That One Boss...

[Wolf Kanno]

I've been reading too much of TV Tropes lately and was laughing my ass off in remembrance of the genre of gaming tropes known as "That One Boss"...

Basically its the Boss of the game that is not the Final Boss or some super powerful optional boss, it's just a regular boss who seems to be in a league of his own compared to everything else in the game and is insanely hard for one reason or another. The other clincher is that it is not a boss that has some trick to them unless its a trick you had no chance in hell of knowing about.

So who do you think is the most notorious "That One Boss" in gaming?

[qwertysaur]

Midboss

[Vermachtnis]

Matador, there's a reason he's the page picture on Atlus' very one One Boss page. He's in the middle of a hallway. The first time he catches you off guard and probably under leveled. And there is his Red Copote. Sig~H I hate that move. And he's only like the second boss.

[Jessweeee♪]

I may have spent at least 72 hours of my life reading the gaming tropes alone ;_;

[Raistlin]

FFT: Wiegraf. I remember the first time I played through it FFT seemed almost impossibly hard, though with age and experience I now have limited trouble with most of the game. That being said, Wiegraf is never easy.

Suikoden II: Luca Blight. This may be more of a "Wake Up Call Boss" according to that article (except you're not supposed to learn much from it; it's just surprising), but boy he was tough my first time through. Although I actually thought you had to defeat him with all three parties... yeah, shut up.

[Rase]

I may have spent at least 72 hours of my life reading the gaming tropes alone ;_;

This.

[Lawr]

[Markus. D]

That Lava Golem Boss Thing in Valkyrie Profile 2 gave me a scare the first time... in-fact, it lead to me restarting the game.

All of a sudden I should of been dealing at least 500 or so damage with each character, I needed to learn how to play xD!

[Kyros]

Suikoden II: Luca Blight. This may be more of a "Wake Up Call Boss" according to that article (except you're not supposed to learn much from it; it's just surprising), but boy he was tough my first time through. Although I actually thought you had to defeat him with all three parties... yeah, shut up.

I can agree with this lol

[blackmage_nuke]

Psycho Mantis

[Kyros]

the final fight vs Seymour in FFX was pretty annoying

[Wolf Kanno]

Sleeping Table from Persona 3...

Imagine this, its a game where exploiting elemental weaknesses grant you extra turns and thus strategy is a higher priority than brute force. The Sleeping Table has no elemental weakness, is immune to instant death and its three main offensive spells are Maragidyne (High Level Fire spell that targets all), Megidoloan (most powerful non-elemental all party hitting spell that cannot be reflected or defended), Mahamoan (High level, all hitting holy instand death spell with a great chance of actually landing), and then an evil combo where he inflicts a certain status spell that practically incapacitates your party and then the second spell will instant kill anyone inflicted with said status affliction. Did I forget to mention that if the main character gets killed its an automatic game over?

Throw in he has HP and the highest stats of any boss at this point in the game and you have pure frustration. Your only hope is to somehow land a critical hit with a physical hit just so you can have a round to heal. He was the most notorious boss in P3 and was so reviled by fans that Atlus decided to bring him back in P4 as the second to last boss of the game on the route for the True Ending...

[qwertysaur]

the final fight vs Seymour in FFX was pretty annoying

That fight is so easy. Summon the Aeon of the same element as his main attack, sheild Ultima, and overdrive before moving to the next Aeon.

[Rocket Edge]

I have a few:

Streets of Rage: There was these two twin girls on the boat who kept jumping around the place and were really hard to catch. Tough Stuff.

FFX: Seymour, on Gagazet.

FFX: Yunalesca, albeit after a couple of tries I got the hang of it.

I'll think of some more later, blanking out.

[Yeargdribble]

Nothing on this list compares to the above.

That said, half of the bosses in Demon's Souls so far fit into this category... especially if you try to play a melee class. I quickly learned to invest in some ranged goodness.