Did anyone mention "The Nothing". That's a scary opponent. You can't even hit it between the eyes. Video of reference.
The Nothing was also my first though when I read the OP.
Any existence-negating "force of nature" offers possibilities as a supreme villain. I have a home-brew RPG setting with insects that literally eat reality. Transformers has a robot planet in Unicron that involves a similar concept. Another example might be something like Marvel's Galactus, depending on whether you consider him effectively a god or something else.
Power creep over a game's lifetime and the desire to make a player feel "epic" are inevitable factors in what makes a compelling ultimate villain. When the player has been killing demons, vampires, and mad wizards, it's hard to "go back" (the typical way of doing so is to make the boss a "bigger" version of something weaker, or to have him/her/it empowered by some powerful artifact or substance).
I personally like the Serpentor concept -- a character made from the souls, "essence", or DNA of several of the setting's deceased past heroes and villains and possessing their personalities and powers -- and am surprised it isn't used more often ... particularly if the setup is really good, where the game places a heavy emphasis on the setting's history.
For the OP; One area that I'd explore is insects. Starship Troopers (movie) used insect form creatures very effectively as a villainous race. Since they have great diversity in forms, there are plenty of ways they could be utilized from an artistic perspective ranging from flyers to underground dwellers.
Also, there's something eerie, almost unnatural or alien, about insects. This opens up potential for backstory or lore. Is their origin extra-terrestrial, or perhaps magically derived from some ancient form of demonism? Maybe some lost race that's been hidden from awareness and they've been multiplying to where they number in the millions and are now ready to re-take their position as rulers of the world?
Sounds corny, I admit. But it could make for some sweet game box-art.
Ken Fisher - Semi retired old fart Network Administrator, now working in Network Security. I don't Forum PVP. If you feel I've attacked you, it was probably by accident. When I don't understand, I ask. Such is not intended as criticism.
It doesn't even have to be a unique creature. Perhaps an evil god of some sorts. At times, I find myself wishing for a Dragonlance or a Forgotten Realms mmo.
"For the Angel of Death spread his wings on the blast, And breathed in the face of the foe as he passed: And the eyes of the sleepers waxed deadly and chill, And their hearts but once heaved, and for ever grew still!" ~Lord George Gordon Byron
What about a zombie dragon? Or a Dragon with a zombie army. Or a cheeseburger with double zombie.
Maybe a Kraken, doing the overgrown Mindflayer from Dungeons and Dragons thing. Lots of arms symbolising it meddling in many things, a huge brain, psychic powers/hive mind, scary looks.
What about a zombie dragon? Or a Dragon with a zombie army. Or a cheeseburger with double zombie.
Maybe a Kraken, doing the overgrown Mindflayer from Dungeons and Dragons thing. Lots of arms symbolising it meddling in many things, a huge brain, psychic powers/hive mind, scary looks.
Guessing you havent played GW2 then. The main boss is a zombie dragon, with a zombie army.
What about a zombie dragon? Or a Dragon with a zombie army. Or a cheeseburger with double zombie.
Maybe a Kraken, doing the overgrown Mindflayer from Dungeons and Dragons thing. Lots of arms symbolising it meddling in many things, a huge brain, psychic powers/hive mind, scary looks.
Guessing you havent played GW2 then. The main boss is a zombie dragon, with a zombie army.
GW 2, where you assemble at Fort Trinity, to fight the dragon Zhaitan.
It´s the Chistian God vs the Red Dragon Satan ripoff isn't it.
At least not as tasteless as Diablo 3, where an Archangel descends to take human form and by his acts ascends to heaven where he will be their king.
Fallen Archangel Lucifer trying to say he is Jesus isn't it?
I guess these things are just pointing to the fact that gameindustry, and hollywood, are suffering from a lack of creativity and imagination also. They go through everything and turn it into junkfood.
Nothing is Holy they say. Why don't they say that they turn everything into shit, thats a much more correct explanation. Instead of them insinuating by their statement that they are improving upon things. But all they take in comes out their behind doesn't it.
I think the issue with getting enouugh good boss fights isn't nescessarily in the boss itself. It's that the player isn't forced to fight at a disadvantage often enough. usually you got something in a deep dark dungeon (more often then not placed there by someone) where it isn't at it's best. and the player often gets oplenty of ability to combat the boss provisons and information wise on the way in. so put the player to start with at an extreem disadvantage and even the weakest of bosses become formidable, and the strongest become near impossible....
Have a player fight a dragon on a craggy volcanic mountain top where the dragon can land unimpeaded and have the advantage of the sky and cover of clouds, but the player is hard pressed to take a step without falling to grievous injury or death. But the player can hardly hold still either seathing vents sometimes spew scorching gas and the player is forced to move from crag to crag while dealing with the terror above. The player may have to use the vents and jumping away from them in good timming to get the dragon to stop attempting aerial asaults and finally land so the real fight can begin.
Or a giant funnel spider in a seemingly endlessly deep and dark pit fall lined with web. With only some foot and hand holds and the odd ledge here and there to hold onto. As the player slowly decends. the spider comes in from above. Hitting it is almost no better then not hitting it as doing so knocks its young brood off of it's body and onto the player and the surrounding wall where they themselves become very agressive. The player could find shallow alcoves in the wall that let's them take a better stance again little ones comming in and prevents the momma from getting anything more then a barbed spear like leg in.
Maybe the player falls through the ice when it is drifting and smashing together before parting again in pockets, and the player can come up to gasp for air but a strange turblence in the waters keep these pockets onlky open briefly enough to do just that lest the player be crushed between to great masses of ice, and diving back down after each breath eventually the source of the comotion above is realized as the player is confronted by a Kracken. Luckily the player knew the dangers of the area and brought some sort of way to briefly breath under water... better defeat it before supplies run out.
The best 'Boss trick' should really only give the player a chance at not dying. rather then completely turning the tables. and as shown above the environment in which these epic battles take place should be to the boss advantage. When a player leaves a dungeon barely alive, scared of agressive low level monsters because it only takes a light tap at that point for them to keel over...the thought shouldn't be "Yeah ima wait till it respawns and run it again!"...rather it should be "What the hell was i thinking! I am NEVER coming back to this dungeon with anything short of an army!"
I think a god would be a good idea. Think along the lines of mythology where gods use humans like puppets in their fights against other gods etc but have it set in an era where humanity is at its peak of power. They try to free themselves and results in a war against their creator while at the same time the other gods are trying to take advantage of this. Do results in deitys being the main power. Think morrowind last boss battle.
come to think of it 8-16 bit bosses scared me more then any since...they often took up most the screen or made most of it unusable. leaving sometimes almost no way to avoid being half healthed or more, and often leaving split second opertunities of attack 9on the good ones any way, like some of the NES ninja Gaidens, like vetorman boss levels's as well, especially number 2).
I would like to see the legion boss from castlevania in a MMORPG. It is a very enjoyable boss if you know the mechanics from the Castlevania games.
+1
Can we get some platform style bosses in MMORPGs? Ones where you have to find weak spots and look for opportunities to attack? Balore(Giant man in a prison) or Andrameleck(Demon Goat thingy) would be perfect candidates for this as well.
I played WoW up until WotLK, played RoM for 2 years and now Rift. I am F2P player. I support games when I feel they deserve my money and I want the items enough. I don't troll, and I don't take kindly to trolls.
Comments
How about this dragon?
http://imageshack.us/a/img543/7426/gkbpaf2.png
It's called a Sabre Dragon in the game, Baten Kaitos.
The Nothing was also my first though when I read the OP.
Any existence-negating "force of nature" offers possibilities as a supreme villain. I have a home-brew RPG setting with insects that literally eat reality. Transformers has a robot planet in Unicron that involves a similar concept. Another example might be something like Marvel's Galactus, depending on whether you consider him effectively a god or something else.
Power creep over a game's lifetime and the desire to make a player feel "epic" are inevitable factors in what makes a compelling ultimate villain. When the player has been killing demons, vampires, and mad wizards, it's hard to "go back" (the typical way of doing so is to make the boss a "bigger" version of something weaker, or to have him/her/it empowered by some powerful artifact or substance).
I personally like the Serpentor concept -- a character made from the souls, "essence", or DNA of several of the setting's deceased past heroes and villains and possessing their personalities and powers -- and am surprised it isn't used more often ... particularly if the setup is really good, where the game places a heavy emphasis on the setting's history.
For the OP; One area that I'd explore is insects. Starship Troopers (movie) used insect form creatures very effectively as a villainous race. Since they have great diversity in forms, there are plenty of ways they could be utilized from an artistic perspective ranging from flyers to underground dwellers.
Also, there's something eerie, almost unnatural or alien, about insects. This opens up potential for backstory or lore. Is their origin extra-terrestrial, or perhaps magically derived from some ancient form of demonism? Maybe some lost race that's been hidden from awareness and they've been multiplying to where they number in the millions and are now ready to re-take their position as rulers of the world?
Sounds corny, I admit. But it could make for some sweet game box-art.
"For the Angel of Death spread his wings on the blast,
And breathed in the face of the foe as he passed:
And the eyes of the sleepers waxed deadly and chill,
And their hearts but once heaved, and for ever grew still!"
~Lord George Gordon Byron
What about a zombie dragon? Or a Dragon with a zombie army. Or a cheeseburger with double zombie.
Maybe a Kraken, doing the overgrown Mindflayer from Dungeons and Dragons thing. Lots of arms symbolising it meddling in many things, a huge brain, psychic powers/hive mind, scary looks.
Or maybe a japanese Tanuki? A racoon like spirit that would teabag you with it's giant testicles.
Tanuki
Now that just aint right to die like that, just aint right.
Edit: More Tanuki.
A flesh eating virus?
Or angels like in Tales of Symphonia where they turn out to be the bad guys.
Guessing you havent played GW2 then. The main boss is a zombie dragon, with a zombie army.
GW 2, where you assemble at Fort Trinity, to fight the dragon Zhaitan.
It´s the Chistian God vs the Red Dragon Satan ripoff isn't it.
At least not as tasteless as Diablo 3, where an Archangel descends to take human form and by his acts ascends to heaven where he will be their king.
Fallen Archangel Lucifer trying to say he is Jesus isn't it?
I guess these things are just pointing to the fact that gameindustry, and hollywood, are suffering from a lack of creativity and imagination also. They go through everything and turn it into junkfood.
Nothing is Holy they say. Why don't they say that they turn everything into shit, thats a much more correct explanation. Instead of them insinuating by their statement that they are improving upon things. But all they take in comes out their behind doesn't it.
If it has to be the big bad, conscious, evil villain, Elementals, demi gods, sphinxes, maybe wendingo.
If it can be a senseless evil creature, Leviathans and other big savage creatures.
I think the issue with getting enouugh good boss fights isn't nescessarily in the boss itself. It's that the player isn't forced to fight at a disadvantage often enough. usually you got something in a deep dark dungeon (more often then not placed there by someone) where it isn't at it's best. and the player often gets oplenty of ability to combat the boss provisons and information wise on the way in. so put the player to start with at an extreem disadvantage and even the weakest of bosses become formidable, and the strongest become near impossible....
Probably Cthulhu or other Lovecraft Mythos entities. Dagon might make an appearance in there somewhere.
I can not remember winning or losing a single debate on the internet.
I would like to see the legion boss from castlevania in a MMORPG. It is a very enjoyable boss if you know the mechanics from the Castlevania games.
+1
Can we get some platform style bosses in MMORPGs? Ones where you have to find weak spots and look for opportunities to attack? Balore(Giant man in a prison) or Andrameleck(Demon Goat thingy) would be perfect candidates for this as well.
I played WoW up until WotLK, played RoM for 2 years and now Rift.
I am F2P player. I support games when I feel they deserve my money and I want the items enough.
I don't troll, and I don't take kindly to trolls.
FFXI does. Then again everything in that game is better than others.
A reader lives a thousand lives before he dies, the man who never reads lives only one.
We will always remember your sacrifice, Louisoux!
The Phraints from Arduin.
Otherwise, Brain slugs, Futurama sytle
.
http://trialsofascension.com