What Makes A Great Impossible Boss?
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- Опубліковано 4 тра 2023
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An impossible boss sounds like an unworkable idea. Yet, they're everywhere in games! Clearly, it does work. What game design techniques can you use to create fun in an unwinnable situation? It's going to take some lateral thinking. Let's talk about how to find the fun in something impossible.
Featuring:
Paper Mario
Final Fantasy IX
Halo Reach
Resident Evil 2 Remake
Metroid Fusion
Metroid Dread
Final Fantasy VIII
Paper Mario: The Thousand-Year Door
Dynasty Warriors
Devil May Cry 5
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ok
I'm a girl and I don't have a beard.
Pls talk about senator Armstrong sometime
That promo was so off-topic.
What is the name of the intro (0:00) music?
It's really unique how fromsoft makes every boss in souls borne impossible but gives special copies of the game where they're not impossible to everyone except me
You can do it! All it takes is a bit of perseverance and memorisation!
Rough.... but thats the Fromsoft difference! 👌
Skill issue
@@Anonymous-73 That's... the joke
My ass couldn't beat the Taurus demon.
I mean, I was 10 but still
I also like the "very hard boss at the start of the game that you are 100% meant to die to but if you're insane with it you go down a secret path" sorta thing
So, the FromSoft start?
@@chrisschoenthaler5184 maybe
Devil May Cry 5 has that
@@KnightmareOXyou cant beat urizen at the begining
@@Pakotuguduguduguduguduguduguyes you can, i ve done it a dozen times
Giygas in Earthbound is one of my favorite “impossible” bosses because of how his fight wraps up the story so well, with how you have to defeat him through using a mostly irrelevant ability that you have had pretty much the entire game.
all of the final bosses in the mother series are like this and they’re all so cool in their own ways
ah yes, the searys in which one mc is fighting his great great uncle, another is fighting cuthulu, which is the others great great uncle, and both you and the final mc get depression.
@@wodawiod5447 It's probably what makes the mother series so lovely for me.
Yes, you beat all the people with PSI or beating the everloving shit out of them, but on the end boss, violence doesn't work.
The only thing that works is love. Be it Giegue's lingering feelings for Mary as a mother through the melodies in Mother, be it the bonds you built throughout Mother 2, or be it the bond of brotherly love between you and Claus.
Love of a mother, love between friends, love between siblings - all forms of love that aren't just the normal "romantic love", but also such strong feelings and bonds, which overcomes everything life throws at you.
Also, it's sad that mother 2, the one that has the theme of mother's love the least prominent, was translated so they didn't keep the series as "mother" and instead named it the more generic-sounding "earthbound" which imo leans way more into the wacky alien shenanigans than the themes the mother franchise loved to go into.
@@youtube-kit9450 The final boss of mother 1 invokes the feelings of the antagonist; Giegue, making the player feel bad for him. The final boss of mother 2 invokes the feelings of the player themself, as it is so disturbing that even for some adults, the player would be too scared and hopeless to focus on the characters. The final boss of mother 3 invokes the feelings of the protagonist; Lucas, making the player feel bad for him.
I love Mr. X so much because the game immediately makes it clear that you will die if you try to face him. The game encourages you to protect yourself from him not by fighting, but by actively trying to avoid encounters with him wherever possible.
In the og you could both run and fight
@@steelbear2063 Yea, and it was kinda funny that this huge tyrant would just faceplant on the floor and drop you ammo
They did a great job portraying him as a proper, immovable threat, by only allowing you to stun him for a moment
@@spicydong317 The stun not even being viable as it drains too much ammo.
@@dylfaiHe goes down for a while tbh
@@spicydong317 Yeah, Mr. X in the original was meh at best. In the remake, he is still possible to drop if you spend a boatload of ammo, and it stuns him long enough that you genuinely can go and do everything you want to after one drop if you know what you're doing. So fleeing and stealth is heavily encouraged, but in a tight spot, you can (under heavy penalty) also shoot yourself out of the situation, which is generally the game design in RE2R, where the beefy zombies encourage stunning and dodging instead of straight up fights.
A good impossible boss is either beatable through skill and knowledge or is clearly an impossible boss so you don’t waste all your rare elixirs trying not to die.
That’s why putting one early works well-you don’t have many resources to waste.
@@pokepress Yeah, and yet silly people still criticized Bowser from Paper Mario. Despite the fact that at this point, you have literally no resources to waste.
While it isn't as easy for games that don't display HP values, I think that having a boss with an HP bar that you are required to get below a certain threshold to trigger some instakill attack is the best way to do it if a game designer wants to get the player to fight the boss legitimately but also the story requires the character lose. Since doing it in a cutscene is cheap, and also doing it in actual gameplay gives the player a sneak preview of some of the bosses' attack patterns and let their brain start working on some of the strategy for when they get a real fight.
Like CrossCode does with the Designer, or Scarlet Nexus does with Karen (the second fight, specifically). Functionally the boss fights you lose to them even after you take their HP to "zero" but they don't actually place the HP you need to drop them to be zero, but rather a set point on their actual HP bar which might as well be zero but since you see their HP bar you can see that when they beat you it is at a point where they clearly are not beaten since you can see they have over half their HP remaining. It makes it simultaneously a regular boss fight but with the plot framing of an unwinnable fight.
@@Zetact_ CrossCode mentioned. Happiness achieved. What a wonderful experience.
@@marcaronispagetthi3553 CrossCode does simply everything right.
Shizuka is also technically an unwinnable fight because she'll pop open another duel even if you win but not only is it totally not something you'd ever complain about because duels are fun and her theme is a BANGER AMONGST BANGERS but it serves as a great means of giving her some extra characterization even with a very small amount of screentime investment.
One of my favorite “impossible bosses” are the dungeon guardians from terraria. They were FULLY INTENDED to be truly impossible to beat with both a lot of health and boss armour, but after someone in the community found a way to kill them, the devs added a special pet item for the guardians to drop
"No gold, no loot, only emptiness"
... they were in journey mode weren't they?
@@Chara_Dreemurr1 the hoik-inator
@@Chara_Dreemurr1 you underestimate a terrarians creativity
@@subnauticaispog7580 i am a terrarian.
Beatrix comes up as an asspull forced loss until you realize that she succeeds at executing her orders and kills the party only if you don't treat the fight like a real one.
You aren't losing, you're barely surviving against the strongest swordsman on the continent until she has to get on the last ship leaving and doesn't have the time to confirm your death.
I always loved the first shroob encounter in Mario and Luigi: Partner in Time because it highlights the fact that the baby versions of the bros could beat an enemy the adults couldn't simply because they had some turtle shells.
There's one lil detail about Mr X that you might not''ve known about. If you shoot the hat off of his head, he actually becomes even more faster and aggressive towards you. That's right, this big bulky zombie loves his lil fedora so much, he only becomes even stronger after you shoot it off of his invincible head
This has been proven wrong, he speeds up even with a hat on, that happening is just random
The hat weighs 400 pounds
@@LordofTheNight88 It's not random. It happens if you shoot Mr. X on the head with a powerful weapon and cause his stagger animation. Even if he has no hat, after recovering from his stagger animation, he will speed up for like a minute and in Hardcore mode he becomes almost impossible to outrun.
newspaper zombie moment
At first you think it’s because he really likes his hat.
But no, it’s just that the chip on his head is vulnerable.
The last category fits Genichiro, the first boss in Sekiro, very well. You are supposed to lose to him, but even if you manage to defeat him he cuts off your arm.
actually, if you pay attention to each time you fight Genichiro in the game, you can see how he develops. first time you are the weaker one, second time its on par, but the last time if you can find him, he actually looks already beat up and tired while you are at your peak of ability with the roles reversed.
This is my favorite kind of "impossible boss." I love it when they design a seemingly-impossible boss to be perfectly beatable once you have the technical skill to overcome it
He doesnt cut off your arm. |Someone else does.
@@WhatDoesDStandFor It's been a while since I played, but I do think it was Genichiro. Someone else causes a distraction while the main boss still goes for the arm.
@Aurora also you see progression in wolf, in the first fight he is rusty, his reach fir the sword is awkward, hesitant, in the second it's much more smothe and ready, just one swift motion to grab the sword and get into stance
The SA-X and E.M.M.I are both great for different reasons. The SA-X sets up a sense of horror through scripted encounters while capitalizing on the fact that you need to be careful all the time as on your first playthrough you don't know that those encounters are scripted, and the E.M.M.I are great at building anxiety and the brief change of pace in contrast to the rest of the game. Their AI is solid, and even on repeat playthroughs they can give you a tough time if you aren't careful or efficient.
You are right. After completing like the half of Metroid Dread, I learned to parry and I'd bully the E.M.M.I.s because it was fun, but I'd never forget that part of Metroid Fusion where you fall down into the jungle area and the SA-X is just waiting for you. At that moment I was like: *"WHAT THE...? F^CK, F^CK, F^CK!!!"*
Yeah... the E.M.M.I.s put the dread in metroid dread... when I see an E.M.M.I. Zone and enter... my anxiety spikes and I get extremely paranoid... even if the E.M.M.I. isn't in the room I'm still scared because I have no clue if it is. I think I'm softlocked because I can't go anywhere. The E.M.M.I. in the E.M.M.I. zone is right in front of that doorway. I'm in a save room... but the only way to go is the E.M.M.I. zone.
@@OmegaM3TE0R while I believe that Dread could have been better, storywise, and the emmi were more of an annoyance than scary, I will never forget that moment in Fusion. So awesome.
@@HerbMandoom Yes, the fact that the E.M.M.I.s can be parried makes them less scary with the more you play. The thing that makes the SA-X terrifying is how the only thing you can do when you face it, is run and try to hide because you can't do sh*t to it and it freezes you with any shot it manages to land...
@@OmegaM3TE0R Once you get the ice missiles though, the SA-X becomes much less scary. Freezing it is a lot easier than parrying the EMMIs.
Not sure if anyone will mention him, but I enjoyed feeling of dread when facing off against Vader in Jedi: Fallen Order. Unlike first and second fight against Trilla, there is no combat which concludes in you loosing, your only option to survive is to run away. It’s really neat to see Vader in this horror-like theming in a game where you play Jedi-survivor. He is hunting you down and he is enjoying himself and game makes it pretty clear how much of a different levels you two are.
I second this emphatically. It coming right after the final second sister fight creates this awful panicky atmosphere , and then sitting around long enough makes him just break your neck with seemingly no effort. Out of every moment in that game, Cal’s sheer inability to face Vader even after growing so much is just so goddamn striking.
Also, J:S is shaping up to be even better than its predecessor; I really
love these games.
It's been one of the few impossible bosses I've met that really didn't feel cheap either, I've wasted an hour on some impossible boss fights because they couldn't down my party either.
I kinda like it when they don't have a healthbar so it's a clear hint that: "Oh I'm not supposed to fight you like that"
my favorite is when you hit them and you see "immune" or "0 damage"
its when it clicks in your head and you go "ahhhh, im fucked."
even better is when one character knows its immortal or something and the others like " nah everthing living can die" and then that character just staight up dies
like vader in fallen order
Like the first fight with sam in mgr?
@@vitruvius997 that's exactly what I was referencing haha
I'm not really sure if it could be classified as an impossible boss, but I love the fight against Snatcher from A Hat In Time. In this game, one thing is clear: if a boss becomes blue, you can hit it. That's basically just the sign to tell you "He's weak now, get his ass!". But Snatcher, he won't turn blue, you never get the chance to attack him... Until you use his attacks against him.
In his fight he throws some potion bottle in your face and, you guessed it, they contain a blue liquid. After dodging the attack you grab one, toss it at the Snatcher's face, and he then asks you ded in the eyes "Did you just color me blue with my own attack? This... Can't count right? Surely this doesn't count!" (It does). You can now finally fight back the Boogeyman and he goes down pretty easily without his invincibility.
This boss isn't really hard, and his invincible mechanic isn't really used a lot in the fight, but it's a nice way to subvert the expectation and it makes the fight extremely unique.
Damn, I forgot how genuinely funny that game could be-
A more direct example would be his EX "bossfight" in the quality time contract, where you can't do any damage to him at all and the main goal is to just keep dodging for as long as you can until you eventually die
Funnily enough is that the Conductor and Grooves DON'T use the Turn-to-blue rule in their fight(s), only the Mafia Boss and Toilet do that, so the main reason Snatcher can even be damaged ISN'T because he's blue, but because he got so pissed off at the notion that Hat Kid might've juked the system that he leaves the sludge pool, the sole spot in the arena you can't actually reach lest you take damage.
He also only doesn't become blue because, to quote Snatcher himself, "it doesn't suit me."
In choosing to be stylish he achieved invincibility
And then there's the powered up versions in Seal The Deal, the strongest of which was even nerfed because his fight was just too damn chaotic.
Honestly the EMMI from Metroid Dread is great. It starts out easy, it doesn’t have much power ups, but when it detects you, it chases you, but even when you find the room and get the upgrade, you can’t just shoot them, you have to find the perfect spot that is long enough to destroy the amour and kill it, and the EMMIs are getting harder with each new room you encounter. Honestly it’s very good as a impossible boss.
I also love how each EMMI is difficult in uniquely their own way.
The Green one has so many tunnels it can crawl through to get to you,
the Yellow one is breathing down your neck as it chases you,
The blue one will freeze you if you remain parallel with them,
And the purple kinda just knows where you are at all times and shoots purple stunning projectiles.
There's also a serious progression from EMMI who can't crawl through 1 tile high gaps, to EMMI who treats line of sight as a suggestion.
I've always been a fan of the reaper from Persona games. He appears and hunts you down when you spend too much time in an area looking for treasure chests in order to punish your greed. You are supposed to run away, but if you do try to fight him he will destroy you with ease. As you progress through the games and get stronger, your attacks will hit him a bit harder and you can come closer to surviving his attacks and eventually you can hold your own against him.
Gargaros from Yo-kai Watch is similar because he is also someone that will easily kill you if he catches you, but will become beatable as you level up.
Ya but he's not rlly an "impossible boss" since you can literally farm him for xp lol
It does kinda depend on the game, but yeah, early game those chains are terrifying. Late game in 3 though, he's a chump lol soloable with little to no issue at lvl 99
@@mistahl5350 the reaper is so weak in 3 its funny, way less challenging than in 4 and 5
@@packs358 I haven't played 4 yet, so I can't speak to that version yet, but I'm imagining the characters in 3 jumping to 999 hp/sp helps a ton in making him a chump when they hit level 99, regardless of the actual damage they do. I had him beat a few times before the request came along to do so
For me, I think the biggest requirement for a good impossible boss is telegraphing. you need to make it really clear to the player that the boss cannot be defeated, usually before the fight, to not mess up future fights. NPCs telling you not to fight something, the boss wiping you out almost at the start of the fight, or having a cutscene that really highlights the power difference helps make it so the player understands that this isn't a fight to be won.
I also think it's important to account for a modicome of overleveling for these fights. Nothing annoys me more than playing an RPG, getting my team into a really good shape where we demolish enemies and bosses, only to be told after wiping the floor with a boss that I'm still not good enough. Either scale the enemy up or have some alternative dialogue to reward players who are playing particularly well.
Also, make sure not to swing too far in the opposite direction, you might create a kind of "you aren't supposed to win" feeling for something that the player is supposed to win. Metal Gear Solid 3 is a really great game but also really screws up the final boss. Spoilers for people who haven't played this game yet.
just words here so UA-cam doesn't remove it all the line breaks
blah blah
You spend the entire game watching The Boss kick Naked Snake's ass at CQC. At no point is anything shown that suggest Snake is getting better at it and becoming a match for The Boss. Even the last time you watch them fight, near the end of the game after you plant the C3 in the Shagohod hanger, The Boss easily kicks Snake's ass. Then you finally get to fight her in gameplay. Almost everyone I've seen play it for the first time tries to fight her with guns, myself included, because the game just spent its entire runtime teaching the player "don't use CQC against The Boss, she will kick your ass". But using guns against The Boss is a crappy strategy. What are you actually supposed to do? Ignore the entire rest of the game and use CQC to beat her. You find out AFTER the boss fight that it's actually her mission to die here, and then you realize she's letting you win, and then you might go back and try CQC with this knowledge in mind and hey it works because of course it does when she's letting you win.
What's weird is that seasoned players will get mad at first time players for not using CQC in this fight. Get over yourselves, it is entirely the game's fault that people try to use guns instead of CQC in this fight.
And maybe the most diehard of Kojima and MGS fans will have some excuse for why Kojima did this on purpose, but I'm not buying it. I just think they kinda screwed up and conditioned every first time player to do the fight in the most unfun, tedious way possible.
Ah, the boss wiping you out gives me an idea like... if it would be an action game, your character could be charging in at the boss in a cutscene only for it to bat you several feet away and reduce your HP bar by 3/4 or something, then someone explicitly says "okay forget this, RUN", and perhaps the camera changes to pan away from the boss to indicate that this is not you stepping into the arena with an equal opponent, where the cameras perspective being the whole arena tells you to keep careful watch of the enemy and try to read its movements- this is your character, via the camera focusing in the exact opposite direction of the boss, telling you the player to RUN!
@@mjc0961You know, this makes me think back to that fight and how I did in fact beat her by attempting CQC in the final fight right away, even though as you say the game conditions you to not use that... and I wonder why I did it.
My guess is that I either used a guide and I've simply forgotten now that I try not to use guides anymore, OR maybe they actually do tell you to use CQC in a Codec Call. Because I was the type to listen to EVERY codec option whenever I suspected there was a fresh batch of calls, but it's probably not every players way to sit down and listen to calls every ten or fifteen minutes of the game so even if those instructions WERE sent via codec, I can believe that a lot of people just missed out on them.
Undertale has a few impossible bosses, but you do 0 damage if you attack them so it's easy to tell you aren't supposed to do it
Indeed
Or making it possible But REALLY HARD at your level
Project wingman's Crimson Squadron comes to mind for that
Yakuza Kiwami's first encounter with Majima fits in with this. He's ABSURDLY powerful when you first fight him, but you CAN defeat him if you're good enough, even getting an extra bit of dialogue if you DO manage to take down the mad dog himself.
As well as quite a bit of EXP.
You also get a lot of exp which can help you out in early game
Chrono Trigger's Ocean Palace Lavos encounter is my favorite example of a beatable impossible boss. It's the first time that you are forced into a Lavos encounter when every past encounter was entirely optional. It's also made to have Lavos's most dangerous stats and moves. If you beat Lavos in that encounter, you get the most secret ending in the game.
I love how with chrono trigger, you can beat the game whenever you want, but the longer you play the better ending you get
The final fight of OMORI is an example of this where, where all you can do is survive for as long as you can, as the boss gets stronger over time and eventually drops any pretences of being fair (since if you somehow survive the phase at which you're supposed to lose, the boss gets into final FINAL phase with just one attack that deals massive damage and disables your skills just in case). Given your opponent, it makes sense story-wise.
In World of Horror there's also a special encounter called "Something Truly Evil". Technically you can kill it by abusing some loopholes but you get nothing from it. On average, the encounter exists solely to fuck over your Stamina and Reason pool and all you can do is hope it gets satisfied quickly.
If you somehow beat the final omori fight does the game do something weird? As in what happens if you cheat to kill the boss once and for all
@@karisasani7006 The boss has your second chance mechanic, except it's more like infinite chance as it never runs out of the second chances.
@@Dukstless But if you cheat and bypass it what happens?
@@Dukstless As in you do something that the game realizes that you intend to kill the final boss no matter what? Does the game throw in a joke ending or something?
@@Dukstless Basically you do something that renders the second chance null for the final boss
Probably my least favorite flavor of impossible boss is when the gameplay treats it as win (as in you depleted their health, took minimal damage and they fell to their knees or exploded or whatever) but the narrative treats it as though you just got trounced.
The final Giacomo fights from Baten Kaitos comes to mind. I was treating it like a real fight and the game seemed to as well until it suddenly told me it really wasn't.
How do you feel about fights that you win until reinforcements arrive in a cutscene, or where the defeated boss escapes?
In my case it's Kratos from Tales of Symphonia. If I loose, the game told me it was expected since Kratos is really strong, if I win, the game told me I only win because Kratos was going easy on me ( -_- )
@@pokepress Escapes are cool, reinforcements aren't. If the same thing happens whether I win or lose, what's the point of winning?
I love the Trails series, but those games pull this shit all the time. Finish a boss fight without even letting the boss take a turn? "He's too strong, we can't win!"
"Damn, I've been defeated but I can't fall here. I must make a tactical retreat"
I simply love "impossible" bosses that secretly can be defeated. I remember one in Disgaea that you can beat the game very early on if you manage to do so.
Also, the impossible end fight on FF Crisis Core is one of the most beautiful things ever.
I believe it was Larharl in Disgaea 2 that _could_ be defeated, but if he detected you cheated, he'll wipe your save lmao
Disgaea loooooves secret endings hidden behind winning or losing vs bosses you shouldn't be winning or losing against.
@@darkiway I never finished the game because it fell off a cliff later on, but the funniest case of a bad ending I have ever seen in a videogame happened in Disgaea 5 where Usalia is on the field in her wild state. Iirc, she died because she attacked one of my units and ate a pretty painful counter.
inscryption does that too
Only unwinnable fight in the original Disgaea was the alternate Overlord. Doesn't change anything storywise since I believe it either skips the refight where Allies come and help or skips it. Either way it doesn't matter.
D2 had 2 or 3 story fights. One for Etna and one or two for Laharl who were all massively overleveled. Winning any of the fights made them angry and they'd wipe out the planet forcing a NG+.
D3 had a hidden time limited one where you refight Mao's Dad's fingers at level 1000 (as bizarre as it sounds.) Winning this fight caused a NG+ since you technically accomplished what you'd set out to do.
They pretty much stopped doing them after that.
I loved how in Hellblade, the Impossible Boss was there not to find a way to overcome impossible odds, but to tell you that letting go is an acceptable response to some situations.
There is a similar fight near the end of The Prince of Persia 3, where in a dream sequence the prince's dark side shows wanting to fight, but every time you land a hit he just duplicates. The only way to succeed is to ignore him and pass to the next room. The point is that he is what you might become if you succumb to hatred and anger, so by not fighting he loses his power over you.
I love Ridley at the start of Super Metroid. He'll fly away only after you're down to 20 energy, or you do enough damage to him. It's a tiny detail that makes very little difference, but it's fun dodging his attacks, getting him to drop the metroid larva, and then grab it again and flee.
Undyne from Undertale has some of these characteristics - if you’re doing a pacifist run. She’s the first boss that really makes you put work into figuring out how to spare her, which reflects the story, where she’s the most hostile towards you personality-wise in the entire game. You have to run from her, a mechanic you may not have used the entire game before now, across multiple screens, then solve a mini-puzzle. Fighting her is a much more straightforward option, but if you kill her, her death scene is one of the most brutal to sit through in the entire game, incentivizing you to try something else. She’s not impossible in the conventional sense, but the tropes of an impossible boss are used to make a memorable one instead.
Undyne is very similar to the FF8 mech boss escape, except with a far more satisfying payoff!
She makes you put work in? Bro she keeps saying RUN highlighted text I thought it was obvious lmao
I think the main thing that bothered me is that every instance of a fight starting had an exclamation mark appear over your character, and you couldn't move while that exclamation mark happens.
It happens immediately if you run from Undyne.
Except for some reason THIS time you're able to move while it happens.
Even if you think to use the run button, it's still not obvious that you're actually able to RUN.
I got stuck on her way too long assuming that I was supposed to keep taunting her and increasing the difficulty to earn her respect and also assumed the really obvious "RUN AWAY" hints were telling me that if I did that it would reset my progress or something lol
I remember fighting her multiple times over the span of a few days, totaling a ridiculous amount of time. Honestly, I just thought her telling you to run was a threat and eventually I watched a streamer I follow run away from her and I felt like an idiot.
I was surprised you didn't comment much on the "impossible" bosses that I find most frustrating: the "You can beat the boss no problem in the actual in-game fight then in a cutscene they somehow beat you anyway." There isn't much that frustrates me more than that kind of fight because it just rarely ever makes sense. Your character will handily be taking on everything that comes their way and then it's just a cutscene that finally gets you and it's usually something stupid like normally your character can take a missile directly to their face and they're fine after eating some healing herbs or something, but then in the cutscene they bonk you on the head with a club or something and you're instantly down for the count. I see this kind of thing far more often than I'd like to.
I feel like that falls more into a category of "win in the battle, lose in the cutscene" than an impossible boss since, by definition, the boss fight itself is very beatable.
I agree though, those are often some of the most poorly conceived story moments in games. There needs to be some damn good justification for the player to win a battle and get portrayed as having lost without it harming immersion. I'm not saying it's impossible to do, but certainly most of my experiences with the trope have been negative. Xenoblade 2 immediately jumps to mind, but there are many other games that it applies to.
@@LinkThinks I suppose but at the same time you didn't really beat the person in the end if they beat you in the cutscene afterward, though I see what you mean. It really does just feel like poor writing. I played Horizon Zero Dawn recently and for the most part, fantastic game, but there are one or two times you get cutscene'd to defeat and it just feels like poor writing in otherwise a game with good writing.
@@Congra Perhaps a better term to use rather than "win in the battle, lose in the cutscene" would be an unwinnable boss. The boss fight itself isn't impossible to beat, but the game treats it as a loss afterwards. Well, it's all semantics either way.
I understand that it's difficult for game writers to set up threatening recurring antagonists while also allowing the player to just trounce them each time, but it's kind of wild to me that we still see the frustrating unwinnable boss in major productions to this day. I dunno, you'd think there would be more awareness that players generally hate that stuff.
@@LinkThinks Yeah it's endlessly frustrating to see it. Just... write the story in a different way. Make the fight unwinnable in another way. It just needs to make sense in context.
yeah, that's not an Impossible Boss but rather Ludonarrative Disonance. an impossible boss is a boss you can't beat in either plot NOR gameplay
I love how from soft handles their impossible first bosses, specifically the asylum demon and the grafted scion from ds1 and Elden Ring, respectively. They exist to express to the player not only how difficult the game will be, but also how the player has the tools needed to win regardless. There’s a definite feeling of possibility in the face of crushing defeat. So when the game gives you a power up (equipment in DS and just time in ER) and you fell your foe, it highlights just how possible the game is, all you have to do is look for the opportunity you need.
every fromsoftware game has impossible bosses that you can win by getting good, whether it be with knowledge (black firebombs for asylum demon), or skill (sekiro).
I love that Starcraft 2 Wings of Liberty mission when you play out the last battle of the Protoss army. You will eventually by overrun by the insane amount of Zerg the game throws at you, really driving home the narrative of an impossible last stand.
The Warden from Minecraft is an honorable mention, but there is not much to say about him that hasn't already been mentioned. The devs noted they wanted to make something along the lines of a force of nature that should be avoided, and they certainly did that. Technically it's not unbeatable but it's a heck of a challenge, assuming you don't uses some cheese tactics. And, of course, the theming of this guy is *Fabulous*.
Yeah, I loved the concept and the theming, though the execution was rather poor. The generous spawn time, the smell sense, and its hitscan attack, all encourage play that seems to contradict the devs' intent. The dominant strategy when it spawns or while it's in "search" mode is running away, not sneaking around, and when it catches you, you can't outrun it without cheese, removing any potential gratification for managing to escape. The sense of smell only further removes the option to go around it without giving a wide berth.
They should have focused on giving the warden better (but still fair) mobility and detection that would increase terror without making it unfair, and doing so probably would have fixed cheese better than just making it a hitscan turret. The fact that it also gains sight once it detects the player without any sensible cue as to why doesn't do the warden any favors.
The current warden may still function as an unbeatable boss, sure, and I'd still say it's a great mention, but it is particularly a great mention of how many things can go wrong when designing such an encounter.
Dungeon guardian from terraria is a fun example of this too
@@eman3600 hmm... Can't really argue with you there. I suppose it would be better to say the Warden has two phases: the sneaking phase (before he has spawned), and the roaming phase (the bad one).
Phase one is nice with more emphasis on sneaking around, but phase two is where it falls apart. In defense of the devs however, the sense of smell was added after seeing that players could just sit still for ten minutes and wait for him to despawn, which would be even worse. Similarly, the sonic blast was added to discourage tunneling out of reach or trying to trap the Warden. Of course that's not to say there isn't a lot of ways it could be improved.
To be fair, I have't had a whole lot of experience with him myself. I usually just grab a catalyst and leave, so I'm probably not the one to ask for balance suggestions. On that note, I am curious what specifically you would change if you could. You seem to have more experience with him and I would love to hear you take on it (of course you don't need to respond, I am some random dude on the internet after all).
@@mrrootbeertheobserver I would say there's also a pursuit phase, which is a death sentence if you don't have a way to quickly escape. The smell thing definitely solves the problem, though there may have been better ways to handle it. It's certainly better than the sonic boom, which made its respective problem actively worse.
I definitely can't answer everything I'd change right now, but that prompt might bring me back into content creation.
@Childmanman Boi you are technically correct, but in order to beat it without glitches, you need to lure it out of the dungeon so you have space to fight it and more don’t spawn. Because if this, the dungeon guardian still fills its purpose, to guard the dungeon until you beat skeletron.
Impossible bosses that aren't "impossible" always give a special sense of satisfaction that you took one additional step to truly master the game, like the Turtle Dove from Bravely Default or Sephiroth from KH.
Maybe even Malenia could be categorized as that kind of boss
Grimm as Nightmare king from hollow knight, i haven't defeated that bitc- yet
@@GOTY1995 DEFINITELY not. Not even close tbh
But then they aren't impossible bosses
Gades from Lufia II.
One of my favorites is the dlc for Kakarot based on "History Of Trunks"
Forcing you to play as future gohan and face a battle most players already *know* they'll lose
But they know the consequences of losing
They force you to play this fight and feel the same emotion fans felt when it happened
No mattered how hard you try, this is set for the timeline
I just love the emotion they put into it
I was hoping the Black Knight from Fire Emblem Path of Radiance would get a mention as an impossible boss. The few chapters he shows up in have major impacts on the story and can really throw a wrench into your plans.
It's kinda funny how he doesn't really do much in gameplay, he usually only moves if you put someone in his range, but the sheer fear of him being right behind you is enough to make you pick up the pace, FE in general has really good gameplay-story integration in regards to bosses
You need to telegraph that the impossibly boss can't be beat, like with story context, or extremely low damage compared to the recent fights, or the boss healing automatically from all attacks.
SPOILER in Skies of Arcadia also replenishes your used items as an anti frustration feature.
Honestly, a mechanic that would replenish used items in a impossible boss fight would widely alleviate the frustration of wasting useful, and in some instances mandatory items. Even if it wouldn't make narrative sense, I think that should become the norm.
Bug Fables does it well by disabling the Spy option
For the Metroid Dread E.M.M.I.s, you forgot to mention how not only evading/bypassing the E.M.M.I.s is a navigation puzzle, but taking them DOWN is too. After getting the upgraded cannon, you have to rapid fire the protective covering on its weak spot which requires a lot of time, so the player also has to determine WHERE in the E.M.M.I.s' zone they can realistically break down its defenses in time before it catches up to the player.
(Edit: change ME to E.M.M.I.)
They're called E.M.M.I not ME, just a small correction
He didn't forget to mention it. It's at 13:19. He just didn't explain it explicitly enough for you to notice it.
@@ExtremeAce oh, whoops. Been a while since I played, so forgot that bit. Thanks!
@@AnotherDuck Ah, I suppose what he said could be interpreted that way. Was just a bit misleading/vague combined with his phrasing and gameplay footage. Oh well, thanks.
@@MrEnvisioner I think it's a bit to avoid spoilers and details that aren't necessary for the message of the video, even if they can be interesting for the particular example.
I apologise if I seemed aggressive; I just don't like the "you missed this" type of comments for various reasons.
I think it should also be noted that once you obtain the omega canon in Metroid dread if an Emmie catches you you only get one chance, not two to stop it. Just because you get the power to stop it doesn’t mean it isn’t dangerous and in fact only makes it more determined to kill you. Also, when you’re underwater, it’s easier to counter the Emmie and maybe it’s me but it gets a little harder once you obtain the gravity suit.
you do actually get two. One sequence, but two opportunities. One is when the Emmi makes to grab, the other is right before the needle
I'm a fan of the blast pit tentacle boss from in half-life 1. It's a brief stealth bit where you use grenades in a non-combat way, it's a refreshing change of pace. The build up is great too since you see this giant structure and you can hear it banging around well before you see it.
There's points in Tales of Zestiria where Heldalf (the big bad) shows up in the world, and you can in fact kill him if you try hard enough or are good at the game. His point is to keep you from progressing into that area at that time, but if you kill him, you get a secret bad ending!
Kudos for your Tales of Zestiria knowledge! So many people skipped that one and don’t know much about it
Hold up! You get a bad ending if you beat the main villain early?!
@@LinkinMark1994 Yep! *spoilers after break*
He basically has a corrupted god inside him, which is now released. And you don't have the ability to purify it yet, so you kinda just screwed yourself. It gives you the cutscene, lets you save, and then plops you back in the overworld. You get the enemy entry and can't fight him for that ending anymore, but the game lets you continue as normal and get the good ending.
@@LinkinMark1994 Its one of these Cycle things. Hero kills big baddy, big baddy returns and new hero comes, repeat. In the Game, you break that Cycle, if you defeat that final boss early you dont
I really like Everhood’s incinerator fight. You’re expected to lose and go through the process of bringing yourself back to life, but if you manage to outlast the fire, the game congratulates you, and then shows you all your failed attempts. It was fate after all.
No way, a wild Everhood reference???
But yeah, I completely agree, the incinerator sequence is a great example of impossible bosses that aren't impossible but are actually just way way too hard.
The game also calls you a "Master of Time" because it knows the only way to beat it is to reload your save a bunch of times
I especially like how there’s straight up two phases to a fight most people will lose to in the first 20 seconds, and then never give a second thought. Very cool “boss”, if you can call an incinerator a boss
Sadly, Cat God's Incinerator (or Incinerator 2 as I seen it be called) isn't actually beatable like the first one, but you do get two different endings if you do enter it depending on if Professor Orange still is in Everhood or not.
Likes Everhood, opinion validated ✅
One boss I really loved was Genichiro from Sekiro. The first time you fight him on that hill at the beginning of the game, he totally fucks you up, and that’s that. You can’t fight him again. However at that point he’s still very much beatable, and on repeated runs becomes even easy. It’s a great way of testing the player, even in his reappearances, and it’s cool that when you defeat him on your first go, the game even awards you with a new cutscene.
I like how Impossible bosses are handled by Nihon Falcom in their "The Legend of Heroes: Trails" series. There are a number of scripted loss fights, but if you know what you're doing and have set your characters up correctly it's still possible to beat them, and they generally give you some pretty nice rewards.
It can also lead to minor changes in the narrative where the characters get out of a bad situation without needing to be rescued, or cause a boss to pull the "This isn't even my final form" card.
It allows the designers to create bosses that are strong both narratively and mechanically while still allowing and incentivizing players to overcome the challenge.
One of my Favorites is a Spoiler from Trails to Azure. She's considered to be one of the most powerful warriors in the game's setting and the entire fight is framed as earning her respect enough that she'll let you go after the big bad. It starts like a normal fight, if you lose you need to try again, and it will continue like a normal boss fight until you chip her down to about 2/3 health. Once you reach the threshold, her helmet breaks, she gets a full heal, boosted stats, and the ability to OHKO the entire party is you misjudge when to cast your barrier spells.
The fight really tests you on your game knowledge; character positioning, knowing when to use certain spells, keeping the party buffed so you can actually do more than 100 damage in an attack (She has over 60,000 HP, probably more but I can't remember off the top if my head), and overall its a really great boss fight.
And in the same game, you also get the infamous timed boss battle, the nemesis of every perfectionist. God, I hate that battle so much, 5-minute timers keep giving me PTSD.
@@alexanderougai4899 Yes, well. They can't all be bangers unfortunately (looking at you Sky SC Hard mode tutorial boss) and it's rather ironic that the game which gave us the best 'impossible' boss in series (that I've played so far) also gave us the worst.
@@dragonmaster1500 oh yes, SC tutorial is bonkers on Nightmare
Unfortunately, the next two games half-ass their impossible boss encounters by making them hang on with 1 HP even if you one-shot them, then taking multiple consecutive turns and spamming their S-crafts until you die. Half the time, the game doesn't even acknowledge that you could have beat them.
There's an "impossible boss" moment in the first Danganronpa game, which is actually pretty interesting given its not even combat oriented game. The game even let's you play out the alternate scenario as a fun little easter egg, but also acts to prove the odds of the situation you've been put in.
It builds up a great narrative, fleshes out certain characters, and makes the ending of the game feel amazing as you go from one of the lowest points of the game to the highest of highs.
I assume you mean the i think 5th class trial where makoto and kyoko are suspects?
also, drv3 also has something like this with the impossible escape level where you go through that platforming section, and if you beat it, you get a secret ending
Some of the Monster Hunter games have a super-early quest be interrupted by the flagship monster of the game, long before you're realistically equipped to take it down. It depends from game to game whether it's actually impossible; the Rathalos in the original game can be slayed if you're skilled and persistent enough, but the Lagiacrus in Tri is coded to not go past a certain health threshold.
Not fucking Bazelgeuse again! At least I brought the glaive.
@Fiks Anzo™ Bagel Guest is one of my favorites! Love that Big Boomin Boi!
I remember when the homies and I jumped in the water to fight Lagi.. two people said "hell no, underwater level" and left, and then the two of us that were left got dunked on.
Not a good intro to monster hunter, but I persisted and enjoy the series fully now lol
I remember beating the first encounter with Glavenus on my first playthrough of MHGU. It was down to the wire and I only succeeded because I played MHG and used Adept GS but it was very satisfying.
When I play the older games I really wanna try beating the first encounters, or at least get a part break. MH is one of the best examples of a impossible boss, gameplay wise at least, I don't think I got unique dialogue.
probably my favorite "impossible" bosses are Gargaros, Ogralus, and Orcanos from the Yo-Kai Watch series. You're thrown into their fight incredibly early into the game, and stand no chance, but when you encounter them in post game and defeat them, the feeling is unmatched.
Love the early monster hunter’s approaches to the flagships
They appear really early on, like tigrex in the popo tongues quest, and lagiacrus in the stomach quest, they’re beatable if you know what you’re doing, but to someone just starting out, they seem insurmountable, and I love that
When I first picked up Tri and I found Lagi for the first time. I just noped out and went back to the village. I didn't pick the game back up for a month. I have a fear of big things in the deep ocean.
Certainly didn't help that he had some of the scariest appearance and sounds I've seen in a videogame ever up to that point.
I think one of the most interesting uses of an invincible boss is a temporary form taken by Reimu in Imperishable Night, specifically her Fantasy Heaven/Innate Dream Last Word Spellcard. Basically, if you manage to capture all spellcards as Marisa solo on at least Normal Difficulty, you unlock the ability to challenge Reimu's strongest spell, an attack where she goes intangible while still firing bullets at you. You cannot damage her at all, she's perfectly invincible, your only option is to outlive the timer. This one spellcard being invincible not only forces the player to focus solely on dodging rather than juggling both shooting and avoiding attacks, but also frames with gameplay just how powerful Reimu really is that she can casually go invincible during a fight with basically no loss on her end.
In fact, it's been stated in Marisa's Grimoire that if a spell time limit wasn't imposed, this form of Reimu's would be utterly unbeatable, so giving the player a taste of that outmatched power is a cool Easter Egg.
Quite a few of the bosses have timeout cards, basically all the EX bosses, a few stage 6 bosses, and also Clownpiece for... some reason.
I think my favorite is Mokou, who just straight-up possesses you and uses your own body as the launching point for her attacks. You outrun or out-position her, the attack will always come from just beside you.
@@MrCDM6 The difference between Reimu and EX Bosses is that most of the time, Extra bosses demonstrate that they are very powerful beings, either capable of destroying anything, being damn near or outright gods, or just being insanely persistent. Reimu is the series protagonist, which while it should already speak to her skill, she's still not more than a stage 4 boss out of 6. Even in sidegames, the reason why you fight Reimu last tends to be because you're outright playing as the cause of the problem, and sometimes she's also not the final boss.
It portrays her as a competent protagonist and capable at doing her job well but nowhere near the most powerful force out there, just one of the more skillful ones.
When Fantasy Nature comes into play, and even Marisa, her close friend and the one doing her best to keep up with her, comments on how she's completely unbeatable in this state where it not for Rules of Gameplay, you KNOW it's bad, and it showcases just how powerful Reimu and her ability really are that not even someone with the innate power to destroy the "eye" of anything is said to be as bad as Reimu at full power.
Bonus points for being able to actually use this supermove in one of the fighting games. And it sure is a supermove when activated.
@@SuperSuperstarMario The rules of gameplay were created BECAUSE she's basically unbeatable in that state, short of an obscenely powerful creature killing her, which would cause a huge disaster. I never thought of it before but it's neat to see a bit of background lore thrown at the player like that. Let you see 'oh, now I see why this is such a problem.'
@Marcos Ensoul Reimu is at her strongest when she isn't trying at all. The more effort she puts in the more likely to fail she is. Which is a pretty interesting ability.
There's a rumor(or maybe actual evidence?) that IN was meant to be the final entry at one point; so Fantasy Heaven would be kinda a final sendoff given how much effort you need to unlock it.
Impossible bosses are basically playable cutscenes
Re3 remake until the end basically
Wrong, actually. For example, take the level P-2 from ultrakill, a secret level. Spoilers below
There are multiple idols, an enemy type that you have faced before at this point in the game. They make a predetermined enemy invincible as long as they are alive, and can only be damaged by your melee attack (which kills them instantly). The thing is, here they're used more creatively, hidden behind walls where you can't destroy them, and boosting enemies (mostly mini bosses) that are often considered to be priority targets. In this scenario, you can't just kill them first like you usually would, but you have to dodge their attacks and clear out the rest of the room. In one instance, the first one can't be taken out even after you clear the rest of the enemies in the room it spawns in, instead you have to move on to where the game eventually spawns a second one, and you have to dodge both while clearing that new room. The level is the hardest in the game because of this, and a worthy challenge for veteran players.
@@Brass319 what you mentioned are enemies that have a shield that needs to be taken down. Theoretically, the boosted enemies are impossible to defeat, but in reality, it's like them having additional health that has different hurtboxes.
Which isn't fun.
@@MEM-brain no... you're missing the point. Of course an impossible boss is gonna be able to die/leave you be at some point if you're not scripted to lose to it.
One of my favorites, in Pikmin 2 (SPOILERS) there is a cave surrounded by water, and only your water breathing blue pikmin can enter. This is the Submerged Castle. Upon entering, the player will immediately notice the eerie music and the apparent lack of life within the tunnels. If they dawdle, down from the ceiling falls two concrete cylinders and a transparent, gelatinous humanoid, the Water Wraith. The wraith then patrols the narrow tunnels, making it a point to crush your pikmin under his makeshift steamroller whenever he finds them. There seems to be no way to fight back or damage it at all, so your only option is to expedite your trek to the next sublevel, buying you some time before it follows you down.
At the final sublevel, you find a flower that allows you to transform your blue pikmin into purple pikmin, which turns out can frighten the water wraith with the shockwaves they produce when thrown. The frightened water wraith cowers and turns purple and completely opaque, and finally your pikmin can latch on and start dealing damage.
I'd also like a follow-up video on "bad" impossible bosses. One of the things I hate most about impossible bosses is when they don't establish a proper reason for why they are impossible, and then "force" you to lose even if you were going to win. This video showed the impossible fight in Tales of Symphonia against Yggdrasil, but I HATE that fight. If you go through the effort (or new game plus) to be able to beat him at that stage, then you should win. Don't force a loss there because the story demands it while at the same time throwing away the work that the player put in to beat it. If losing that fight is needed for the story, then make winning it just an Easter Egg ending like suggested later, but then have you respawn before the fight and ask you to lose or something.
Xenoblade bosses moment
Agree, this reminds me of Yu-Gi-Oh! Forbidden Memories (also showed in the video), it should had a secret ending (plus a rare card as a prize) for defeating Heishin in the first duel against him. The way it is treated is awful, as you have to keep dueling against him until you intentionally lose if you're stronger than him at that moment.
I mean, you technically can beat him. It's just nothing changes.
my favourite variety is the "you're *clearly* not supposed to do this right now but it is technically possible" and they let you smack your head against it any number of times you want.
i started my very first elden ring run as a naked man taking down the Tree Sentinel and it fuckin ruled honestly, shit even has a second-phase man. one of the hardest souls fights of all time cause of the massive stat gap just right there at the start.
Yeah the Tree sentinel and also the Grafted scion in the starting area are good exemples
I like how Xenoblade 1 handles impossible bosses. Since a lot of bosses are defeated (or lost to) in cutscenes, most of the time you only have to get rid of a percentage of the boss's health. And since you don't have consumable items, you don't run into the problem of using all your items on an impossible boss.
Trails of cold steel had this problem in the first two games. You'd completely maul a boss and they'd go "haha I was only using 5% of my power" which got really repetitive as time went on. But they sort of fixed it after cold steel 3 to have you reduce the HP to a set percentage
Xenoblade 2 does this as well and it's great. The fight with Malos and Jin in Morytha is one of my favorite impossible fights in an RPG because it sells just how hopeless and desperate the situation is, and makes it all the more satisfying when the narrative takes over and you find a way to power through.
And on another note, Unique Monsters give an interesting challenge as optional minibosses you could beat if you’re skilled enough, with iconic ones such as Territorial
Rotbart being a Level 81 behemoth you’re encouraged to take down after you beat the game, giving you a strong sense of catharsis
Yeah, the series kind of has a problem with that, doesn't it...
@@StarlightNkyra problem implies it's a bad thing
The dungeon guardian from terraria is a great one. I remember spending weeks making a strategy to kill it and how tense each attempt was knowing it could kill me with one slip up
I disagree. The amount of weapons Terraria has make it rather easy with proper mobility. Even in pre-hardmode you stand a chance with the SoC and an asphalt airbridge, though if you bring in hardmode gear it becomes trivial.
@@staringgasmask Back in 1.1 it was a lot more difficult. It took over a year for someone to kill it for the first time. The developers added a reward for killing it because they didn't know you could until then.
In the current version of the game, it's still challenging if you don't know what to do, but nearly impossible to mess up when you know what you're doing and have endgame gear.
@@MBCollector672 yeah, in 1.1 it probably was almost impossible. Endgame gear isn't really needed, just an infinite flight mount with decent speed (UFO and above)
@@staringgasmask Cosmic Car Key is pretty late-game, but not end-game. Should've clarified better what I meant, I considered that as endgame because it's usually a mount you continue using post-ML.
@@MBCollector672 yeah, that's fair. There aren't many more infinite flight mounts to rival it, the others are expert or master only
One of my favorite impossible bosses is vs P03 in act 2 of Inscryption, since it’s done with a 4th wall break and adds so much to the narrative
I kept thinking about the Etrian Odyssey F.O.E. the entire video. They're super powerful bosses that you can't possibly beat the first time you see them, so they become an obstacle you must evade on the map as you explore the labyrinth. Once you get more powerful by exploring and leveling up, you can try to face them and defeat them in exchange for a big chunk of experience and materials for more powerful gear and weapons
>Once you get more powerful by exploring and leveling up, you can try to face them and defeat them in exchange for a big chunk of experience and materials for more powerful gear and weapons
Unless its the original EO2, in which case they don't give you exp at all, sadly. The rest still applies, thankfully. EO2 was just weird.
Ha Ha Ha, we put an enemy there in advance
_Definitely F.O.E._
My favorite has to be Llednar Twem from Final Fantasy Tactics Advance. He's only "invincible" because of the world revolving around the concept of laws, from "No Items allowed" to "No Healing allowed", affecting everyone equally. And the amount and harshness of these laws gets worse for everyone as the story goes on.
Llednar though has a law that's pretty much "Llednar Twem cannot be defeated" and he antagonizes you throughout the story with impossible boss fights. It really shows how biased the laws are.
So it's just so satisfying when you finally get to fight him for real in the end without the law protecting him.
The full board of Grizzly Bears in Inscryption is a really well-done “Impossible” Boss
This reminds me of a game I played a lot of as a kid: DBZ Boudokai Tenkaichi 2. The closest thing that game had to boss battles in it's story mode were matches against buffed up opponents where your only goal is to survive as the time counts down. However, if you manage to beat the enemy before the time reached zero you'd unlock a playable "What If" scenario based on what could happen if that character actually lost their fight.
I would like to point out a different kind of impossible boss, the "narrative" impossible boss, where it is possible to defeat them and it may not even be a hard fight, just to see your party losing on the following cutscene, it accomplishes exactly the opposite feeling of conquering a impossible boss
(Hint Hint, Jin from XB2)
Worse: in those cases, often you have to "defeat" the boss because losing the fight gets you a game over, yet you lose in the cutscene anyway
There is actully a really funny case where the maincharacters face the final boss fore the first time and can not put a scratch on him and he acts all smug andd high and mighty."This is the devil that plauged ouer army? I am disapointed."
The funny thing is the maincharacters are in the narativ nerved. They are not at there usual power and the Final Boss does not know that. He lets them live becuse he wants to finish them with the god he is trying to resurect. If the maincharacters would have had there normal power they would have defeated and destroyed him at there first encounter.
Normaly forced lost bosses are in the narativ just stronger then the heros. In this case the narativ had to nerf the heroes so the villain can win this first fight.
They do kick his ass 2 chapters latter.
"Sometimes the boss has just really good armor or something."
Perfect encapsulation of the Black Knight and his blessed armor that makes him invulnerable to all damage.
Until you look at his stats and realizes he comes with the highest speed, attack and defense numbers for a non-laguz unit, plus a ranged sword that negates non-skill based crits and increases his physical and magical defenses.
Nothing like using A and S rank weapons to beat him in randomizers though, as if his armor was never blessed to begin with and letting you exploit his lower resistance with Runesword. :D
I remember, towards the end of Xenogears, the game throws _so_ many extremely difficult bosses at you with strange gimmicks that require you to fight in specific ways, prepare for specific things, and basically completely annihilate you if you aren't prepared, that almost every single endgame fight felt like "oh i was supposed to lose that, right?"
...and then i'd get hit with the game over screen and i'd be floored
This in and of itself isn't bad, it was fun to solve what felt unsolvable, but there were two issues I had!
Firstly, two of those fights happened _back-to-back,_ meaning I had to first boss, die because I hadn't prepared for his gimmick, fight him again, then fight the NEXT boss, die because I didn't know _that_ gimmick, then fight the first guy a _third_ time!
And secondly, the far worse issue...
ONE OF THOSE ENDGAME FIGHTS _WAS_ ACTUALLY A FIGHT YOU WERE MEANT TO LOSE
That whole "the player will have a nagging suspicion about every difficult fight" bit holds so true. My mindset was so off for every fight up until what I was certain was the final boss.
I really like the first encounter with the wasp king in Bug fables: The everlasting sapling. I see it as a representation of the tone shift that happenes after chapter 4. Before you would be fighting aginst things like bandits , random wildlife , other explorers and all that jazz. But the wasp king with this one simple encounter proves to you that he isnt just some "dungeon boss of the week" he is shown as a real threat. It also could be an alegory for the team having to "grow up" since the game gets much more sirious after that point onward and the characters tackle their personal strugles
I had Urizen on the mind for pretty much the whole video, so I'm glad you brought him up at the end.
Though for a more comical use of the impossible boss, when starting a new save file in Dissidia 012 Final Fantasy, the game puts you through a tutorial, and at one point you're given the chance to tell the game that you know what you're doing and don't need a tutorial. The game interprets this in an arrogant manner, so it decides to challenge you by having you play as Lightning at Level 1, against Feral Chaos, the Level 130 superboss from the postgame story.
You technically _can_ beat this fight if you have the patience to whittle down his 125,000+ HP (and avoid getting OHKO'd because Feral Chaos can _easily_ do so with that level gap), and it does unlock the postgame story right out the gate if you do, but the tutorial cutscene you get after the fight doesn't change regardless of if you win or lose.
You showed the first Sam fight from Metal Gear Rising a few times, but didn't mention one of the interesting set pieces in it - after a little while, the game outright cripples you and makes you controllably helpless. This feels like an interesting tangent to go on for "you're supposed to lose this fight" fights - at some point, the boss does a scripted attack that signals the end of the fight proper, but still lets you at least flail while still making it clear you're not going to win.
Armstrong does this too in his second fight atop Excelsus - you've been disarmed of your sword and are doing chip damage to him, but you can still fight. In theory you could chip down his health bar, but he does a scripted unavoidable explosion at like 90% health to lead into the next cutscene. Of course, if you lose properly, you go straight into the cutscene anyway.
That feels much more palatable than the "you need to do well enough to progress the story" style mentioned. Woe betide the game that has an invisible "you've done well enough" point, but making it instantly make you lose can be narratively unsatisfying - why didn't they just do that in the first place? At least letting the boss play with you lets the defeat set in.
Sam cuts off Raiden’s arm when you lose all of your health, the fight can actually last forever during both phases as long as you don’t get hit. And Armstrong’s explosion thing only happens when you lose all of your health or when a certain amount of time passes, (I’m pretty sure it’s two and a half minutes) hitting him does nothing. This doesn’t change anything just thought it was worth mentioning.
just a funfact that i wanted to tell: the song lyrics for the bosses in metal gear rising revengeance actually tell the story of the boss itself like how at the end of jetstream sams bossfight theme it says "and never realizing why i fight" i can probably think of it as jetstream sam not thinking about what he was fighting for or why he was fighting once (i love to go deep into the lore of the game even the songs so thats why.)
I like that you touched on Beatrix. She's a great boss. Kuja is technically never beaten in battle either. I think that Fortune from MGS2 is also a good example of an impossible boss. The fact that they purposely gave her a very small health bar is funny, too. The Xenomorph in Alien is what I'd imagine the SA-X would be like if Fusion got a remake in first-person.
I remember in Trails of Cold Steel 1, you face off against your instructor with a couple of friends who are bickering over small differences. You then quickly see how differently your party who is just in a military school fares against someone who has fought in an actual war and even was revered for her skill, and speed. She *is* possible, I think, but she is so fast and so durable that your attacks barely make much of a difference.
This may be loose in this category but in Undertale's Pacifist route, I would say Undyne can be considered an "Optional Impossible Boss". in that route she basically chases you down and her boss fight is a choice to go for the simple route, or continue with the pacifist route and use a function barely used (a Joestar secret technique).
And in a way, The Final Boss in the Pacifist route can be an inverse of this category (but still in a way, can't be "beaten up")
Mettaton is an impossible boss as well
There's also a Dungeon Guardian from Terraria. He is an enemy that one shots you when you try to enter the dungeon before defeating Skeletron. However it is possible to kill him. He has 9999 health and 9999 defense and it takes a very long time, a lot of ammo and very fast movement speed to finally kill him. But even then he will respawn when you enter the dungeon again.
And the only thing it drops is a "pet" summoning item, making it mechanically pointless to kill it.
Although to my knowledge the best way to kill it isn't with ammo but with a melee weapon that has reach and leaves damaging particles for it to run into. (No matter what you attack it with each hit will deal 1 damage or 2 if that hit crits, meaning any ranged weapon will be burning through a ton of ammo which is generally too expensive to justify, although i don't know what is considered the absolute fastest way to kill it)
@@jasonreed7522 the way i tend to beat it is with megashark+endless musket pouch
The fun part about Dungeon Guardian is that it isnt just something that shows up and kills you if you haven't killed Skeletron.
If you haven't killed Skeletron, the game actually replaces _all_ spawns in the dungeon with Dungeon Guardians.
This means the Mechanic NPC (spawn replace with Guardian) and the locked chests (key-holding slime spawn replaced with Guardian) that make the Dungeon worth exploring in the first place completely inaccessible even if you _could_ survive or dispatch the Guardians.
@@jasonreed7522 To be fair the pet is there for bragging rights. You were able to beat it, enjoy bragging about it and showing proof of your victory.
Of course, nowadays it's not as hard as it used to be, between infinite fly and the Zenith, so it's not the big deal it was at the time, but on the other hand, at first you didn't even get the pet, so...
@@lenlimbo that is why i said its mechanically pointless, the pet is just aesthetics and bragging rights. (And lets be honest, bragging rights is the most important reason to do anything)
In a similar vein Minecraft's Warden was supposed to be a force of nature that didn't drop anything and people took that as a challenge and immediately made a Warden Farm. (Now it drops an item that is way easier to get by other means)
The funniest kind are the ones that are beatable with a godlike strategy/NG+, but if you do best them, the cutscene afterwards still pretends that you lost.
I love Enoch from OFF who is I am pretty sure the only enemy in the game you can flee from, and have to. After you flee, he chases you through a fun little maze before you can tire him out enough to defeat him. Also his OST is a banger and his buildup and dialogue are A tier
Fire Emblem Three Houses have an example similar to the Lu Bu example mentioned in the video. Being the Death Knight, who is an optional enemy who shows up every few missions and mostly stays in one spot on the map but its attacks will instantly kill you, even counter attacks, no matter how far from him you are will obliterate you. Despite all this it is technically possible to defeat it, which is more likely later in the game with certain stronger units and abilities.
I was so scared of him until I realized I had Lysithea
Fire Emblem loves this one, although they usually charge at you and your job is to clear the map before they catch you or fulfill some condition to make them leave. There's the first Julius encounter in Genealogy, Galzus in Thracia, Naesala in Path of Radiance, a ton on Radiant Dawn, the hounds on engage, and Gaiden/Echoes Desaix and Jedah, wich i think are the only ones other than the Death Knight that have special rewards tied to actually beating them.
Ah, yes. The Lysithea showcase.
@@cartoonkenj2209 glass cannon for the win
In addition to the Vanguard you showed footage of, _Demon's Souls_ also features a clever twist on the "boss you're supposed to whittle down to zero HP but they survive anyway because they're friendly" fight. Old King Doran has like a million HP, and you're only supposed to chip away about 10% of it before he calls time and declares you the winner. But if you really want to be a soulless bastard, or have a death wish, you can keep hitting him and he'll go back to fighting back (and I think he also fights more aggressively at this point), and if you somehow manage to deplete his health bar, he will die for real and you'll get a unique item out of it.
The Dahaka from Prince of Persia: Warrior Within is a pretty dope encounter. It's a tense chase sequence every times you see him, I particularly like how the game let you know he is getting closer by slowly taking away the color off the screen. The game established very early that you can only run from him as the whole narative is centered around finding a way to defeat it.
I'm having Inner Agent 3 flashbacks (Splatoon 2: Octo Expansion DLC). To even get to him, you have to complete all 80 of the levels and complete the entire ending, all 8 phases. Then you go back to the main station, go to locker number 8 to the right of the subway train, and then interact with the shiny object inside.
8 days of crying, frustration, nearly breaking my Nintendo Switch. I can't help but think of Sisyphus. I would get to his last phase, the boulder finally near the top, before he splatted me, the boulder rolling back down. I can hear "Me and the Birds" playing in my head already. And then it happened. I saw Inner Agent 3 fall backwards as I got the message Inner Agent 3 defeated! Your reward is a shiny little trinket you can wear in your hat slot. Oh well, at least it has a good amount of ability slots.
Oh and also, I beat him in 8 tries when I returned to the game years later, about 8 minutes, funny how that works eh? Did you know I've used the number "8" 8 times including the ones in this sentence? The Octo Expansion loves that number to death.
4:18 This fight right here will stick in my memory forever for entirely unintended, hilarious reasons.
See, at one point I used a Gameshark to cheat my way into having all the dragoon spirits from the start. The unintended consequence of this was having access to the (spoiler) dragoon spirit right from the get go, and while this fight locks Dart out of his FIRE dragoon spirit, it doesn't account for the (spoiler).
So I change into the most powerful, ultimate form available to Dart, unleashing an attack that fills the arena with fire and explosions, practically cracking the planet in half as the wave of devastation spreads out around dart.
Lloyd gently glides six inches to the left and says "You missed me!". It was so absurd I couldn't help but laugh.
It reminds me of the Reaper in Persona 3 and 5 : an extremely powerful ennemy that will appear if you stay on the same floor of the dungeon for too long, forcing you to always move on, but can actually be defeated (though at level 99)
Or in the case of Persona 5 vanilla, fight him during pollen season so that he would start the fight with the despair debuff, which effectively makes him die by himself
@@granmastersword Yeah but why would you ever play P5 over P5R ?
@@smilingman4299 I played the game way before P5R came out. I still need to get around to play Royal
@@granmastersword Yeah, especially since it's available on all plateforms now
@@granmastersword Royal is definitely worth playing if you can.
The E.M.M.I were so much fun. On your first playthrough, its honestly really scary and anxiety inducing. They really made the game 10x better.
the halo one was my favorite. it really hits home. I actually felt sad in the ending as I fought for as long as I could. I read the books prior to reach game coming out, so I knew the ending... They did a great job with that one.
One boss I thought was impossible for the longest time was Leon in Kingdom Hearts 1. I assumed since he hits hard and you don't game over when he beats that you were supposed to lose the fight. I was so surprised and happy when I came back years later and beat him. Plus you get an item at the end of Traverse Town for doing it which is sweet.
I do like how Cloud in the Colosseum and Sabor (fight 1) in the deep jungle have a similar "Technically winnable but outcome doesn't change" thing but iirc unlike Leon it doesn't matter if you win or not against Cloud or first fight Sabor
Here's an idea. A "impossible" boss that appears near the start of the game that acts as a hidden difficulty scale. If you get your ass handed to you almost immediately, the game sets it's difficulty to easy. If you managed to last a certain amount of turns or reduce his HP down to a certain amount before losing, the game sets it's difficulty to medium. But if you managed to actually beat him, the game sets it's difficulty to hard.
@@pomelo9518 That's why I said _near_ the beginning. That way, you have some time to establish what the player should expect from the game and throw in enough hints before the boss so that they would have an idea that it won't be easy and try to prepare.
Equivalent of the "look up" prompt setting wether your vertical look is inverted.
Super Metroid does this. If you can beat Ridley, then the bosses after him have a different move set.
I like the impossible boss of OMORI. In there, you have to defeat him, but the mechanic from the headspace section where you survive lethal damage with one hp comes back to bite you in the ass. Eventually, omori overpowers you, giving you a “game over” screen. From there, i love how the ending you get depends on if you choose to continue or give up.
If you don't you forgive yourself ( Literally ) and move on. However.... if you don't....
🧑🏻🏥
The first encounter with Anubis in Zone of the Enders 1, meaning the final battle. I remember thinking it was the coolest thing back when it first came out.
You showed the Water Wraith for a brief moment. You ended up calling me, a Pikmin fan, to ramble. You did this to yourself.
I love the Waterwraith as an impossible boss, and this video made me think about it and its area, the Submerged Castle. It's a tough level, especially since the entrance is located in a spot were you can only take Blue Pikmin into it. In a cave with every hazard available.
Seeing that thing drop from the sky is very stressful, and in the context of the game, a RTS management sim thing, it makes you either figure out the most efficient way to get all the treasures before it arrives, or panic and try to guide the thing away from an area in order for the Pikmin to get what's left to the ship. What I appreciate, though, is that every level of the cavern has an exit geyser available. If things are to dicey for you, or you're inexperienced, you can hop out of the level and rethink your strategy with what you now know (there's a horrible thing that chases you after enough time, every stage hazard is there, but bulbmin are also available).
Then, you reach the bottom, and you get access to Purple Pikmin, and are forced to face off against the invincible beast. Only this time, you now have the key to beating it, the Purple's. Deplete it's health bar, and you get a second phase!.. which is the thing losing its lethal stone wheels and being forced to run around like a scared chicken. It's hilarious.
After a stressful and hellish level with that thing always breathing down your neck, even when it hasn't dropped into the stage itself, you get a moment of catharsis in making the thing cower before you. It all makes the Submerged Castle into one of the most memorable levels in the Pikmin Series.
Something you left out by the way:
Not only is the submerged castle entrance underwater, forcing you to bring blues, but even if you somehow cheat other Pikmin to the entrance, *you will be confronted by the message "Only Blue Pikmin may enter this dungeon."*
@@CybeastID I wasn't aware of that, but a good way to keep the difficulty.
I think you are understating the amount of psychological power the waterwraith holds over those it traumatized as kids. I still get major anxiety and have my heart race the whole time I'm in the Submerged Castle.
You get 5min of the creepiest music in the series, in what is already a tricky cave using blues & bulbmin to overcome all the hazards possible in the game, and then the water wraith shows up and steamrolls your pikmin. (The best strategy is usually to just skip to the next level if he shows up, and get the rest later)
Of course as an adult i now rush to that hole for the memes, and the best powerup in the game, the pluck-a-phone.
11/10 impossible boss, it has 1 job and it executes it perfectly.
PS: its just a meme that it traumatized us, buts its half true, it's definitely terrifying as a kid, especially compared to the rest of the game's tone.
man you really gotta appreciate how much of a tonal shift that level is compared to every other level and how it makes the game genuinely scary, how it pushes the player to their limits mechanically and emotionally and makes it one of the most memorable moments of the game. Gotta give props to the developers to take such a risk like that to throw a genuine horror level in a game like that, there’s something about sneaking something scary in a game that isnt scary that makes those scary moments so good.
Legitimately the boss that has scared me most. Because in horror games I'm expecting scares, that thing dropping in had me terrified all 3 times I had to go through that first childhood run. Obviously now it's fine, but nothing's matched the terror I felt that first run it dropped down and started chasing me.
There's a recurring villain in Final Fantasy Tactics Advance named Llednar who is unbeatable and has incredibly powerful attacks, with the first couple encounters just requiring you to survive. One fun detail though is that if you have the Steal skill, he has rare and very powerful equipment, so you can spend the encounters trying to steal from him instead of just trying to survive.
A great one that wasn’t mentioned: Darth Vader in Jedi: Fallen Order.
For the entire game you’ve been relearning how to be a Jedi, slowly getting stronger. You’ve been unlocking more and more powerful abilities and skills, and earlier bosses you found impossibly hard become manageable or even easy depending on your skill and the difficulty level.
And then comes Vader. Vader, who immediately one shots the boss you had just been toiling away at, who is so powerful that when the cutscene goes back to gameplay he doesn’t even get a health bar. Vader, who’s strategy guide literally says “Escape is the only chance of survival”.
Also from the RE series, Verdugo from RE4/RE4r is treated as a survival impossible boss section even though it's a boss you can actually kill (I actually thought it was unkillable the first time I saw it in the original). Since you're trapped in the sewers until the elevator comes down, the game implies that you're supposed to just run around, waste time, and do your best to survive before getting the hell outta there. But with enough perseverance, you can actually kill the Verdugo even on New Game harder difficulties, even on your first blind playthrough.
The Regenerador later on also kinda works a similar way. You are sorta out of luck on your first encounter because you don't have the thermal scope and no matter what you do the thing will just regenerate health, but you can actually kill them without it with certain strategies even without the thermal scope. They tried to replicate the same vibe with the Rasklapanje in RE6, which is actually an impossible enemy you can't permanently kill (though you can kill their hands using the environment like popping it into the microwave or furnace).
RE6 having the worst, most difficult to pronounce enemy names.
In Shin Megami Tensei V, there’s a boss in the latter half of the game powered up by 8 nodes you saw before in an area you just finished traversing. Once you’re close enough to challenge her, you are prompted to backtrack and deactivate those nodes to remove her power. After that prompt it is entirely up to you how many get turned off. You can deactivate them all and make her a bit of a push over, you could ignore the warnings and fight her with her buffed stats, stronger skills, and extra turns, or somewhere in the middle. If you know how she fights either on a repeat playthrough or after a game over, it isn’t unreasonable for you to rearrange your team to counter her at full power, but you are definitely losing if you don’t prep like that. It’s basically an in game difficulty slider and I love it
I conpleted smt v and i don't remember that boss what was it called?
@@moley249 Ishtar
@@joebobjon1127 ah yeah i forgot about her
The parade scene in Final Fantasy VIII, where the characters are all hopeful and feel like they have a real plan and a mission and are going to really pull it off, only to then get absolutely crushed by Sorceress Edea is one of my favorite memories of that game. Everything about that whole part just worked.
Agreed. But you're still supposed to win the boss fight. Even if the narrative treats it as if you'd lost (or at least as if Edea hadn't really been trying).
In a game called Shadows Over Loathing, there is an optional boss called "The Goliath Gator" that the game expressly tells you that they haven't beaten it before you fight it. It is tricky and tedious but it is possible, you just need an attack called "stop hitting yourself" which uses its own muscle against itself, also you need a lot of shields or stunning items so you don't just get one shot.
You showed him briefly, but Vile from Mega Man X is a good one, he's such a good impossible boss that Maverick Hunter X loses a little bit from making him not only beatable, but required beatable. I remember trying so hard to beat him everytime I played.
The Trails series, while lesser known, absolutely loves the impossible boss that tasks you with getting their health down to a certain point and eventually being able to outright beat them. Honestly it ends up feeling pretty good since it gives you a decent reference for how far you've come.
Just a week ago I was completing Trails to Azure. 2 of those "impossible" bosses made my head spin.
And then you make your characters so broken that you destroy them without even letting them have a turn but you still lose in the cutscene.
@@Ephelle Or in cold steel 1 and 2 you spam delay and never let the enemy get a turn
@@user-lh7mt7zo7l Or in CS3 you abuse Accelerate orders during a break.
@@Ephelle Yeah true. It's kind of fun trying to find out how to break those games.
Wallman from Castlevania: Order of Ecclesia can only be beaten by absorbing his glyph he uses to move into a castle wall to take cover from the bombs he throwns into the room. This is completely unique and can take a while to figure out, making him seemingly impossible to beat as he keeps healing. It is a pretty memorable encounter for this reason.
but it's not impossible, just an encounter with a really clever way to defeat it.
@@MrJechgo True, like many bosses described in the video, it's only seemingly impossible until you figure out the hidden solution
@@YaenGamedev and this is where the difference is: the boss isn't "impossible to defeat", it just have this one secret weakness that kills it in one shot, because it's impervious to anything else.
@@MrJechgo Yeah so like... The first thing in the mechanics section of the video at around 6:50. Just giving another example here :)
I like bosses that literally say they're unbeatable such as showing they have perfect evasion or take 0 damage... as well as ones that are technically possible, but not realistically possible to beat... if a boss is either of them, it's a good impossible boss... if it's the former, it becomes a question of how to deal with this, and if it's the latter, it's a challenge for the best of players to strive towards
The Mary Skelter series introduced an interesting impossible boss mechanic along the lines of Mr. X from Resident Evil 2 - an area warden called a Nightmare will sometimes attack the area and if you enter its sphere of influence (or it spawns close enough to you) you have no choice but to get away. It can trap you, and if it does you can knock it down, but even if you're high enough level you can't actually kill the thing until you find and destroy the one thing in the dungeon keeping it immortal.
Honestly i like hard bosses that are beatable to really show your power. Especially if you manage to win against them in your first playthrough with enough skill or luck.
Tales of series for example has many examples of this
And those examples all spit in your face and tell you that the party lost regardless of outcome
@@MizunoKetsuban not really. Tales of has different scenes when you beat one of those bosses so I'm right
Impossible bosses, I’m not against. Bosses that can’t be defeated in that encounter, but require you to get decently far however, I can get a little annoyed about it, despite how much I enjoy those games (looking at you, Digimon Cyber Sleuth).
Some of my favourite unbeatable boss fights though are those bosses that make you feel more satisfied when you can defeat them later on. My personal favs are the antagonist of Bug Fables, as well as against Jasper in Dragon Quest 11. Both cases have some powerful ability where in their first battles, you’ll either get one-shotted at a certain point, or are just unable to hit them. So when you eventually get the means to overcome their challenges, though not completely erase it, it feels more satisfying to take them on and defeat them.
Plus, with these bosses, it’s made clear that you won’t win those battles the first time, because of either an absurd amount of damage, or just straight up being told you can’t do anything to them. So I don’t feel like I’m just in a tough fight for a while, before being ejected out of the battle because I reached their threshold (again, looking at you Digimon Cyber Sleuth, but also Ni No Kuni’s Shadar). It’s short, sweet, and to the point. When your boss’ gimmick is literal invincibility or OTK power, it’s best not to dwell on it too long.
I think the impossible boss that stuck with me the most was the Mystery Man and Mystery Woman encounter in the prologue of Golden Sun. Kinda crazy that you get a glimpse of the power that an experience Adept wields that early into the game, as well as going on to eventually be strong enough to defeat them at the end of the game. Masterful.
I love the use of tales of symphonia’s fight against Yggdrasil. The game needs way more love. Thank you for using it as an example in your video
Man... I've been doing 4 Job Fiesta on FF5 and Galuf's passing still makes me tear up. Also FF5 has another one somewhat unwinnable fight, the first Abductor where you fight it with only Bartz, you're supposed to lose but you CAN win to then have a chest, upon opening it, it releases a sleeping gas to then proceed with the game.
The E.M.M.I reminds me of the space pirates during the stealth part of Zero Mission.
I think he should've put a spoiler warning. I mean sure, the game is old, and the story also... isn't good, but Galuf's last stand was still one of the more memorable moments that should be experienced unspoiled.
@@kentknightofcaelin4537 wdym not good? We have a pecking DBZ fight between Exdeath and Ghido!
I can think of two examples. First, the ending of Crisis Core FFVII, which feels a lot like the ending of Halo Reach and also makes me sad when I think about it. Second, and not really impossible (and more of a mini boss,) is Mr. Shakedown from Yakuza 0, who will wander the overworld at all times with a ton of money on him, and if he sees you he's coming for your money next. While not impossible, his attack patterns are just weird enough that someone playing the game for the first time is gonna struggle to avoid getting hit, and getting hit likely means death. However, any money he takes from you is added to what he carries, and if you beat him you can take everything he's got in return. You can also find him sleeping in the overworld, and if you're careful you can rob him in his sleep. Or if you git gud enough to beat him consistently, you can get the upgrade that makes him multiply any money he takes from you by 1.3 and cycle winning and intentionally losing to grind money.
One thing about Crisis Core is that most people who play the game is familiar with the story from FFVII, so they know how that battle is going to end. That sets the player up for an impossible last stand mentality before it even begins.
I've just discovered your channel. I love it so much, TY !!