While there have been plenty of great beat ‘em ups since the days of arcades like Castle Crashers and Scott Pilgrim vs. the World: The Game, in some ways, it feels like this style of game never entirely left its origins behind. Modernizing them is a difficult problem because if you change too much, they no longer have the classic feel people come to them for, but if you change too little, you risk emulating the kinds of annoyances that stem from being designed to shake people down for quarters.
Absolum, the newly announced game from Streets of Rage 4 developers Dotemu and Guard Crush Games, aims to resolve these issues by maintaining the feel of its predecessors while introducing layers of depth that set it apart, like RPG elements, a roguelike structure, and lots of gameplay nuances. And from the preview build we played, it seems to accomplish just that, combining Streets of Rage 4’s combo system where you air juggle foes like volleyballs with rewarding defensive mechanics like dashes, dodges, and deflects. While only time will tell if its punishing run-based approach will fully pan out, if nothing else, it’s already an absolute blast to clobber fantasy creatures into another dimension as the combo counter climbs.
Set in a dark fantasy setting as brutal as its gameplay, you play as members of a resistance movement battling an all-powerful warlord, the Sun King Azra. He used a recent magic-fueled disaster as a pretext to crush all wizards while expanding his domain, and now only you and a few remaining spellcasters are around to stop him. At first blush, it’s a fairly straightforward high-fantasy setup about beating up an evil guy in a tower, and it’s hard to avoid comparing the game to famous Action RPG beat ‘em ups like Dungeons & Dragons: Shadow over Mystara. On top of this, there are plenty of classic Tolkien-esque details here, like dwarves, elves, and orcs.
But this spin seems to have at least a bit of unique flavor, thanks to its allusions towards a complicated, only partially explained mythos. Sacred trees and resurrection rituals are tied together by a colorful art style courtesy of animation studio Supamonks that calls to mind the unique designs and thick line art of Studio Trigger’s work. There are interesting little touches everywhere, like how when your character meets their end (which will happen a lot), godly hands materialize to catch them before they fall, whisking them back to the enchanted forest that acts as their base of operations. While it’s hard to tell how much emphasis there will be on these elements compared to the fisticuffs, there appears to be more going on than just another regurgitated fantasy milieu.
That said, punching guys is certainly the main event, and from what I’ve played, Absolum absolutely delivers in this department. At first blush, things will feel familiar for beat ‘em up fans, especially for those who played Streets of Rage 4: tap X to perform a four-hit combo, Y is a heavy attack, and A is to jump. There are also powered-up special moves that require mana (remember the whole wizard conceit), alongside a dash, dash attack, grabs, and aerial attacks. But things get really interesting when it comes to the defensive mechanics that will have parry enthusiasts rejoicing.
In most beat ‘em ups, especially old-school ones, offense is your best defense. Judo toss those goons over your shoulder to group them up before closing in from the Z-axis and giving everyone a simultaneous beat down. Absolum shakes up this formula by adding parries and dodges that incentivize you to get a read on the zombie dwarves, assassins, and angry mushroom men in your path. The defensive maneuver you’ll likely use the most is Deflections, which triggers when dashing forward as an enemy’s attack is about to land. If successful, they’ll be knocked back, leaving them wide open for a punishing counter-combo complemented by a satisfying audio cue. Some enemy attacks can’t be Deflected, though, as marked by a big wind-up and red glowing indicator, and in this case, you can either dodge to the side and initiate a follow-up attack or go for a more difficult technique called a Clash, where you swing with a heavy attack right as an opponent does the same. While this isn’t the first modern beat ‘em up to have things like blocking and parries, the execution here is top-notch, and it’s incredibly satisfying to bat away or sidestep incoming strikes before delivering a crunchy series of strikes.
And once you’ve negated an enemy’s assault and are back on the offensive, Guard Crush Games shows off what they learned from Streets of Rage 4 with a bouncy and satisfying combo system where you meld light attacks, heavies, dash strikes, and wall bounces into lengthy air juggles. It’s simple but has a freeform, fighting game-style feel that’s further improved by some great hitstop and feedback on your moves. As you wrack up the hits, you’ll build up pressure that eventually breaks down a foe’s defenses, leaving even bosses wide open to massive damage.
As for the playable characters, we got a look at the two of the cast: Galandra, a cloaked elven woman wielding a massive Berserk-style sword, and Karl, a pugilistic dwarf with a blunderbuss. On top of sporting slightly different movesets and upgrades, each has multiple unlockable special attacks, like Karl’s shotgun blasts or Galandra’s deadly Necrotic Wave that sends a magic shockwave ripping across the screen. Things get even zanier when you start adding the roguelike upgrades—again, this is a run-based game—alongside persistent unlocks that boost your strength, resulting in scenarios where you can sometimes stunlock the early-game bosses into oblivion.
As for the run-based temporary upgrades, after battles, you can choose between one of two boons, like applying a burn status effect to your standard combos or leaving an electric charge that stuns foes after a successful dodge. On top of this, after beating bosses, you can choose between new substantive powers that do things like adding a combo to your heavy attacks or gaining a dive kick (that happens to be outrageously good at the moment). While you only get two choices to pick between at each juncture, these elements add up to make battles at least slightly different.
To speak more about the game’s structure, the ultimate goal is to battle through three areas to challenge Azra and end his reign for good; if you die, it’s back to the beginning. However, while defeating this big bad is your overarching mission, you’ll also discover branching paths during these runs that lead to sidequests and other findings. Because taking on these sub-objectives can permanently alter the map and open up new routes, sometimes the goal of a run becomes to explore so you can unlock new characters and other benefits instead of challenging Azra. And across these many attempts, you’ll earn resources that unlock substantial upgrades, like one that permanently increases your health or another that lets you revive after biting it.
However, even with these permanent upgrades that make things easier, I don’t doubt this run-based structure will prove a little divisive due to how unforgiving it can be. A single bad scuffle can screw over a run, which can be a problem given how chaotic beat ‘em ups like this often are. While I could eventually fairly consistently clear the first area after a good number of attempts, there were still two worlds more that needed to be beaten, which I imagine will be a tall task for those expecting to casually button-mash with a buddy like with most beat ‘em ups. While the tight battles justify this difficulty for the most part (except for a few attack patterns from the first area boss), it makes it so that, for better and worse, the game doesn’t fit neatly into what many expect from this kind of experience.
Perhaps the bigger potential issue with the game’s structure is that these battles were largely the same from run to run, meaning you will repeatedly fight through similar scenarios. While you can add variety by picking different paths, and there were change-ups even when heading down the same routes, there wasn’t nearly the same amount of variance compared to many other roguelikes that use procedural generation more heavily to deliver unique challenges. While its core gameplay is quite fair compared to arcade-era beat ‘em ups, this experience very much feels like trying to get through one of these games with a single quarter.
That said, even with the skull-crushing difficulty and similarities between each attempt, the core brawling here is such a blast that I happily lept back into these stages even after reaching the end of the demo multiple times. From what I’ve seen, Absolum largely successfully straddles the line between old and new, introducing enough smart gameplay tweaks to stand out while delivering the visceral fun this genre is known for. Sometimes, all you need is the gratifying thud of bouncing your foes off the ground with a slab-of-iron sword followed by a multi-hit combo that carries them from coast to coast. Thanks to moments like this, I’ll be dreaming of air-juggling goblins until this one comes out later this year.
Elijah Gonzalez is an assistant Games and TV Editor for Paste Magazine. In addition to playing and watching the latest on the small screen, he also loves film, creating large lists of media he’ll probably never actually get to, and dreaming of the day he finally gets through all the Like a Dragon games. You can follow him on Bluesky @elijahgonzalez.bsky.social.