The Final Boss

[Shamus O Lively]

i find myself to be one of the skilled players out there, dont get me wrong i love a gripping story but i also feel a large amount of dissatisfaction when you can do the last boss with yours eyes closed.

the most recent example of this for me was gears of war 2, on insane there was a couple of challenging parts during the game, but when it comes to the last boss, all you have to do is hold the right triger, i dont even think you can fail it

 

[DaveMc]

Very interesting article! One thing that jumps out at me is that this tension between heroism and skills doesn't arise only with the final boss. 'Cause really, any time the "hero" dies over and over is a potential break in your feeling of being a world-saving badass, whether it happens at the final stage or during the opening tutorial.

One counter-question your article made me think about: How much dying is too much? I'm pretty sure you're not saying that the player should *never* die, but when you really think about it, *every* death is a break in immersion: if you're really such a hero, how come you're getting killed at all, ever? Some games (like your beloved Prince of Persia) explicitly avoid that by using a time-rewinding or "No, that's not what happened" mechanic -- is that one reason they appeal to you so much?

 

[Crystalgate]

Skilled player, to some extent at least. I don't imagine myself to be the hero and I seldom have any difficulty to "pause" my immersion when I fail a boss fight and then resume once I beat the boss. I also do like it when the fights test my skill.

There is however a limit to how many retries I can do before I get tired, so the desire for the game to test my skill only goes so far. Generally, once I've lost thrice I start looking in FAQs for ways to cheese the boss. How many losses I tolerate depends on how much time the boss takes and how much time I have to spend just getting to the boss between failures.

 

[KDR_11k]

To me dying (or failing in general) establishes the basic difficulty of the task the hero has to overcome. That's why in movies there are redshirts and such that show us what the average guy would be like in that situation so the hero stands out as an ace who handles dangerous situations easily (of course that doesn't always work out either, resulting in the Imperial Stormtrooper Marksmanship Academy feeling where the mooks just seem so weak that a peasant with a badly sharpened stick can defeat them). In videogames we can see the "what if the hero was just a bumbling fool" scenario ourselves when we aren't playing very well. Dying isn't a break in immersion for me. If I can just easily walk through the game without much difficulty I get the feeling that that world doesn't need a hero because every random peasant can do the job. For a hero to be heroic he has to be better than the average man and it feels cheap if his only ability is to inexplicably take 10x as much damage as the other guys wearing the same armor.

So, who should be the hero: You or your character? Should it be up to you to develop skills that go beyond that of regular people and do what those people cannot or should it be up to your character to be better than NPCs?

How many losses I tolerate depends on how much time the boss takes and how much time I have to spend just getting to the boss between failures.

Fully agree on that one though I also figure in whether I feel like I'm making progress, if I always die at roughly the same time or fairly randomly without a feeling like I'm closer to victory that's frustrating. On the other hand I've spent dozens of tries on some bosses in Bunny Must Die.

 

[Lord_Ascendant]

pretty good article

 

[Syntax Error]

Depends on the game, really.

Heroic in games which have particularly sweeping stories or just makes me feel like I'm the hero. Like in Shadow of the Colossus.

Skilled when it comes to "no-story games" such as shmups. There is something that gets the blood pumping when you memorize and enemy pattern then use all the skills and reflexes you earned to pull off those boss kills (Most especially in Gradius and "Bullet Hell" type of shmups).

 

[Aries_Split]

Or they simply throw a very hard boss at you, so hard that eventually you think "what's the point?" and look the ending up on Wikipedia.

Also known as the MGS2 effect.

 

[Bongo Bill]

Bonus bosses all the way, man. My favorite kind of game starts when you clear the final boss; everything up to that point was practice.

 

[LordCraigus]

Looking at the games I play most (mostly WWII FPS/RTS) I could never really feel like the 'hero' without having taken a severe beating, as such I'm inclined to say I'm more in it for the challenge. I sort of have a 'no pain, no gain' mentality.

Example: While I'm not a major fan of the series I recently borrowed CoD:WaW from a friend and decided to beat it on veteran difficulty. Not because I'm some sort of gaming sadist but because after enjoying it on regular difficulty I wanted more of a challenge out of the game and veteran felt do-able. After playing games like Red Orchestra it doesn't really feel like a WWII game until you pre-empt every room, tunnel and doorway with grenades and spending half your time behind cover or crawling on your stomach.

 

[JMeganSnow]

I don't think these two options really cover the spectrum, because I'm a "heroic" player but I also enjoy tough final boss fights. What really gets me is if there is not a superb dramatic *wrap-up* after the "OH GOD I'VE BEEN FIGHTING THIS BASTARD FOR THREE HOURS!!!!" fight. I don't want some static pictures and a few "and they lived happily ever after" voiceovers. I WANT A MOVIE!! I WANT A REALLY GOOD FREAKIN' AWESOME CINEMATIC FULL OF AWESOME WITH A SLICE OF AWESOME ON THE SIDE!!!!"

If I get that, and maybe some amusing bloopers with the credits such as PoP: Two Thrones had, I will not feel that the drama has been sacrificed in the name of satisfying the "skilled" players, in fact, both of us will probably watch the cinematic together and be thoroughly happy.

 

[PauL o_O]

Personally, I'm dissapointed when I get to the end boss fight, where it's just one quick fight, based of the same fighting scheme, that takes no thought or skill. *Cough*Gears of War 2*Cough* I like it when a boss completely whoops me, and I actually have to use what I have to beat him. If the boss fight is one quick, easy blow-out, then what's the point of getting there? Of course you're going to get your pretty little cinematic clip at the end, but you're not playing that..!

-Quick Version: Boss Fights Should Be HARD.

 

[SargentToughie]

The worst final boss ever... has to be the MLG pro team "Final Boss"

They doesn't want your TPS report on their desk by tuesday, they want your head on a silver platter

 

[Lvl 64 Klutz]

I enjoy the type of bosses that you briefly mentioned near the end. I'm 100% a Heroic Gamer, but to truly create an experience worthy of culminating a story, there must be some kind of tension. Take Xenosaga Episode 2, one of the most story driven series out there. The final boss just sits around while you pummel him to death. While this is important to the story, it causes the game to whimper out, rather than "end with a bang," so to speak.

Kingdom Hearts 2 is the perfect example of using atmosphere and visuals over sheer difficulty to create a climactic and dramatic final conflict.

 

[Anterean]

I like the way fallout and fallout 2 handled the final boss fight.

Giving you the option of going up against "The Master" with guns blazing, or activating the nuke he foolishly has laying around the basement.

Or in case of Frank Horrigan turning defense systems against him.

I my self is largely a "heroic" player

 

[josh797]

so i love these new articles. please keep them going. they are high writing, and they are very very interesting.

on topic, im definitely heroic, but as others have stated, a final boss that doesnt provide the climax to a story arc, where the hero didnt really need his journey, he just needed one good kick, it feels cheap and anticlimactic, the exact opposite of what is expected by the "heroic" gamer. i want to destroy the big bad, cuz i hate him. giving the character that ability to go balls to the walls, and just barely win is what makes for a good climax, to both a video game and a story

 

[Korhal]

In the Afro Samurai game, the battle with Justice at the end is phenomenal as far as balance between difficulty and story goes. The fight was hard enough that I died once or twice before beating him, and the whole time Justice is talking and taunting you... plus the level design is wildly different from anything seen in the game up to that point.

The end of the game was one of the best final bosses I've ever seen.

 

[R.O.]

First of all, heroics are pretty overrated when they have to satisfy millions of individual gamers. The more personal it is, the more heroic it is. I guess I have to go with KOTOR because I never got tired of beating on Malak. He is always challenging to defeat even if you have a superior character. Any boss fight from any of the Metal Gear Solid series games especially Liquid who just wouldn't stay dead. Virgil from Devil May Cry 3 because he was ultra tough to take down plus he looked cool when he is kicking your arse. Andrew Ryan for obvious reasons if you played Bioshock. And for Final Fantasy, Kuja, Jechts, and of course Sephiroth.

 

[P1p3s]

I like both types of games. Stick that in your pipe and smoke it

what he said - although I'm not recommending you smoke anything.
kthnxbai

 

[Dectilon]

One of the best final bosses for me is Apocalypse in Silver. He forces you to use your collected knowledge and skill to beat him, but as long as you stay focused you will eventually defeat him.

I'm not all that for a final boss that looks really awesome but fights like a handicapped tadpole. That completely drains all the epicness from the moment. As long as the game isn't an asshole and forces you to sit through the same cutscene every time you retry it definately feels like the "real" battle was the one where you finally beat it.

If it's more of a strange cinematic (see FFX) it's easy for me to start questioning the entire premise, because I don't like meta-combat...

The one thing doesn't detract from the other as I see it, so 100% heroics and 100% difficulty

 

[Hirvox]

I'm mostly looking for difficulty in boss encounters, but everything must be taken in moderation. A too difficult boss (especially if it's a MK Walker boss) just breeds frustration and practically guarantees that the game won't be touched afterwards. Ideally, a boss would test your abilities in non-obvious ways. For example, the Sword Master in Secret of Monkey Island. All of the other pirates have distinct insult-reply pairs, but defeating the Sword Master requires you to look beyond the pairs and find appropriate replies to the Sword Master's unique insults. The first duel usually ends badly and thus ramps up the Sword Master's status for the time that you actually defeat her, maintaining the narrative.

One of my favourite mixes of narrative and heroism occurs at the end of System Shock, where you finally corner the elusive Shodan into a single computer system. Just getting there required you to use your problem-solving and combat skills to the fullest, and the added control screw mechanic made Shodan the deadliest cyberspace opponent in the game. Which is appropriate, because you're fighting her on her turf. Facing her again in "real" space in System Shock 2 felt downright anticlimatic by comparison, and not just because she was a pushover. The narrative's momentum stopped at the moment you destroyed the Many's brain, getting rid of the primary antagonist. Taking care of Shodan felt like mopping off the blood after a firefight. She should have been left as an optional (and hard!) boss fight or even gotten a full-blown sequel/expansion dedicated to fighting her.