys depected on these games are totally accurate for the time, in the 80's men were all bodybuilders in spandex, Mad Max punks or ninjas...
You can't win a chess game only watching your pieces.
Nice! After I saw Gaia Crusaders, I was hoping Sengoku 3 would make the cut though
( bonus points just for knowing about Gaia Crusaders ... )
Ahh the days when women were sexier in games and such. Good times these games bring me back.
I thought all you alpha male gamers were arguing that they weren't sexualized...which is it, dingus?
Just think, if ladies can tank a few hits from the main protagonists with hardly any clothing, just imagine how tough they'd be with armor on lol. They also seem to make guys out to be basically hulking knuckle dragging morons or ninjas that fight with the grace of a bunch of hobos huffing glue.
I like the LACK OF commentary = no FALSE narratives about "sexism in video games"
Blaze forever!
The queen of the beat em ups!
*gets out the lotion* Dis gon be good.
I meet only Double Dragon,Golden Axe,Final Fight,Captain Commando,Vendetta,Streets of Rage,Cadillacs and Dinossaurs,The Punisher and Violent Storm.
Mutation nation cover for sailor moon ?
I didn't knew that featuring.
Sorry 🙏
Let's be fair and honest, the title of this video could just as easily be replaced with
"The depiction of men in video games - jacked up shirtless & arms as muscular as Arnold Schwarzenegger" ?
Yeah, a lot of people ignore that part when they complain about portrayal of female characters, they're quite happy to see the male characters all turned into these super-buff topless guys with ridiculously over-sized biceps, that's totally fine. But make a female character look even remotely attractive and people lose their minds. :D
Could it really have been though?
And to be fair, I actually do think it IS a problem how many times men in video games, especially retro games were always depicted as buff, stupid, jingoistic, military men with gun three sizes bigger than them with Ameirca flags practically tatto'd on their biceps and have to be a bad enough dude to save the president and take out a million ninjas without breaking a sweat. To the point where for a while every video game had to have characters like Bill and Lance from Contra who were really just bad rip-offs of Schwarzenegger and Stallone (at least on the cover art). Finally culminating in Duke Nukem, one of the worst and most embarrassing artifacts from that time, that mountains of bad characters in gaming were all leading to.
Even though he did lug around that giant sword, I always identified more towards heroes like Cloud from FF7 or Cecil Harvey from Final Fantasy 4. Complex individuals with identity and self-doubt issues that are far more than they merely appear to be on the outside.
@@the-NightStar But then you have Shigeru Miyamoto protagonists.
A short fat man & a tall skinny brother with confidence issues. A strong female lead, unheard of in videogames at the time and an underappreciated youngster who's name doesn't even take centre stage on his own game franchise and is instead left to the head strong female counterpart. Nintendo still leads the way to innovation even to this very day.
You left out the female ninjas of Sengoku 3.
Great beat em up!
Don't forget the first two games, they also had female ninjas too.
Why no "spiderman the videogame" (sega 1991)? "Black cat" is a really good character in that game.
Instead of being a princess to be saved, the chicks here fight just as well as the guys, and are their equal in ability and status, sorta like Vasquez in Aliens They don't complain about the men oppressing them or try to overtake them as punishment for "patriarchy", they fight alongside them to help and do greater good. Save the innocent, beat the bad guy, win the day.. It shows both genders can be brave, heroic, skilled, strong and cool. Yeah the chicks dress light and have tight bods, but the guys are big beefy dudes who also wear tight outfits. These characters look good and are often idealized versions of what we'd like to be, like Conan or Barbie. These games were just fun and had enjoyable characters who we could use more of today, instead of wiener kids crying in the wind and having breakdowns because someone they just met didn't think there style was good (Like Yuya in Yugioh ARC -)
8:02 Bits & Beats: *EDITOR!*
To give Golden Axe some slack, almost everyone was underdress in that game lol.
Another outstanding video thanks 4444😎
Many thanks Mark!
@@BitsBeats You're welcome dude 😎👍
Has anyone played Shredders Revenge? I think it's great. One RUclips reviewer said why weren't the graphics more "old school" since that's what it's so desperately trying to be. I bought Streets of Rage 4 at the exact same time and TMNT is DEFINITELY old school. They also said it was way too easy and beat it first time. I'm stuck on Technodrome Redux. I'm having a lot of fun with both games though.
I played it last week on Gamepass. It's fantastic
@@BitsBeats I've just gotten to Super Shredder but was beaten at the last moment so I'm having a break from it to watch the end of your video which was great by the way. I'm pleased to see that you included Gaia Crusader's, one of the best beat em ups of all time. Thanks for the reply 👍
I wish there were more dominatrix characters like that in games
And Sengoku 3? Forgotten this!
Forgot Ninja Warriors
2:50 That one looks... familiar...
Take a look at Tough Turf (1989) which upends the 'damsel in distress' angle by making the woman you save inexplicably into the final boss. Depiction wise she is still similar to other tropes in this video but at least that little twist at the end was interesting.
I don't understand why whenever it comes to women, the comments section is always full of frustrated and always annoying people. This is a chill video, stop whining.
No love for Elf and Thief from the sidescrolling beat em up Dungeons and Dragons games?
7:46 don't remember Ripley fistfighting a horde of aliens from the movies...
That's because she's Lt Kurosawa, a Japanese Colonial Marine who fights with a katana sword, and not Ellen Ripley.
Damn some of these are funny as heck. Love the design of the characters from Aliens Vs Predator and Golden Axe.
I think The Simpsons should habe been included. Only one I can think of where you play as a child (besides Captain Commando)
you can play as a little girl riding an ostrich in battle circuit
Ah, yes... that's exactly how I like em.
As a kid I liked female characters and I'm a guy not because of sex but because some of them were bad ass like the one in Streets of Rage. Blaze is one of my all time favorites. One of my favorite female fighters is Epon from the game Tobal on Playstation 1. She doesn't wear anything revealing at all. Just a jump suit almost or so .
Amazing...
How'd you get Blaze fighting Poison?
Photoshop skills 😁👌
@@BitsBeats Impressive!
Also, Blaze and Tyris Flare 😍
There’s a Bucky O’Hare game?! Need to get that rom!
Renegade had women too
I found a oopsy.
On the sailor moon clip it shows the box art for mutation nation.
🙏
I played Combatribes in my local amusement arcade years ago, never got to the end fight. Recently when I watched a youtube video & saw that the final boss was female I was surprised, she was the only female character in the game, even if she was a robot. Thinking back on it now, they should have included a playable female character as well. The arcade closed down years ago & I moved house to another town.
Captain commando and warrior of fate destroying YER stick game 😂👌
Is it the right cover box when Sailor Moon game is shown?
It's a mistake, sorry
@@BitsBeats imho no big deal, everyone knows what sailor moon looks like so there should be no confusion
Tyris Flare, my favorite! 🔥🔥🔥🔥🔥🔥
1:58 wait... no more heroes?
모든영상이 흥미롭다 계속 계속 올려주시길!
Wish we could play as npc girl on beat em up game. Just for the free mode
Jesus Christ, there was actually a game called "Crime Fighters"? That's like calling a game "Gun Shooter" or "Action Fighter"
In one case the home version showed a little more.. Golden Axe Tyra Flare had a bikini in the arcade version and a thong in the genesis version.
you forgot final figth2 and 3, sengoku 3
growl = indiana jones
Great
nice collection
What about the depiction of men in modern day film and media?
It would be interesting to see 😁👌
*Woman is in a skimpy revealing outfit*
Woketards: "That's sexiest, objectifies women and sets completely unrealistic beauty and body standards for women! 🤬"
*Man is literally shirtless, half naked, in painted on jeans, looks like He-Man on massive amounts of steroids*
Woketards: *silence*
The men are idealized for the intended male audience, sh!t for brains.
What up boss keep it up u are in beast mode
What in tarnation is Poison doing here ?
Ah, nostalgia....
Actually, poison and Roxy from final fight are trans, so they biologically are men despite their appearances
Haz cambiado de horario? Buenoooo... Desayunemos con Bits & Beats 😊🍳🥞🧇
Me alegra que los juegos que te mencioné estén en la lista.
Y puedes creer que de todo lo que te sugerí se me pasó por alto un beat tan importante como Sailor Moon D:
Esa es una super Sayayin 2:04 xDDDD
Violent Storm es uno de los best em up favoritos de un chero que tengo xDDDD en mi caso mi favorito sería peace keepers, growl, aliens vs predator y night slashers.
"Lógica" de los videojuegos entre menos ropa más "protegido" estás jajajajajajajaja... Solo mira Golden Axe 😂😂😂🤣🤣🤣 🪓 y lo más gracioso es que ni el chero se salva, casi anda en pelota xDDDD
Cuando era niña no le di demasiadas vueltas a la cabeza en cuanto a atuendo de las chicas, se que es bastante estereotipada, pero supongo que son cuestiones de épocas. Lo que si me molesta un poco es que ahora que los personajes femeninos si parecen guerreras decentes, no sean del agrado del público masculino y estén jode y jode porque quieren ver strippers 🙄🙄🙄🙄 como dije son cuestiones de épocas y van cambiando y no solo hombres juegan.
Tienen más outfit de irse a la playa que de partir cráneos en un suburbio. Ahora las hacen algo más "realistas".
@@BitsBeats No les duelen los batasos, los cuchillos el fuego y demás, pero a la playa si nos da pena y nos ponemos más ropa Jajajajajajajajajajajaja... xDDDD
Si se te ocurre hacer un vídeo de mujeres protagonista de otros géneros (de preferencia plataforma) chécate a Yuko Asou de la franquicia de Valis, su "armadura" es para cagarse de risa 😂😂😂🤣🤣🤣👌 es literalmente un bikini xDDDD
Cool
Awwww. Your Growl clip doesn't include when the player grabs a woman by the hair and punches her in the face three times.
My friends and I used to say "Where's my money, bitch?" when that happened. We were/are awful people.
No woke included, fists rated E for everyone.
Hey i say always keep the strong sexy gals in beat em ups hell even women like playing as them as well, and hey it's always a awesome addition.
Who cares? Just play the friggen game and have a good time.
Some of these characters get really outlandish and fantastic, but I'm still not over the women in business suits who are also poaching lions in Growl. Kinda hot, but the animal trafficking is a real turn off
Gosht sendai tensen, gourmet, (esnes)
As a (now) man and then boy to young man, MANY of my favorite characters (comics and videos games) were females. This is why I get so upset when I hear those false narratives (LIES) about sexism in these mediums. In fact, as a SOR fan, I picked Blaze more than anyone else and Chun Li, Pia Mai and Ivy more in those franchises. Didn't hurt that they were. . . well, you know 😏😉😜
yes they are made to look appealing but they are not there just to be objectified. The damsels are (they are literally just a goal), but not the main characters in comics or the playable characters in games.
5:15 Model DD7
Good ol times.
Now its EA ,Ubisoft ugly , machos