Which Single-Player Games have the MOST Bosses?

[aozgolo]

Ye olde boss fight, a traditional hallmark of video games, and usually the high point of a game's difficulty. I got a bit curious the other day wondering "Which game has the most amount of bosses you can battle?" So I'll pose the question here, a few basic qualifications though before you answer:

1: I mentioned Single Player only games, because otherwise I have a feeling MMORPGs would win hands down simply by their design
2: For the sake of argument, a boss should be considered an enemy with unique mechanics, not simply a more powerful mook (Sorry Skyrim, your Bandit Chiefs are disqualified)
3: Quantity over Quality, Dark Souls might have the most memorable boss fights you can think of but it doesn't have the most, and while games like Shadow of the Colossus boast 16 boss battles that stand out, your typical Final Fantasy game has more than that.


So let's play that numbers game, any game you can think of that might qualify.

 

[FalloutJack]

Well, bearing in mind that any mook pallette-swaps that occurred in the game were AFTER the things had been used in a boss, it seems that Final Fantasy 6 - since you mention the series - has about 55 of them. (This varies if you count individual beings or if different forms in a boss battle count, but considering ALL Final Fantasy games have to consider that, this might be the most in at least THESE games.)

 

[Addendum_Forthcoming]

I'd say Monster Hunter is a game of boss battles. That's not the only thing you do, of course ... but the highlights are obviously you vs. a new, more powerful beastie, or more than one beastie. Though it's not single player only.

 

[Nazulu]

I think there are almost 70 different bosses in Rebirth (Afterbirth) without adding in the different colour variations. I remember counting them awhile ago when it was new and hip.

Edit: If you include the mini-bosses, it will definitely be more.

 

[WhiteFangofWhoa]

I think an article counted up the bosses in Wild Arms 3 once and arrived somewhere in the neighbourhood of 80, but keep in mind this includes plenty of rematches with the recurring villains and rivals where the only thing that's changed about them is that they have higher stats and new attacks (and so do you). The character model itself hardly changes.

Take a look, you fight blue-haired scoundrel Janus Cascade no less than EIGHT times in total- three times with his black-hat posse and five times alone with his demon powers, and every single time he is notably stronger than the last match, also getting one fight where he wins:

http://shrines.rpgclassics.com/ps2/wa3/bosses.shtml

Still love the game though. Check out all the various bonus bosses on that list... including a boss fight against a porn magazine. The rest of that franchise tends to have larger than normal number of bosses too. Wild Arms 5 had a steadfast rule of always having two bosses per dungeon even if that dungeon is just a tunnel taking you from one town to another, plus story bosses and over a dozen optional ones. Also, you might count the Sol Nigers as well since they get the boss music and are unique fights (powerful optional enemy in every dungeon where, if you beat it, you can switch off all encounters for that dungeon, PLUS four extremely tough 'World Nigers' for the four world map areas).

Also check out the TVTropes entry, 'Boss Game' for games that consist of nothing but bosses.

 

[FalloutJack]

Rematches

I'm counting rematches, myself. It's a different battle where the boss has done some sit-ups and come back with a shinier sword. He's back, but he's changed up a bit, usually. So far, that makes it 80 as the top number, which is impressive.

OT: I should point out that Persona games cannot count a number of its Shadow bosses, because the extra bosses ARE largely bosses in mooks' clothing. HOWEVER, I did a count of Shin Megami Tensei: Nocturne...and it was SO CLOSE. 76!

 

[aozgolo]

I do want to do a count of Dragon Quest IX and Final Fantasy XII. In DQ:IX on top of the main story bosses, there's also Grotto bosses which are legacy bosses from previous installments in the series, so it's probably a substantial number. Final Fantasy XII on top of boasting the usual wide array of story-bosses, also has many optional bosses such as Espers and Hunts which up the number significantly. There are a few Hunts that are basically boss-in-mook-clothing but many are quite unique in their set-up.

 

[WhiteFangofWhoa]

...And I think I've broken the record again. Talking about the two Wild Arms games with the most bosses led me to check out the last game in the series just out of curiosity. I even made a list to prove it.

If you count the 'hopeless' boss battles where one of the main villains wrecks you, WA5 has 59 story bosses total.

It also has 19 optional bosses, again including a 'hard' battle against Adult Magazines and series superboss Ragu O Ragla.

Add in the fact that there are 26 dungeons including the four bonus dungeons, and each one has a Sol Niger. They all look the same but have different stats and abilities, and some are different sizes. Also one of those for each of the 4 segments of the world map.

Final count: 108

 

[WindKnight]

Hmmm... can We count Warning Forever, which is nothing but boss fights, with the boss evolving each time you defeat it, according to how you defeated it, and the game is built around how far you can go?

 

[Dreiko_v1legacy]

Jrpgs, which one is a hard question but my instinct was to go for persona 3 fes beause the epilogue alone has a ton of em and the main game is an 80 hour Jrpg in it own merit.

 

[go-10]

I think Witcher 3 has a lot of bosses, dunno how many but at least one per every other quest