Out of place boss battles

[Afterbirth]

Bosses are cool, but it depends on genre.
Bosses used to be the main graphical effect for a game, as well as a test of skill.
Everyone used to love taking on a Boss (normally in a shooter, but other games too, platformers mainly) because it really used to push a machine graphically.
Game genres have changed these days and bosses just don't suite certain genres.


I'd say they fit RPG's though. Fantasy books and tradition have always had a boss charater of some kind.

[Alf-Life]

I dunno about the guy who complained about the 10-minute trek to get back to the Sheegoth miniboss - if you were that crap to get killed by it you deserved to travel 10 minutes. :P

With WW, I'm sure most of you are disappointed because it's a rehash of OOT, and while OOT shared similarities with LttP, it was 3D and so there was some innovation there. WW had none of that really. :/

As for Prime, I'm suprised people are putting down how amazing the boss battles were - now, granted I too don't like the obvious neon arrow flashing point to my Zelda boss' weakness... but I do like some feedback from the game showing me that what I'm doing is right/having an effect... in this way Meta Ridley in particular disappointed me.
Maybe I missed the point, but I never really 'got' how to kill him - I just got in close and pummelled his face while he tried to breathe fire at me... then, sometimes his head would flash yellow but I never really 'got' why... or at least got what I was doing differently from all the times I shot his head and it didn't flash yellow. And Prime was a bit annoying until I went back and found the Ice Breaker Thing.

I don't mind dying, but in a Zelda game you start back at the lair - getting killed by Ridley required a trek from the Mothership, and being killed at Prime required an annoying platform jump room with almost unkillable (or at least pointless to kill) RESPAWNING! metroids.


I agree with the Halo thing, too, it was great not to have to fight a generic boss, plus ingenious that all the stuff you learn and play with in earlier levels in controlling the Warthog pays off and you must escape with it.


Also, since we're talking about bosses - what about that Skedar King eh? No previous mention and suddenly kill him and the Skedar-Maian War is over. Oh, and if you die back to the start please.
Trevelyan was way cooler.


Overall, Garibaldi's post was great... I too like to feel that the whole dungeon is the boss' domain, and not just the final chamber.

[Tom Salter]

It's like Nemesis from RE:3. You were constantly being hunted, he wanted your ass. And when he came, you couldn't do anything about it. The world was HIS domain.

Except this didn't quite work, because Nemesis was so badly scripted.

[SuperBrother]

Dark Falz in PSO is one of my faves, the whole ruins level builds up to it nicely (if you bother to read the message capsules) starting out as an "artificial" man made area and becoming more organic and alive the deeper you go. The final bit with the tranquil, blue skied area which transforms is great - the boss himself is a fair challenge until you suss out the patterns and which techs to use.

[Alf-Life]

It's like Nemesis from RE:3. You were constantly being hunted, he wanted your ass. And when he came, you couldn't do anything about it. The world was HIS domain.

Except this didn't quite work, because Nemesis was so badly scripted.

Ooh, interesting, I really need to play RE Nemesis... is Nemesis the only enemy? I've often wondered about an FPS or survival horror without the cannon fodder - the gaming equivalents of the Predator (or Alien, or Jaws) movie.

[Tom Salter]

Nah, there's still loads of other enemies. But what made Nemesis different was the fact that he could move from one area to the next, unlike the others who could be avoided by going through a door. You couldn't easily fight him off, so running through multiple areas was your only hope, until you found something cunningly placed to stop him progressing.

So yeah, it's kinda like Alien...sorta.

There's so few games where enemies are more than simple cannon fodder. I hate just having to pump shells into generic enemy after generic enemy, as *you* are the hunter, rather than you being hunted. In fact, has there ever been a game where you are hunted? Except for RE:3