Boss Battles

According to some journalist who wrote an interesting article about Boss Battles in video games, he is basically saying they are just an old relict from 80s arcade-machine-times.

Guess he is meaning that these days we don´t really need them boss battles in absolutely every game while of course they are the main essence of games like DARK SOULS and other similiar titles.

Thinking about this article, i often got the idea devs think, they under any circumstances absolutely must include boss battles, even when it´s all being made somehow "half-assed" so that you already get the feeling some boss-battle is only there because they obviously thought there absolutely must be one becaues it is a video-game and "video-games all have boss-battles!" after all.

As to the question of whether or not vide-games these days really need boss-battles, let´s start with the positives those boss battles can bring:

.) They can be a good challenge...if done right.

.) They can require certain tactics while even puzzle-fans might have their good share of fun while trying to figure out how to beat the fu**er

.) They can give this great feeling of revenge and redemption, causing a great overall feeling of satisfaction.

.) They can give gamers a reason to brag about, once they finally made it to kill Elden Ring´s Margit, Ninja Gaiden´s Nuclear Armadillo or Phantom in Devil May Cry, the latter one made me break numerous pads, several windows and once i was close to strangling my stupid neighbour because he dared to knock at my door while just being close to kill that motherfu**ing lava spider....

...so here i come to the negatives:

.) They can really break the flow of a game while being stuck for hours, days or even weeks at the same bastard, depending if you have other things to do in life besides killing stupid level-bosses in videogames.

.) They can be downright "dumb", meaning that there is neither any strategy nor "smart" way of killing one off. You in fact just have to shooting-button mash, jumping-button mash, dodging-button mash and hacking-button mash while to all that mashing you as well need some luck in order to drain that last fu**ing inch of his constantly self healing life bar...and when that unfriendly entity is probably changing its shape too, then you have even more than just one self healing life bar to drain....needing an additional portion of luck and probably more endurance in your mash-fingers.

.) Some of them can really make you stop playing a game and in some cases for once and for all.

.) It can happen devs are putting a little too much effort into making certain bosses "hard" while they aren´t really THAT hard while gamers just need to find the right strategy, tactic or weak spot, which at times could make the whole battle along with what-the-hell-is-actually-to-do? a rather troublesome experience full of trial and error, starting to be a real pain after a while.

.) From time to time i get the idea devs have made certain boss-battles rather unbalanced compared to the rest of the game or how come the entire game feels like a walk in the park, except a few minor boss-battles are actually taking more hours to win than the actual game itself.

My personal opinion would be boss-battles still being a must-be for certain titles but i don´t really need them everywhere...especially when devs obviously have no clue how to make them interesting.

That article is almost a decade late to the party, it's full of skeletons now. People who like boss battles won the war.

The whole 'boss battles are outdated and should die out' was very popular in the first generation of HD consoles; journalists embracing the Uncharted series and wanting more of that, and less Ninja Gaiden, etc. Was it because media was filled with people who hate playing video games? I would argue to yes. Many I've seen making these statements also review television shows and movies. So clearly they prefer not to pick up a controller, must be a hassle for them

Back onto when these statements couldn't be avoided; I feel it peaked with The Last of Us. Dark times on these gaming forums. So much hate for Vanquish as it wasn't a pretty story video game, honestly depressing.

Since Dark Souls took the world by storm however a counter argument became common-place, and used as >the< example for why bosses are not a negative.

Monster Hunter constantly growing in popularity also contributed, as many other games with strong boss design and great gameplay. By the time MH: World released the argument of bosses being a negative is all but gone. Vocalists for the 'boo boss battle' statements have muted almost entirely today.

Much like OP I too think bosses are great in video games when given the time and care by talented developers. We have plenty of examples of bad and poor boss design, however they do not represent the concept no more than Superman 64 represents a 3D Platformer.

In early 2000's to 2015 boss hating articles/ videos became the norm. Heck Game Spot hated D00M 2016 until it blew in the sites face. The same time GS preached Fall Out 4 as the second coming; didn't age well.

Those who made long-winded articles hating bosses had very controversial takes anyhow, it was a popular time for these writers/ bloggers to be dumping on the Asian gaming market. They just wanted to put the controller down and be given tummy rubs for triggering a QTE. Playing a video game that's hard is just too much, or was in the 2000's apparently.

I had a theory that this demographic/ vocalist group who disregarded bosses, see bosses and hard games as frustratingly hard, naturally because they prefer the simpler pleasures in gaming. So because they can't justify being called a "casual gamer" had to go out on a limb to remove the hardcore market (metaphor- can't simply eat a healthy salad and enjoy it, they have to insult those enjoying a fat steak dinner). And it's pretty petty if true. It's preferences people! just play what you wanna play. Don't force the world to see it your way, and your way only.

Even then as a reminder I'm all for people enjoying RP walk-n-talk handholding games, relaxing games have a place that I think need to stick around. I dive into a casual game once in a while to take a breather, Animal Crossing is very tranquil Yet I'm not pressuring people to play leisure games, same with hardcore, don't be that person!

For years it was a very, this is the only way games should be, mentality. That mind-set has a lot in common with hardcore-wokeness demands in 2022. But that's an entirely different discussion for another time. Nevertheless, forced ideology from people who don't know any better. Bigotry at its finest.

In closing it's how obligated those articles came across. Telling us what we should be enjoying in video games and pressuring as many as possible to see something enjoyable (a good boss battle) as a negative was never going to work. Just made the bloggers/ writers look like douchebags.

Am i blind or really ain´t there any option on this forum to get notified once someone posts in a certain thread?

Looks like i almost missed this one.

Anyway, i actually think games became a little way too easy these days, i mean there must be something funny when i play a game on its last, "most heavy" difficulty level and it just appears to be the "regular heavy" difficulty level.

So that´s probably the secret behind games like DARK SOULS, they are delivering what most games these days aren´t...

...and that being a really DIFFICULT difficulty level.

I just wished certain games would actually offer the whole game as "difficult" rather than just always focus on hard boss-battles while the rest of the game is rather a walk in the park...

...or even better yet...how about making games being real hard all the way through and just boss battles relatively easy, like boss-battles being a way to relax while still having fun gameplay-wise!