Looking for nice co-op beat em ups

[Menegrothx]

I'm trying to find nice (console) beat em up games that can be (offline) co-opped with another player. 4 player games are OK too but I guess there's not that many of those released on home consoles. I really like hand drawn/cartoony 2D graphics. I'm gonna get the classics (Streets of Rage&Final Fight) but I generally dislike the "concrete jungle/big bad 1980s city" theme of many archetype beat em ups - I'd rather have a fantasy setting. I'm also intrested in Metal Slug type of run n gun games - as long as it looks good and has a co-op I'm fine with it.
Since I like cartoony 2D graphics with vibrant colors, 8 bit and many Genesis&SNES games are out of the question, but I'll also have to rule out all new games that use 2.5D/3D graphics.

Here are the games that are on my to get list so far:

Dungeons&Dragons Collection - Highest priority right now
Guardian Heroes - Looks I can get the PAL version quite cheaply. If not, how much will I miss out if I get the Japanese version instead? Is the text and story in this game totally irrelevant, or are they important enough that I should pay extra to get a comprehensible version of the game (=NTSC-U/PAL)?
Turtles in Time
Three Dirty Dwarves
Pu-Li-Ru-La
Streets of Rage 2, Bare Knuckle III
Final Fight CD
Spinmaster - I don't know if this game has a co-op or not, but either way if I'll ever get a MVS to AES converter, I must buy this one

I've read the best undiscovered beat em ups article here in racketboy but I haven't searched for gameplay footage so I can't really tell if some of the games are worth my time or not.

So, any other games that fit the bill I should look into?

[Hazerd]

Spikeout: Battle Street on the oXbox, i havent played it, but its on my list of games to look out for.

http://www.gamefaqs.com/xbox/920602-spi ... tle-street

[Menegrothx]

Spikeout: Battle Street on the oXbox

It's 3D and it has a realistic artstyle

[Hazerd]

Spikeout: Battle Street on the oXbox

It's 3D and it has a realistic artstyle

The Bouncer?

j/k

[marurun]

Three Dirty Dwarves is on your list. Have you ever played it before? I find it to be fantastic fun. It was a far better game to play with a friend (or two, if you have a Saturn 6-player adapter) than I ever expected.

[Erik_Twice]

Play Battle Circuit. It's awesome and the setting is really cool:

http://www.snackbar-games.com/features/ ... apcom-gem/

[samsonlonghair]

I wholeheartedly recommend Alien Storm for Sega Genesis.

[CD AGES]

Dynamite Cop on Dreamcast. Now GO! MOVEIT!

[Menegrothx]

Three Dirty Dwarves is on your list. Have you ever played it before? I find it to be fantastic fun. It was a far better game to play with a friend (or two, if you have a Saturn 6-player adapter) than I ever expected.

Nope, but I might try it out on a emulator some day since it's not first on my list of games to buy, and it's expensive. I'm getting all of these games for playing with a friend, so graphics and how fun co-op is the two criteria I've based on these games, I'm not that concerned about price. Quite many of the games on the list are pricy.

Play Battle Circuit. It's awesome and the setting is really cool:

http://www.snackbar-games.com/features/ ... apcom-gem/

Looks awesome but I'm looking for games that got released on home consoles so I can play offline co-op when my cousin/big sister visits me, I don't really have a way to play 2+ player games on an emulator right now. I'll probably check that game out though.

It sucks that Capcom made a lot of awesome beat em ups that were never ported to consoles&computer systems.

I wholeheartedly recommend Alien Storm for Sega Genesis.

I'm aware of that game, AVGN did a short video on it http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=y7_gsAVKz8E
I've considered getting it, but it's not what I'm looking for at the moment though.

Dynamite Cop on Dreamcast. Now GO! MOVEIT!

Yet another ugly 3D game. If I want to play a 3D beat em up, I'll play Power Stone. Well, it's not a beat em up exactly but fun as hell.

[CD AGES]

Yet another ugly 3D game. If I want to play a 3D beat em up, I'll play Power Stone. Well, it's not a beat em up exactly but fun as hell.

Ugly!? The game looks fantastic even by today standards especially when compared with later releases in the genre utilizing 3D like Gekido for example.