Scramble, released by Konami in early 1981, had continuous scrolling in a single direction and was the first side-scroller with multiple distinct levels.
[11] Activision published two side-scrolling racing games for the Atari VCS in 1982: the biplane-based Barnstorming[12] and the top-view Grand Prix.
By 1984, there were other racing games played from a side-scrolling view, including Nintendo's Excitebike[13] SNK's Jumping Cross[broken anchor].
[15] In 1985, Konami's side-scrolling shooter: Gradius gave the player greater control over the choice of weaponry, thus introducing another element of strategy.
[19] It adapted combat mechanics similar to single-screen fighting game Karate Champ (1984) for a side-scrolling format,[19] along with adapting elements from two Hong Kong martial arts films, Bruce Lee's Game of Death (1973) and Jackie Chan's Wheels on Meals (1984),[20][21] and had elements such as end-of-level boss battles[22] as well as health meters for the player character and bosses.
The Western adaptation Renegade (released the same year) added an underworld revenge plot that proved more popular with gamers than the principled combat sport of other games.
The game was designed as Technos Japan's spiritual successor to Renegade,[31] but it took the genre to new heights with its detailed set of martial arts attacks and its outstanding two-player cooperative gameplay.
[31][33] Double Dragon's success largely resulted in a flood of beat 'em ups that came in the late 1980s,[33] where acclaimed titles such as Golden Axe and Final Fight (both 1989) distinguished themselves from the others.
[35] Golden Axe was acclaimed for its visceral hack and slash action and cooperative mode and was influential through its selection of multiple protagonists with distinct fighting styles.
[18] Compared to earlier platformers, Super Mario Bros. was more expansive, with the player having to "strategize while scrolling sideways" over long distances across colorful levels aboveground as well as underground.
[28][29] It used the same game engine as Excitebike, which allowed Mario to accelerate from a walk to a run, rather than move at a constant speed like earlier platformers.
[44] In 1984, Hover Attack for the Sharp X1 was an early run & gun shooter that freely scrolled in all directions and allowed the player to shoot diagonally as well as straight ahead.
[5] Run and gun video games became popular during the mid-to-late 1980s, with titles such as Konami's Green Beret (1985)[45] and Namco's Rolling Thunder (1986).
[citation needed] There were a small number of PC ports of smooth scrolling arcade games in the early 1980s, including Moon Patrol [48] and Defender.
Id Software went on to develop Commander Keen that same year, which was the first publicly available PC platform game to feature smoothly-scrolling graphics.