Bosses with Adds/Minions are the worst because it clearly shows the boss is not strong enough to deal with the player by themselves.
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Let’s talk about boss battle tropes that make things worse.
- Thread starter Lightning Count
- Start date
Unwinnable battles really should be relegated to cutscenes, JRPGs. What a waste of everyone's time.
I don't like ads in 3rd person action game boss fights.
All it does is fuck up the camera and lock on.
All it does is fuck up the camera and lock on.
In a game with combos, any boss that ignores hit stun and just hits you while you're comboing them (Yakuza is the worst with this)
Bosses that summon little scrubs to get in your way are the worst
So annoying, just let me whack the stupid giant monster, game
So annoying, just let me whack the stupid giant monster, game
Normally I'm okay with any kind of boss. Game desginers have a philosophy behind how some things should be dealt with. And I get that. That said, fuck Nyx from P3 specifically I did my first run through a few months ago. As thematically great fighting Nyx is fuck him.
Due to Nyx, I feel the following:
If a boss has more than 3 phases, I'm mentally clocked out.
If a boss is taking more than 20 minutes, I'm mentally clocked out.
If a boss is able to confuse a party member causing them to fully heal them, I'm mentally clocked out.
Seriously, whoever designed this never thought of the player's sanity. It's one thing to have a difficult boss you keep dying to. But if things come down to a battle of attrition, fuck off. Nobody deserves this.
Due to Nyx, I feel the following:
If a boss has more than 3 phases, I'm mentally clocked out.
If a boss is taking more than 20 minutes, I'm mentally clocked out.
If a boss is able to confuse a party member causing them to fully heal them, I'm mentally clocked out.
Seriously, whoever designed this never thought of the player's sanity. It's one thing to have a difficult boss you keep dying to. But if things come down to a battle of attrition, fuck off. Nobody deserves this.
Luckily in Kiwami 2 you can get pretty OP with weapons. I bought a long ass spear and proceeded to Guanyu the fuck out of every boss with guns.
Bosses that spend most of the fight totally invulnerable, cycling through three or four different attacks that you simply have to dodge or wait out until they're finished. Then they'll finally do the one move in their repertoire that will leave them vulnerable so you can actually do some damage to them, but be quick because it's very possible to miss the chance and have to wait through the whole cycle again for another shot.
Luigi's Mansion 3 does this quite a lot, and it makes for really tedious bossfights.
Luigi's Mansion 3 does this quite a lot, and it makes for really tedious bossfights.
These
Also, the the act four times in a row/stunlock you to death boss, which is usually damn close to an instant kill.
Bosses that spend 99% of the fight being invincible except for a microsecond opening where you can hit them so you can do a single combo or shoot them for a specific amount of time. Then you do that like 10-20 times til it dies.
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Unwinnable battles that are actually "winnable" are another to add to this.
As an example, I have been playing Trails of Cold Steel lately, and there is one part where you fight your instructor, I managed to position my party and use items to keep my team alive long enough to chip away at her HP until it reached 1, at which point i started dealing 0 damage and she started dealing 10s of thousands of damage (to make the fight unwinnable in New Game+ i suspect).
If you are going to make the fight unwinnable, then do it properly.
Phases that are not expressed in the health bar can go fuck themselves. Looking at you From!!! It was a cute surprise in 2010 but if the boss has multiple phases please use a persistent health bar instead of making me believe I killed the damn thing only to let my guard down for a cheap phase 2/3 attack.
Yeah, this shit is annoying.
Anyone who's played Xenoblade knows the line.
Ahh the classic 1st hit = 3 shockwaves, 2nd hit = 4 shockwaves, 3rd hit = 5 shockwaves, and then they die.
THIS. Add Mass Effect 2 and you have my examples. Its always so dumb in such narrative driven games.Bosses that miss the entire point of a character or were included simply because "a video game needs to end on a boss"
Yeah, this one. Just super boring. Feels like 90% percent of nintendo bosses are just about finding that one opening in the boss's attack pattern 3 times while dealing with its attacks that get marginally stronger with each hit.
Bosses with one hit kill attacks. I'm fine with attacks that do a lot of damage but attacks that are poorly telegraphed and instantly kill you are just bad design. For example Dark Souls 3's Dancer is an awesome boss but they gave her a grab attack that has a very large hitbox and the only tell is the noise she makes so avoiding it has a pretty tight timing. In the same game Oceiros has a very high damage charge attack he can launch immediately without warning.
Far Cry 3's QTE bosses are also incredibly disappointing when they build them up for you to hate, getting ready for a good showdown only for them to die in a cutscene.
Large bosses in too small arenas are the worst because the camera is never adapted to work with the boss and the boss will usually have a lot of sections that you can just clip through.
Bosses should also adapt to the number of players because for example DS3 Midir is impossible with more than one player because it has very short attack windows and runs all over its arena so at best there is one player capable of hitting it. Speaking of which, very short attack windows or doing practically no damage unless you hit a specific body part is horrible, at least let us get some reasonable damage elsewhere too!
Far Cry 3's QTE bosses are also incredibly disappointing when they build them up for you to hate, getting ready for a good showdown only for them to die in a cutscene.
Large bosses in too small arenas are the worst because the camera is never adapted to work with the boss and the boss will usually have a lot of sections that you can just clip through.
Bosses should also adapt to the number of players because for example DS3 Midir is impossible with more than one player because it has very short attack windows and runs all over its arena so at best there is one player capable of hitting it. Speaking of which, very short attack windows or doing practically no damage unless you hit a specific body part is horrible, at least let us get some reasonable damage elsewhere too!
The worst DArk Souls boss are the gankers from the DLC. I played offline and having 3 NPC chasing you in a shit arena was the opposite of fun.
That one or Midir, too much life and the battle is 90% chasing him or trying to dodge his attacks.
That one or Midir, too much life and the battle is 90% chasing him or trying to dodge his attacks.
I think the biggest issue with minions is that most action games don't really give you tools to fight multiple opponents at once. Like, for example, that one Valkyrie in God of War that summons minions is a pain in the ass because you can't lock onto her without her stupid bros hitting you from out of nowhere. Don't lock on, though, and she'll fly out of your sight and then get you with projectiles from off-screen.
Meanwhile, in games like Arkham Knight, it's no problem because you're equipped to handle multiple attackers at once.
Meanwhile, in games like Arkham Knight, it's no problem because you're equipped to handle multiple attackers at once.
Yeah, this sucks so much. You learn and practice all these combos, and then against the boss, it's just light, light, dodge, repeat.
Insta death QTEs at the end of the fight. I mean, come on.
Also, in games where killing the MC ends the game, don't make the boss suddenly use an insta-death skill 30 mins into the fight that randomly takes out your whole party because you hadn't prepared for that specifically.
Cases where the wave after wave of minions are the boss fight. Disappointing and lazy.
Also, in games where killing the MC ends the game, don't make the boss suddenly use an insta-death skill 30 mins into the fight that randomly takes out your whole party because you hadn't prepared for that specifically.
Cases where the wave after wave of minions are the boss fight. Disappointing and lazy.
Also all the bosses on Marvel's Spiderman for PS4, I just finished the game and at the beginning, I was trying to fight the bosses like if they were normal enemies with cool moves, but after Shocker, I realized that they are Mario bosses instead: dodge, dodge, web/throw stuff, hit and back to step 1, small variation might occur. I loved the game, but the boss fighting mechanics where a clear weak point of the game
Gotta say I disagree about some of the takes on invincibility phases in here. They can add another layer of challenge. For instance, in Mario games where you can't hurt bowser but he's chasing you through a platforming course that challenging in a different way than just fighting him.
Im playing KH Re:Mind right now, and the "invincibility phases" of the bosses' desperation moves are some of the most tense parts of these battles. A gauntlet of attacks you have to learn to pick your way through.
And Metroid Prime has some of the best bosses of all time. 3D Zelda and Mario have really creative ones that use their mechanics in clever ways. Not everything has to be a test of reflexes or just getting hits in whenever you can lol.
Im playing KH Re:Mind right now, and the "invincibility phases" of the bosses' desperation moves are some of the most tense parts of these battles. A gauntlet of attacks you have to learn to pick your way through.
And Metroid Prime has some of the best bosses of all time. 3D Zelda and Mario have really creative ones that use their mechanics in clever ways. Not everything has to be a test of reflexes or just getting hits in whenever you can lol.
Any JRPG boss that randomly whips out a team wipe move.
many boss that's basically just fighting minions
any boss that is basically fought in a dream sequence or hallucination and you basically feel like you make no progress until a random cutscene starts and you beat them in the cutscene
on top of that, bosses that are beaten in cutscenes for the final blow as opposed to in gameplay
many boss that's basically just fighting minions
any boss that is basically fought in a dream sequence or hallucination and you basically feel like you make no progress until a random cutscene starts and you beat them in the cutscene
on top of that, bosses that are beaten in cutscenes for the final blow as opposed to in gameplay
It's fun reading this thread whilst imagining it's a workplace advice forum:
Remnant: From the Ashes was terrible with this, every fight was based around throwing dozens of enemies out to chase you around while the boss took pot shots at you
I dislike it when bosses or enemies have surprise attacks, in that they disappear from the screen and will randomly appear from some unknown part. Using Dark Souls 3 as an example, that Lodric (I think that's the name) fight toward the end with two brothers attached to each other. He would teleport and shoot rays from the sword at you. Hate it.
Bosses you're supposed to lose against that give you no indication if you're supposed to lose or not.
This is the real bullshit right here, we had tons of these bosses in WoW and it was the fucking worst shit ever to slog through an easy encounter only to get to the hard part 8 minutes in (hello archimonde)
Bullshit.
Immunity phases absolutely have their sense, used sparingly.
Especially in cutting-edge MMO, it is a very important tool.
Every Nintendo boss that does piss easy pattern, has one opening for damage, the. Repeats for approx half a hour until death
That said, the only people who really do a gameplay-first boss properly are at Monster Hunter for SP and WoW\XIV for MP.
Maybe FROM, but compared to MHW all FROM bosses are pretty shit.
All bosses that are "Designer's Dance" - eg. discover pattern, do pattern - with no relevant variation, insight, adaption or resource management need to die.
Evidently, your game didn't need bosses. That's fine.
Maybe FROM, but compared to MHW all FROM bosses are pretty shit.
All bosses that are "Designer's Dance" - eg. discover pattern, do pattern - with no relevant variation, insight, adaption or resource management need to die.
Evidently, your game didn't need bosses. That's fine.
Thank you for providing exactly zero examples of this "important tool". Because there are none.
Immunity phases are nothing but bad game/encounter/ai-design.
I'm gonna disagree with all the complaints about minions. So many action games are all crowd control, about entering a room and dealing with multiple threats at different power levels. Some are fodder, some are minor, some are major. You have to prioritize, improv, constantly move and think about their options and your options.
most good bosses test you on the skills you've learned through the game. A boss with a bunch of bad guys is a proper escalation of that challenge.
most good bosses test you on the skills you've learned through the game. A boss with a bunch of bad guys is a proper escalation of that challenge.
Ifrit's Charge in FFXIV 1st xpac, if you really want a basic one.
Pretty much all Alexander bosses.
Ravana special attacks.
But mostly, immunity has to be used during phase transitions or major attacks requiring co-ordination.
I'm not talking about 30s phases, i'm talking about 5-8s.
Basically, most MMO cutting-edge fights are up against strictly tuned enrage timers - not using immunity during major co-ordination requirement situations means either using only low-intensity challenges as coordination checks, or making the fight about continuining DPS under excessive stress, thereby moving excessive difficulty to a single phase.
The trick to immunity phases is that they need to be the highest point of the stress curve, if at any point the player is just 'waiting' for them to be done, it's badly done.
The worst is when you wipe the floor with the boss in game and then the cutscene starts and you are losing.
Either make the boss impossible or have the fork programmed.
Either make the boss impossible or have the fork programmed.