spoilers How Big of a Difference is Needed?

[Rezanta 373]

Alright folks, it's time we get serious. There's a boss on these here forums, and we need to figure out... Is the intro the same as a common encounter? Do they need to be? Well, let's come to a consensus and go from there, right? (List is from my opinions, please don't hurt me.)

 

Atmosphere

As it looks in today's games, whether it be as subtle as Undertale, as drastic as Bowser, cunning as Eggman, brutal as Ganon, there's always five ingredients to a boss encounter. Music, which has to fit the mood and style of the boss at bare minimum. In the case of multiple bosses, whether it be the Chaotic Gore Magala from Monster Hunter 4 Ultimate or the Axem Rangers, it has to sum up all the parts. For example, The Chaotic Gore's theme is its own theme mashed up with its counterparts Gore and Shagaru Magalas, and plays with the power that it has as you try to take on a frenzied, infectious dragon. The next ingredient is location. Undertale has the habit of placing bosses in their home field, like Papyrus in Snowdin and Undyne in the caverns. The feeling both give reflects how you, the player, are treated by them before the encounter. Papyrus will react in either a scared or pompous demeanor when he decides to spare/subdue you. In Undyne's case, she hunts you down before cornering you multiple times, finally going all out in a flurry of spears or by lifting a boulder. The third is surprisingly timing. Does the boss you encounter attack right off the bat? Does the boss never show themselves until the end? Well, either way you look at it, some, like N from Pokémon Black and White and Eggman from Sonic, start their final assault with a subtle first encounter, measuring your strength and wits at the beginning, to test if you have your bearings. Then, in the end, a full on assault is launched as you start your last fight with them. (This is a bit of an overstatement for Pokémon, but then again, having stairs plow through a building wasn't exactly something small scaled when a castle towered over the Unova League.) The next is style. Is it a simple jump, a swing, a Rev-Roll? Only the style of the boss will tell you how to approach the situation. The last ingredient is portrayal. All games use this, even the ones we make to show the MC's obstacle they must overcome. Examples can be Sora's experience in fighting everything to Xemnas in Kingdom Hearts II, or your gain in knowledge and strategy in Mean Bean Machine.

 

Idealism/View/Goal

Regardless of the game, there is a goal that will be reached. All the protagonist does is sway it into their favor when there's some powerful enemy involved. An example from my game, Dark Tides, comes from Xerian and Xex. While Xerian wants to gain that "ultimate power" he's been trying to achieve by summoning the World's Edge, and Xex wants to find the answer to how the world can be reformed, the heros stop both while learning both how the constant cycle of life will keep reshaping where they live, indirectly showing that their adaptations lead the their highest potential without aid from an unworldly entity. Other examples come from Eggman's obsession for world domination, or Gruntilda's attempt to become beautiful again. Another great example comes from Darkrai from Pokémon Mystery Dungeon: Explorers of Time/Darkness/Sky and Dark Matter from Pokémon Super Mystery Dungeon. In the long run to achieve dominance, Darkrai causing Dialga to become aggressive and cause time to slowly slide into a standstill, and while Dark Matter was simply a collection of negativity from everything living in the world, it had tried to crash the Tree of Life AND the planet into the sun. Talk about large goals that almost succeeded if it wasn't for their defeats. I would state Kingdom Hearts' overall story as an example, but there would be a week's worth of typing to do at that point.

 

Role

Moving on, every antagonist has a role. The Fairy God Mother from Shrek 2 wanted Prince Charming to be married to Fiona, and let's not forget games like Asura's Wrath. (I'm just going to keep to my cup of tea. There's way too much going for AW that I wouldn't finish this XD) Xemnas, Bowser, Sephiroth, The Ghost (Chameleon Twist), Spooky (Pac-Man World 2), the list just rolls off our screens. Something that always stands out to me, however, is that their role is used through the entire story. Technically speaking, these roles normally only benefit the "creator" of said role, but in some cases, like in Lok's Quest, the roles were to try and help in the end.

 

Entry

Flashing screens, eerie music, scolding the player for cheating, breaking the fourth wall... Giygas! Every single boss had some entry that made them unique, outstanding, and/or fitting for the encounter, whether it be Team Rocket's multiple encounter or the Koopalings. I gotta hand it to game developers here, this is normally how they sell some of their games in some scenarios, and more importantly, give you your bill for learning the game to that point. Hope you have cash/Rupees/Coins/Rings/Souls ready!

 

These are what I felt are primarily used to introduce bosses, and while I tend to simply use the story to go "Oh hey, see me? Yeah, I'm the head honcho in these parts. Let's tussle." kind of route, I wonder if I need to spend a portion of my game just letting the antagonists be them, give them the keys to the screen time, and go from there. What are your thoughts?

[lonequeso 1,921]

It really depends on the story whether or not the main antagonist appears before the final battle. I prefer them to have an active role in story. I'm big on character development so I like seeing a character that has more than one dimension to him. Now if a game isn't driven by story, that simple one dimensional antagonist is fine. In Super Mario, you don't need a detailed history showing Bowers's motivations or scenes to brewing out his personality. That's not what the game is about. The story is only there to provide the player with a clear objective.

 

Final boss fights are usually the climax of the story so the atmosphere needs to be properly built with all the stuff you mentioned. If you're going to have a big epic boss fight in a game, then you need to project that feeling to the player. The climax is the highest point of action so it needs the most build up. 

[Kayzee 4,032]

Well, first of all I think there is a clear difference between a 'boss' and an 'antagonist'. The two overlap quite often, but a boss is a gameplay concept while an antagonist is a story concept. I think it's important at times to realize that the two ideas serve different functions. A boss is a interesting gameplay challenge or 'final exam' of what you know, where as an antagonist gives the hero a foil in the story and drives the plot. There are times where the gameplay will call for a boss encounter that doesn't mesh well with your story as written and other times where the story calls for an antagonist that doesn't really make a very compelling boss encounter. There are other times where boss encounters and story antagonists reinforce each other very well, giving a boss encounter context while allowing an antagonist to show off their personality.

 

Let's look at a few examples from Undertale, since it's a popular game and everyone has played it already. You have played it already right? Right, so I don't have to worry about spoilers.

 

Okay, first example, everyone's favorite spider, Muffet! Perhaps there are better examples, maybe the Mad Dummy or some of the secret encounters, but either way some people might have noticed that in terms of story Muffet really has very little to do with anything. Not that she isn't well designed or doesn't have a plot, but in a game where most boss encounters have subtle storytelling Muffet stands out as one of the more gameplay focused bosses. Fun and neat but shows up and does her thing out of nowhere with only a bit of foreshadowing or plot details and doesn't really do much to effect the plot going forward.

 

On the opposite extreme, we have the Fallen Child, the demon that comes when people call its name, known by the True Name as Chara. You never fight Chara in Undertale. By even getting to the point where you have an opportunity meet them face to face you have given them enough power to be unstoppable, and they basically exist to punish the player for their sins. Oh sure, one could imagine coming up with a boss encounter for them just for the sake of having one and there have been several fan battles to that effect, but that's not the type of antagonist Chara is. Fighting them in a boss encounter would defeat the whole point.

 

Lastly, Undertale has quite a few encounters where the boss fight and the character reinforce each other. Flowey is probobly the stand out example in many ways, his twisted 'omega' form being a reflection of his twisted nature while also offering insight into a few characters we otherwise know next to nothing about. His 'real' form is also reflective of his personality, his flashy rainbow attacks also show that under it all he really is a child after all. Another stand out example might be Sans. If you fight Sans he goes all out, breaks every rule and uses every trick he can, doing everything he can to if not make you gave up then at least slow you down. It's a hectic challenging gauntlet and reflects his reasons for fighting you very well.

 

This isn't to say any of these examples are really better then the others, they just serve different functions. A interesting and fun boss that just exists mostly for gameplay isn't a bad thing if the gameplay is compelling. An antagonist who isn't encountered as a boss or makes a weak or boring boss isn't a bad thing if the story behind it is compelling. Using both to reinforce each other is probobly the best option, but it isn't always possible or easy without making compromises somewhere. In addition some games are particularly better suited to do so then others. Undertale for example allows for a lot of mutual reinforcement because of how it's battle system works, both in terms of the act mechanics getting players to pay attention to details and in terms of the bullet patterns usually reflecting something about the characters. Most games though don't have quite that flow between story and gameplay.

 

So how well does this help answer the original question of how to introduce a boss? I donno, but I think it shows that the question should be rephrased a bit. Or rather, we really can break it down to a few other questions:

1. How do we introduce a well done and memorable antagonist to the story?
2. How do we stage a boss encounter event for maximum impact?
3. How should we work out the ideal relationship between the gameplay of any given boss encounter and the story of any given antagonist?
4. How should we decide when a game calls for a particular type of boss battle and when a story calls for a particular type of antagonist and work out what to do when these two don't match?

I think it's more productive to think in these terms rather then trying to mix everything up as one question. But maybe that's just me.

Edited October 5, 2017 by Kayzee