The meaning of this Project was to take a deep dive into what makes bosses memorable, and the thought process behind creating one.
Then, using the principles that were learnt, I created a Boss Fight and the Atmosphere surrounding it inside one of my spare time projects.
In this project we dive into what a boss fight is, and how to make them interesting and memorable. We define a boss as an ultimate climax of both story and mechanics, testing what the player has learnt so far, and by establishing the foundation of what makes a boss fight; with theme, movesets, environment, build-up and story we create a practical example inside a pre-built game project. To do this we take inspiration from the pioneering game series of the genre, Dark Souls, and explore how they define what a good boss fight is, as well as how they approach the importance of movests and themes.
We also establish some of the more common mistakes with creating bosses which can lead to a bad experience. By missing any of the core pillars the fight might seem lacking or bland without depth, and without a way to tie the boss to simpler concepts or themes the fight will be easily forgotten.
By following these set principles and avoiding the common mistakes by analyzing 3 boss examples, we’re left with a boss complete with their own arena, music, storytelling, and has 17 different attack chains, 2 distinctly different phases with a middle phase, compelling VFX and a functional AI which is built to remove repetition and adapt to circumstances such as the distance from the player. The fight itself was perceived as challenging and visually impressive by 4 testers, where one was able to give ample feedback about mechanics due to their varying experience in harder boss fights.
While most of the responses were positive, some negative feedback was gathered; namely that the engine could sometimes not handle the amount of visual effects present, and that certain style choices could be seen as bland. These problems were traced down to the practical example being an un-optimised solution meant to be done by a deadline, and that the environment could have been more visually impressive in the 2nd phase. This could however conflict with feedback from the experienced tester who commented that the environment wasn’t too visually distracting.
Overall the project is deemed a success, by defining the boss fight structure and creating a practical example with the majority of responses being positive. Participants were observed to be having fun when testing and impressed at the grand scale of the project, and were accurately able to bond the fight to simpler themes and ideas that can more easily be memorized. It is however of note that the testing process could have been done much better, with online testing or more random stick samples a wider range of testers could have been gathered to provide a larger test group and more generalizable results.
Lastly, the project serves as a proof of concept at a larger global scale; showing how boss fights are made and how to make them better. As the project is concluded we come to the conclusion that it cannot be continued by a single person anymore, as the scale of the game grows too large.