Uploaded October 2025 | Updated September 2026, 2 weeks ago
Absolum is a brand new beat 'em up from DotEmu, Guard Crush, and Supamonks - the studios that brought us the incredible Streets of Rage 4 back in 2020. It's not easy following one of the all time great games, but I'm happy to say they've created a worthy successor! ...Although it is quite a bit different.
I posted more extensive thoughts on the game in my first video with Garland, which you can read here if you're interested: youtu.be/CYXl1TKQTN8
This time I played with Karl, who's probably meant to be the most power-oriented grappler, but I don't feel like he's particularly strong or much better with throws than the other characters. He does have a special skill that you can find called Earthbreaker though, which is a diving piledriver that hit deals massive damage to the enemy and splash damage to everyone you land near, so there is that. I didn't get it in this run, so I relied more on his spinning attack and specials.
I got two abilities in this run that were way better than that I had previously thought. First, the skill that adds an additional property to your special attacks. For the rapid fire gun, it seems like it makes you fire twice as many bullets (or around there), and for the grenade, it launches a small group of cluster bombs after the initial explosion. The grenade buff is incredibly good for all the screen coverage and damage it dishes out, and the machine gun buff makes it rip through whoever it hits. I also got an ability that makes your shells home in on enemies, so when you combine that with the machine gun, it does a massive amount of damage to anything you hit with it - even the final boss. So I'm not too sad about losing out on Earthbreaker, which is just fun to use despite how simple it makes everything.
I wanted to go through the more hidden paths in this run, so I took the shortcut at the start, the elevator into the cave, and the portal into the Interloper boss in Yeldrim. To unlock that portal, you have to go up the right side of the screen and hit a button, so I wanted to show that in at least one of these runs.
I'll try to get the next video up with the last character tomorrow, but I might not make it. I was sick yesterday and didn't play anything, so I'm a little behind where I want to be. There's a crazy amount of stuff I want to do this month... ( ´・ω・)
One note about this video: it says "no deaths", but you HAVE to die in order to fight Absolum. So it's more like, no *unnecessary* deaths... (Using invincibility to avoid Absolum's instant-death attack prevents him from spawning, and locks the game up, by the way.)
Absolum is available now on Steam, Switch, and PlayStation 4/5. If you're going to play on PC, I'd appreciate it you'd use my affiliate link to buy from Fanatical, which has it on sale for $19.99 (20% off) right now: fanatical.com/en/game/absolum?ref=ngnhyzk
0:00 Intro
2:04 Grandery
22:00 Yeldrim
40:14 Asterios
56:34 Azra, the Sun King
1:00:04 Absolum
-----
Beat 'em Ups (e.g. Final Fight): youtube.com/playlist?list=PLfI6IYca_kvMhpG1GR9sk8OYiWQMZZTgl
2D Action (e.g. Metal Slug): youtube.com/playlist?list=PLfI6IYca_kvNFjpnJ59Th6N0IU1PSpD3d
STG/Shmups (e.g. Dodonpachi): youtube.com/playlist?list=PLFE6B3779BE759F71
Absolum is a brand new beat 'em up from DotEmu, Guard Crush, and Supamonks - the studios that brought us the incredible Streets of Rage 4 back in 2020. It's not easy following one of the all time great games, but I'm happy to say they've created a worthy successor! ...Although it is quite a bit different.
I posted more extensive thoughts on the game in my first video with Garland, which you can read here if you're interested: youtu.be/CYXl1TKQTN8
This time I played with Karl, who's probably meant to be the most power-oriented grappler, but I don't feel like he's particularly strong or much better with throws than the other characters. He does have a special skill that you can find called Earthbreaker though, which is a diving piledriver that hit deals massive damage to the enemy and splash damage to everyone you land near, so there is that. I didn't get it in this run, so I relied more on his spinning attack and specials.
I got two abilities in this run that were way better than that I had previously thought. First, the skill that adds an additional property to your special attacks. For the rapid fire gun, it seems like it makes you fire twice as many bullets (or around there), and for the grenade, it launches a small group of cluster bombs after the initial explosion. The grenade buff is incredibly good for all the screen coverage and damage it dishes out, and the machine gun buff makes it rip through whoever it hits. I also got an ability that makes your shells home in on enemies, so when you combine that with the machine gun, it does a massive amount of damage to anything you hit with it - even the final boss. So I'm not too sad about losing out on Earthbreaker, which is just fun to use despite how simple it makes everything.
I wanted to go through the more hidden paths in this run, so I took the shortcut at the start, the elevator into the cave, and the portal into the Interloper boss in Yeldrim. To unlock that portal, you have to go up the right side of the screen and hit a button, so I wanted to show that in at least one of these runs.
I'll try to get the next video up with the last character tomorrow, but I might not make it. I was sick yesterday and didn't play anything, so I'm a little behind where I want to be. There's a crazy amount of stuff I want to do this month... ( ´・ω・)
One note about this video: it says "no deaths", but you HAVE to die in order to fight Absolum. So it's more like, no *unnecessary* deaths... (Using invincibility to avoid Absolum's instant-death attack prevents him from spawning, and locks the game up, by the way.)
Absolum is available now on Steam, Switch, and PlayStation 4/5. If you're going to play on PC, I'd appreciate it you'd use my affiliate link to buy from Fanatical, which has it on sale for $19.99 (20% off) right now: fanatical.com/en/game/absolum?ref=ngnhyzk
0:00 Intro
2:04 Grandery
22:00 Yeldrim
40:14 Asterios
56:34 Azra, the Sun King
1:00:04 Absolum
-----
Beat 'em Ups (e.g. Final Fight): youtube.com/playlist?list=PLfI6IYca_kvMhpG1GR9sk8OYiWQMZZTgl
2D Action (e.g. Metal Slug): youtube.com/playlist?list=PLfI6IYca_kvNFjpnJ59Th6N0IU1PSpD3d
STG/Shmups (e.g. Dodonpachi): youtube.com/playlist?list=PLFE6B3779BE759F71
![[SNES] Batman Returns - No Death Clear (Mania Difficulty)](https://i.ytimg.com/vi/tUfAvh_HVWE/mqdefault.jpg "[SNES] Batman Returns - No Death Clear (Mania Difficulty)
Batman Returns is a beat em up that Konami developed for the SNES back in 1992. It follows the events of the movie, although they take some creative liberties with the characters and progression in order to make a fun game out of it. And they did an excellent job! This is one of the best games on the SNES, one of the best console beat em ups, and probably the best Batman game ever made (I need to play the NES ones again). Theres really not much to criticize about it - they did a great job in every single area, from gameplay, to graphics, music, enemy design, pacing, difficulty - you name it. Im not really sure if this game is widely seen as a classic, but I feel like its underrated by every possible audience for it. Its absolutely great.
This is a no death clear on the highest difficulty, Mania. In this mode, Konami does the typical console game thing of giving you tons of lives, and leaving very few healing items throughout the stages (there are more on lower difficulties). I really dislike this design because it makes just clearing the game easy and unsatisfying, so you have to go all in and go for a deathless run in order to get a fun challenge out of it. And at least in Mania mode, most of the enemies do a lot of damage if they land a hit on you. Some bosses can even do 50-75% of your HP in one shot. So you really need to put in some work and memorize the hard parts, figure out good strategies for the bosses (the first Catwoman, and especially the Penguin fight is very tricky on Mania difficulty), and play carefully when you need to. Its fun, but Id have liked it balanced a little differently. But regardless, its a great game that every fan of beat em ups, or Batman in general should try out.
0:00 Intro
4:35 Scene 1 — Ambush in Gotham Plaza
9:40 Scene 2 — Battle in the Streets of Gotham City
17:07 Scene 3 — On the Prowl
21:20 Scene 4 — The Penguins Trap
26:03 Scene 5 — To the Batmobile!
29:37 Scene 6 — Circus Train
34:34 Scene 7 — The Penguins Lair
41:35 Ending & Credits
I played this on the BSNES emulator, but watching the replay back, it looks a little choppy at points. Maybe this emulator doesnt play nice with OBS? Im kinda annoyed about that to be honest. I own the game on the SNES, but playing on my PC is a lot more convenient for a bunch of reasons... Maybe Ill try a different emulator next time. Oh well.
Beat em Ups (e.g. Final Fight): https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLfI6IYca_kvMhpG1GR9sk8OYiWQMZZTgl
2D Action (e.g. Metal Slug): https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLfI6IYca_kvNFjpnJ59Th6N0IU1PSpD3d
STG/Shmups (e.g. Dodonpachi): https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLFE6B3779BE759F71")
