Bosses: C/D, S/D

I think what games should do is be a bit more flexible with them. The reason they're annoying to me isn't so much the tedium of playing them but the way they create bottlenecks in gameplay. Even in a platformer like Crash Bandicoot, you can put levels aside to go and try other ones and come back fresh, but once it's you vs boss that's IT until you beat them. So it's really bottlenecks I think are dud, not bosses per se.

So keep the bosses in for people who like them, make sure there's real benefits to beating them*, but maybe also include ways to circumvent them, at least for a while.

*(For instance in a game like Fable where there's a reputation element, obviously your rep would be much bigger for going and killing a boss than for cagily avoiding him or negotiating or tricking him or whatever.)

S: -First Robotnik of Sonic and Knuckles, where you've got to chase him over and under spikey hurdles.
-Final boss of Sonic 3
-Gunstar Heroes second boss.

D: -Bubble Bobble end boss.
-Most Altered Beast bosses with the exception of the first.
-The end boss of Doom 2. Who did this without a walkthrough?

(xposts)

i think what rubs me the wrong way about most bosses is that even though they're presumably supposed to be the apotheosis of each level, they generally don't have much to do with whatever unique or particular style of play is inherent to the game.

The thing I like about most bosses (in games I play) is that they are "now demonstrate that you've mastered the mechanism we've just taught you", though this is obviously rub if you aren't good at the mechanism.

The final boss in Minish Cap is a great example of this, I think you only end up NOT using about 2-3 items? I felt so cool after beating his smug magical ass.

great fun that game

I might go look it out for tomorrow now

Psychonauts bosses were not so hot.

That's what I like so much about those Sonic end bosses. They'd always find some way to rob you of your rings and therefore Supersonic powers beforehand, usually by way of some obscenely long cutscene.

not hard to beat, but oh so classic:

http://mo5.com/gamepatria/images/amiga/rtype/rtype06.jpg

destroy: the first holo-ganon in ocarina of time (I never properly worked out the mechanism for defeating him and though I did it maybe 4 or 5 times, each time was entirely random and fluke); mmm...

shite bosses :
bubble bobble, zelda III, nemesis, final fight, sonic. aliens. swiv.

super jumbo spin attack, visit the remaining sword brothers to get everything pumped up before heading into it. Being careful and precise it a waste of precious time in that fight.

(in the WWF arcade game)

: )

I agree!!

It took me a while too, but once he's out of the painting, you treat him like you treat the real Gannon, ie. whacking his spells back at him.

I like Tom (Groke)'s idea upthread about bosses being treated more like optional side quests. A lot of the bosses in the inverted castle in Symphony of the Night were basically that - these total weirdos or badass mofos that you didn't strictly need to fight in order to come to some sort of completion of the game. Works thematically in a game like that - you kind of accept these bosses not so much as Dracula's minions, but as semi-independent operators that have staked out their own fiefs in the castle.

But bosses I think are generally great, especially ones where you have to blow them up piece by piece. (Although this is often annoying in practice...to keep the boss from getting easier as you blow up their hands, legs, etc., they always end up having some cheap spread gun or rapid fire thing that engages only once they're down to just the head. C'mon!)

Irredeemable dud: multiple bosses on the same life with no recharge/restock moment. This was a standby of oldschool grueling platformers (Ninja Gaiden, Megaman 2), dunno if anyone is still doing that.

Whoever brought up the shitty Doom 2 final boss OTM. Not just impenetrable but also just not that intimidating or awesome or bosslike. Doom 1 had THREE bosses that were all pretty cool, but Doom 2 managed only this...evil wall-tile throwing ordinary monsters at you. I guess they were maybe running out of ways to make a hard enemy in the game and wanted to do something more "puzzle" like but it was just stupid and anticlimactic. Should have gone with the piece-by-piece explosion type!

S:

http://bulk.destructoid.com/ul/68897-the-memory-card-25-a-mccloud-family-reunion/Star%20Fox%2064%20-%20Andross1-550x.jpg

really hated making it all the way there with awesome blue lazers, then you're not careful and he chews you up and then you're missing a wing and down to crappy green lasers.

That game had pretty sweet bosses in general IIRC, although some lame voice acting made lamer through overuse of the same 1-2 phrases per boss.

absolutely loved that game. More games should have hares in fighter pilots.

would seriously love to play that right about now. I think the only thing wrong with that game in the single-player mode was the existence of Slippy.

one of my fave

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sTnLdaA3nTo

lol is that Ralph Pootawn?