Summary
While gaming had been around for more than a decade, the 90s saw the introduction of more complex and adventurous formats, allowing narratives to expand, and gameplay to advance. With such progression in mind, there is no better place to chart this evolution than through the bosses that made for challenging tests of might.
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Without years of market research to determine what players enjoyed, bosses in the 90s could be unforgiving, complicated, and wholly punishing for the average player, but many have retrospectively become favorites within the community.
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The final boss of the spin-off entry in Midway’shell-meets-sci-fifranchise, Mother Demon, is a challenging enemy that turns the incredibly powerful Doomguy into prey for one of the dimension’s most powerful beasts.
The Mother Demon is only powerful if players haven’t collected three keys, which dramatically decreases difficulty. With this in mind, Mother Demon, with her flame attacks and high speed, is not the most challenging opponent, but for the uninitiated, she can pack a real punch.
Wolfenstein 3Dsends players to end the mechanically enhanced dictator themselves, tasking them with fighting through waves of comically irritating officers before arriving at the final boss fight of the original game.
Mecha-Hitler is a tough opponent, making use of two phases to gradually whittle away his health to nothing, which forces players to remain vigilant regarding their ammunition and health.With continuous modern advancementsin games,Wolfenstein 3Dmay not be as groundbreaking as it once was, but the challenging final boss is still a tough encounter to overcome.
Summarizing the Nemesisas a difficult boss fight is as challenging as toppling the undead giant in Capcom’sResident Evil 3. Jill faces this hulking monster on multiple occasions, each with new environments and events that vary the fight with the Nemesis greatly.
Overall, Nemesis proves to be both excruciatingly difficult (such as at The Clocktower) and relatively easy (like with his first appearance), and so, as a result, Nemesis averages out to be a threatening, but not altogether impossible, boss fight.
Sega’s venerated turn-based tactical medieval gameShining Forceoccupies a unique place in gaming history, experimenting with new forms that gave players many fresh enemies to defeat. Among them are the Silver Knight and his weapon, the Laser Eye.
Technically only an addition to the fight, the Laser Eye is the real kicker, capable of blasting the path with enormous destructive potential and punishing players who rush forward with gusto, as would be expected in the game.
It would make sense for the hardest enemy in the originalMortal Kombatto be the final boss, Shang Tsung, but in reality, it is his half-man, half-dragon subordinate whodominates the arcade fighter.
Immune to throwing attacks, and able to spew fire and jump to enormous heights, Goro is a suitably challenging opponent for players, given his status as the victor of the previous nine Mortal Kombat tournaments. In the game, he proves to be a worthy miniboss blocking the way to his master.
Psycho Mantis' boss fight is the stuff of legend, with its difficulty lying not in high health or challenging mechanics, but the unusual approach Kojima took in crafting a memorable,creepy, and tough encounter.
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Players might expect sharp instincts or accurate gunfire to be key to the defeat of Psycho Mantis, but in reality, this psychic is more of a puzzle, relying on unplugging controllers, mimicking lost signals, and a general understanding that Kojima has crafted a boss to which convention does not apply.
From the first moments of his fight, M. Bison delivers a merciless string of aggressive moves that make every previous opponent inStreet Fighter 2look easy in comparison. Whether it be his signature psycho crusher move, or simply the high speed at which he attacks, Bison is a force to be reckoned with.
With competitive arcade machines seeing new popularity at the time of release, Bison was given a high difficulty when other games would stay reserved for fear of alienating players. With this in mind, the Shadaloo Crime Syndicate head is anotoriously difficult opponentin the history of gaming.
Sonic The Hedgehog 2’s Death Egg Zone plays an important role in the overwhelming difficulty of the Death Egg Robot and its controller, the villainous Dr. Eggman. The lack of rings means there is no backup if Sonic is defeated, and as a result, the Death Egg Robot must be slain in one stressful session.
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A collection of moves that punish camping placements or randomness, Death Egg Robot is capable of flight and launching projectiles that will end the boss fight as soon as it has begun. When compared to other bosses in the game, Death Egg’s status as a winner-takes-all fight, andharsh speed, make for a devious boss.
One of the two superboss weapons inFinal Fantasy 7, Emerald Weapon and its sibling Ruby Weapon, can already be considered powerful challenges from that title alone, and offera bigger foethan the main enemies of the game.
What makes Emerald an exceedingly more devastating opponent is its location: at the bottom of the sea. With a time limit of 20 minutes and a move that punishes players that equip more underwater materia (which allows them to remain underwater longer), Emerald Weapon is nothing short of the biggest challenge inFinal Fantasy 7.
Kerafyrm is one of the most powerful bosses of all time because he wasnever meantto be defeated. Instead, the all-powerful dragon was simply meant to decimate the chosen server ofEverquestand depart, never to return.
However, the last server to awaken Kerafyrm formed an alliance of guilds that collectively decided to slay the dragon, despite his instakill abilities and hundreds of millions of hit points. The fight was controversial given Kerafyrm’s despawn by the game masters (although he was later returned), and during the second attempt, nearly 200 players joined forces to defeat the boss for good.
