Dave Cook
If you love side-scrolling beat-’em-ups you’ll love Dave’s new book about the genre
» Go Straight’s front cover is a who’s who of characters from the genre. How many do you recognise?
» [PC Engine] Go Straight started off in October 2019, with Dave writing about Namco’s excellent Splatterhouse.
The side-scrolling beat-’emup has had something of a renaissance in recent years and it shows no signs of stopping. It’s become so popular that the comic-book author Dave Cook has decided to delve into the genre with his incoming book, Go Straight. Here he tells us how it has come about.
Why write Go Straight?
The side-scrolling beat-’em-up genre is by far my favourite, even today. My love of them started back in the early Nineties, when my dad would rent my sister and Ia new Mega Drive game from the local Ritz Video every Friday after school. I had wanted to write a book about gaming for some time but I was dancing around a few different concepts. It was Dotemu’s reveal of Streets Of Rage 4 that cemented the idea, as it almost felt like the genre had come full circle after taking a big dip in the Noughties.