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How often is a game's final boss fight really the most difficult one?

S

Speevy

Banned
Just a few games I've beaten this generation.

Ninja Gaiden - Easy.
Super Mario Sunshine - Easy.
Resident Evil 4 - Easier than other bosses in the game.
Zelda Wind Waker - Easy
Riddick - Pretty easy compared with the rest of the game
KOTOR - Drawn out a little bit, but not insanely hard.

Now, Ikaruga had a hard final stage. REALLY hard. Pikmin 2's final boss was very creative, graphically beautiful, not not that hard if you knew what you were doing.

Do you prefer a light final boss fight or one that's tough as nails?
 
I'll take a final boss that's enjoyable to fight.

If it has nice music supporting it I'll twiddle around just to listen to that! GET ME PUMPING, YEH NO WUT I MEAN?

Like BG&E's. Only without the reverse controls.
 
I prefer one in the medium range of difficulty. You don't want it too easy to the point you feel letdown, but you also don't want it frustratingly difficult with the possibility of never even finishing the game you made it to the very end of.
 
RE4 and NG suffer from the fact that the game gets easier the further along you go, as you get a lot of ammo, healing items and money that you can blow on the last boss.

Onimusha 2 and 3 had pretty challenging end bosses, at least relative to the rest of the game.

As for me, I prefer a more challenging and epic boss battle, but not something as ridiculous as that in some RPGs.
 
final bosses should be bigger, better, or harder...they should also bring closure

what I want is a game to take the X (movie) approach...slowly build up to the final fight between the character and the last enemy...then :D
 
Miburou said:
RE4 and NG suffer from the fact that the game gets easier the further along you go, as you get a lot of ammo, healing items and money that you can blow on the last boss.
Click to expand...

That's the drawback to action games that have and upgrade or leveling system. This is a complaint I hear constantly against Metroidvania.

I have the same opinion as demi--make it enjoyable above all.
 
For RPGs, a "difficult" boss is usually one that's tedious as opposed to intellectually challenging (Arc the Lad 2's boss is the perfect example of this). An RPG final boss (or, in fact, any final boss) should have the good grace to die as soon as you figure out its weakness and exploit it--if the boss has multiple forms, then you should be able to progress through those forms fairly quickly.

And sometimes an overly ambitious final boss fight can overtax the game's engine and cripple play (see Perfect Dark, and arguably Metroid Prime).
 
Miburou said:
RE4 and NG suffer from the fact that the game gets easier the further along you go, as you get a lot of ammo, healing items and money that you can blow on the last boss.
Click to expand...

You hit the nail on the head, but although I did stock up heavily for the final boss fight in RE4 I really didn't use anything for him, he just wasn't hard.
 
Prospero said:
For RPGs, a "difficult" boss is usually one that's tedious as opposed to intellectually challenging (Arc the Lad 2's boss is the perfect example of this). An RPG final boss (or, in fact, any final boss) should have the good grace to die as soon as you figure out its weakness and exploit it--if the boss has multiple forms, then you should be able to progress through those forms fairly quickly.
Click to expand...

FFVII did this flawlessly, IMO.
 
Metroid Prime 2: Echoes

Torvos Bog

1. Alpha Blogg

Dark Sky Temple

2. Ing Leader (3rd phase) One - Eyed Willy <---- i borrow the name from "The Goonies" since he has no name. He's gotta have a name don'tcha think? :lol


The first one took a long time and i couldn't defeat him so i ended up looking for the darkburst to take him out.

The second one, oh my goodness, timmmmeeee consumming!!!!!! I thought i'll never get past that freak. It felt like it took about 30 to 40 mins to beat him. I wonder if Retro Studios over did this one?
 
Well its kinda not fair to rpgs. Those that do offer some nice side quests can make the final boss seem trite compared to boss of ...lets say for example at 100th floor huge dungeon. A small variance to that I like to see on some rpgs would be keeping the final boss without question the hardest mob in game, those that dont have reflexes or such to kill him have the option of some challenging intellilectual side quests to get some better gear to handle him better. That way the elite can brag to have beat him without side quests. And younger or those struggling abit can use them make him abit more bareable while still fleshing out more of story hopefully. Otherwise its sidequest bosses>final boss normally as far as challenge goes unfortunately.
 
even with all the powerups etc, i think the final boss was beyond just "too easy"... to me it felt like the last boss was purposefully easy in Ninja Gaiden.
 
Wonder Boy in Monster World had a pretty tough last boss iirc.

Target Earth, also... though that whole game was insane.
 
Final Boss fights are usually pretty easy for me since I'm a hoarder and have a full game worth of attack/defense/healing items at endgame.
 
Ristamar said:
I'd say the final boss fights in FFII(IV) and FFIII(VI) are the toughest of the game.
Click to expand...


They're also enjoyable, god the final boss music on II(IV) is sooo good. I'm about to fire that bitch up again!

It's like

omg we are gonna die to the mighty
Zeromus
, but then all of a sudden
every character that has died comes back and gives you some power, even your own father~
and it's like HOLY SHIT YOU ARE GONNA DIE NOW MOTHERFUCKER SUPER SAYAJAIN STYLE. With badass musak to boot.

Then you constantly assault it with Kain, because he's so badass.
 
Yeah, fighting up the mound o' Kefka was crazy as hell in FFVI (III US). The music just added to the scene. Then again I still love the Omnislash moment from FFVII, Cloud gave out a beatdown.
 
Minish Cap's final boss was considerably harder than any other in that game.

As for Wind Waker, the second to last boss was possibly the most annoying boss in any Zelda game ever.
 
AtomicShroom said:
Easiest ending boss has to be in Super Metroid. You can't lose!
Click to expand...
Sure you can. Yes you're so powerful by that point that dying is extremely unlikely, but you still can, both before and after you get 'hyper'd. Am I the only one who let themselves get charged up from the baby metroid, and, while flashing from being juiced up, just stood there and let the final boss take potshots at me until I die, just to see if it is possible?
 
worldrunover said:
Minish Cap's final boss was considerably harder than any other in that game.

As for Wind Waker, the second to last boss was possibly the most annoying boss in any Zelda game ever.
Click to expand...


I thought of The Minish Cap when I read the topic title. The game is fun, but pretty easy, especially the bosses. When I got to the final boss, I was thinking "Let's finish the game and see the ending, this should be a breeze". He ended up be substantially harder than any of the other bosses.
 
The final boss of Clock Tower 3 was much much harder than anything else in the game. I know it took me more than 20 tries to beat him...
 
Ratchet & Clank 1's final boss was definitely the hardest in that game, mainly because he has one or two notches too many on his life bar. He's actually a good way of illustrating the point some people are bringing up here ... when I fight him, I know his patterns. I know how to beat them. I GET IT. But it goes on for so long that little slips here and there accumulate, and I'm dead before I can go the distance. If you understand a boss, you should be able to beat him, IMO.

R&C2's was too far in the other direction, but I thought 3's final boss was perfect. It was a hard fight, through several forms, and when I won I really felt like I deserved it.
 
SpoonyBard said:
Luigi's Mansion, the last boss was a lot harder than the rest of the game.
Click to expand...

That's true, I'd never lost all my health in the game until that boss fight. (So I never even saw the "real" Game Over sequence until later, since it's different for the last fight.)

I thought the final boss (
Bowletta
) was suitably toughest in Mario & Luigi Superstar Saga. Even if you were fairly leveled up, and especially after the midway sequence, you HAD to master dodging the attacks. (But I loved how you were able to dodge or counter almost every attack in M&L, it really threw a nice amount of platformer skill into the game to where you could avoid taking ANY damage if you were good.)

What seems to be the trend anymore, at least for RPGs, is that the final boss is fairly tough, but there's optional extra bosses you can find near the end (or after the end) that are much harder. (Such as the Weapons in FF7, Kurt, the Reaper, and someone else in Kingdom Hearts, the dragon at the bottom of the pit in Paper Mario: The Thousand Year Door, and so forth.)
 
Memorable End bosses (either insanely hard or too easy) :

Phantasy Star II : never DID beat Mother Brain, didn't have some of the Techniques you really need to beat her/it

Panzer Dragoon Orta : Beat the last boss on my first try on Easy, but haven't been able to beat him ever since !

Mario & Luigi Superstar Saga : Extremely tough end boss, especially after it (SPOILER)
transforms and leaves you with just 1 HP
! Took me 5-6 tries...

Paper Mario 2 : similar to M&L, very tough end boss, way tougher than most other bosses, again with several different forms to keep you occupied.

Fire Emblem (GBA) : Huge fight in the finale with several bosses reapparing to attack your squad. Haven't beaten it yet, mostly because I had protected my main characters (especially Hector and Lynn) way too much, so they didn't have enough experience to wield the special weapons they get near the end...

KotOR 2 : The end boss stumped me at first, but when I saw through
her
tactics, it as fairly easy.
Once Darth Traya/Kreia gets out the three floating lightsabers, I thought I was f*cked, but by just running around and using lots of Force Lightning, it becomes quite easy..
The fights against the Jedi Masters (especially the first couple of them) were a bit harder than this. Fights against the Sith Lords were also quite easy..

Shining Force : The battle against Darksol was quite hard, mainly because of his extremly powerful attack and the bunch of cronies that surrounded him. Again : I believe there were tougher bosses during the game though, especially the fight inside the Abbey (surrounded by zombies : RE style !) sticks out in my mind as being pretty damn hard.
 
FFVII worst final boss ever. Was that really necessary. Why not make that into a cutscene if he was just going to lay down and die.

On the other hand if they had the Ruby and Emerald weapons as required bosses that would have really given the game some credibility. I don't think I died in that game at all. What a freaking joke compared to FFVI.

The last boss should be vulnerable to the skills you have learned throughout the game. IE Snake Eater. You have to use CQC on the Boss - which you have to been doing throughout the game. If you have been just shooting everyone up and not sneaking you can't win.

Luigi's Mansion was retarded because the boss fight was not in accordance with the game levels. Metroid Prime uses the learning factor, but the theme of changing defences was lame since the previous metorids and bosses had the exact same pattern and they added the super gun at the end. How are you supposed to learn about something when you only get to use it for seconds at a time and only at the last boss.
 
Paper Mario:TYD was easy as shit,then I get to the final boss last night and it absolutely smokes me,now I gotta watch that fuckin cut scene every time,ugh I might not even bother.

Oh and Shinobi's last boss on PS2 was so fuckin hard compared to the rest of the game...I hate how games will be fun through out,but hit that last boss and the difficulty just sky rockets,no excuse,they should be just like every other enemy in the game...have a weakness and not have an insane amount of health or anything,that's so stupid.
 
Rygar had an Insane last boss. Also Ninja Gaiden III's last boss were very difficult.

Dr Wily in Mega man V (snes) also comes to mind.
 
Breath of Fire V: Dragon Quarter had an enjoyable final boss fight in my opinion. Just keep plugging away! In games where you have to slash through an entire group of sub-bosses before reaching the final battle, it's much better for the final boss 'fight' to have a more dynamic solution.
 
:lol @ whoever is having trouble with the last boss of PM 2.
The
Shadow Queen
was extremely easy for me. It took me one try and I only used one Ultra Shroom. Remember, badge selection is key.
 
kumanoki said:
Breath of Fire V: Dragon Quarter had an enjoyable final boss fight in my opinion. Just keep plugging away! In games where you have to slash through an entire group of sub-bosses before reaching the final battle, it's much better for the final boss 'fight' to have a more dynamic solution.
Click to expand...

I kinda wish all bosses tried for a more dynamic solution, to some extent at least. I don't like lazy bosses, that are just like normal enemies with more HP, stats etc. I want patterns, tactics, limited windows for effective attacks, not just hacking away with the same tactics as normal enemies just for longer.
 
Die Squirrel Die said:
I kinda wish all bosses tried for a more dynamic solution, to some extent at least. I don't like lazy bosses, that are just like normal enemies with more HP, stats etc. I want patterns, tactics, limited windows for effective attacks, not just hacking away with the same tactics as normal enemies just for longer.
Click to expand...
The end boss in PM 2 was great. Sure you had to watch a long cutscene that you can't skip halfway through the fight but there are some interesting things that happen. Predictable, but interesting nonetheless.
 
Also a boss should have a maximum of 3 forms. And they should only go for 3 if it introduces entirely new ideas to the battle, not if it's just the boss regains energy and gets slightly harder.
 
Dark Falz in Phantasy Star is probably the hardest Boss. although Lassic was pretty hard too.


Dark Force in Phantasy Star II, the 2nd to last fight, is easily the hardest. Mother Brain was easier.
 
doncale said:
Dark Falz in Phantasy Star is probably the hardest Boss. although Lassic was pretty hard too.


Dark Force in Phantasy Star II, the 2nd to last fight, is easily the hardest. Mother Brain was easier.
Click to expand...

I don't really remember how tough Dark Falz was, I just remember he was very hard to FIND in the last dungeon :D Ergo : I only finished the game years later, after reading the solution in a hint book or an old Gamepro/EGM somewhere.

I'm not sure how tough Dark Force in PSII was either, but like I said, I never could beat Mother Brain. I think I brought the wrong party members with me, and missed out on some of the more potent healing techniques.
 
Cyan said:
Yeah, at the final boss, I not only lost all my hearts for the first time, but got a game over for the first time. Yikes.
Click to expand...

I came close to dying, even though that was the only time I had carried potions with me in the game. I finally got his last pattern as I was using my last fairy and beat hime just before he killed me.

The challenge in Rygar (PS2) was making it to the final boss with full health. There was a full refill in the room with the next to last boss, and Rygar had a very abusive combo that could take out most of her life without letting her move, so it really just took a little planning, but was rather easy.

Star Ocean 2 had the hardest boss I ever killed. I fought Indalecio for 3 days before going into the cave of trials and picking up some bunny shoes then heading back to kill him.

Kartia's Final Bosses were the only challenge in the game.

Grandia, on the other hand, had a final boss who was weak overall and his last form used only the lowest level spells in the game.

What I really hate is a boss who kills me repeatedly, but when I beat him, I kil him without even taking much damage. It feels rather anticlimactic. I love the feeling of limping away from the final battle with only on party member and virtually no health as well as all expendable items used.
 
Final boss are always easy if you can predict the pattern. Take Baldurs Gate:DA for exsample where even on the hieghest difficulty it was easy to finish Eldrith just by blocking certain attacks with a sheild.
 
Like said, I think it needs to be enjoyable, challenging and satisfying. Most difficult? That's debatable. You see at the end of movies when they face the antagonist, sometimes through all the experience, they win by exploiting all they've learned. Sometimes easier than the growing stages. The best are usually strung out though or have something extra special to em. Anyway, final bosses I loved.

MGS1 - Liquid Snake was the man. I love the feeling of not being able to get rid of him and how things came to a clash over and over at the end.

DMC - I REALLY like this boss. The new form of gameplay, the length, had to push myself. From a game with fantastic bosses, it's so cool that the final one stood out even more than the others.

Shenmue II - BEAUTIFUL!! The climactic nature of the fight was just great. But what clinched it was all Ryo learned, and having it come into play. I also am a big fan of QTE and the way they integrate them into the battle system.

MGS3 - BEAUTIFUL!! Being allowed to finally go one on one with CQC rocked if you could time it. That and the scene, multiple ways of tackling it, the emotion, the finish. MGS3 did so many things right in the game. Chalk another one up here

KOTOR - I dunno, I just thought he was really challenging. I needed to use everything. All the boosters, any tricks I can do, etc, etc.

(add more later once i remember)
 
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