It wasn't like a counter or anything, it's the fact that even though you could kill parts of him, their targeting never went away, so while the first round would guarantee two parts would be destroyed, the fact those defeated parts were still targeted and Rapidfire is randomized for targeting meant the move became less effective as the fight went on. You could have Neo ExDeath down to his last part, and watch as all eight hits "missed" him because they kept trying to hit the defeated parts instead of what remained, and that I felt was a great trick because it forced you to play differently.
It sometimes still works out better than more conventional RPGs. My usual gripe is that most of the final boss battles are pretty easy if you utilize support/debuff magic, but since very few bosses in the main game ever require that strategy, it can feel daunting when you tackle a final boss. Even still, in recent memories, I've yet to have a SaGa final boss for me that didn't end with me barely winning with the skin of my teeth.Sadly though, it is really inconsistent through the series, sometimes via intention and sometimes due to bugs/oversight. Saruin in RS1 has the potential to be an absolute monster of a boss and was intended to also be the game's super boss if you gave him the Obsidian Sword, but his poor AI and any form of water immunity render the fight completely negligible. The same is largely true of the final boss in RS3, as it was also designed as both the normal final boss and super boss, depending on player action, but they forgot to work with hp thresholds and most of the 'super' form of the boss fight can just be skipped. . _. That said, some of the Frontier bosses were well done and have solid gimmicks, like one swapping between physical and magical resistance or another gaining strength as you kill off its minions. But, yeah, on the whole I feel SaGa has done final bosses better.Originally Posted by Wolf Kanno
The Egg alone was just a nightmare since several of it's attacks hit your LP directly, so you really do only have a limited amount of time to taken them down or the battle is utterly lost. The Seven Heroes were just a nightmare because you would sometimes discover too late that while trying to build a proper defense for their early phases, they would pull off a few killer special moves late in the battle you would not be prepared for. Of anything, I appreciate the fact that the SaGa final bosses really feel more like endurance matches similar to Cloud of Darkness in the Famicom version, where the tension is really hoping you don't run out of SP/MP before the final boss goes down.
I've never been fond of them to be honest, I think a lot of that stems from how they are built nowadays. In contrast to my last paragraph, I don't like them being built as endurance matches. By which I mean I hate when an optional boss is sporting millions of hp just to drag the fight on. I also hate when the game creates special moves specifically to deal with the optional bosses because I often feel it skews the game's challenge overall. I often find that part of the reason some final bosses are so weak is because I get easy access to skills or abilities that are really designed for the optional challenges. Final Fantasy is especially egregious about this but other series are just as guilty.How do you all feel about super bosses relative to final bosses?
The other type of superboss I find annoying is just the ones that have a very specific pattern, so as long as you know the pattern, you can almost guarantee victory. It's exciting the first time going in blind, but once you know the trick, they become easy prey afterwards.
I feel that's why I really love Omega and Shinryu in FFV, because both fights are really more about utilizing the tools available to win, and likewise, the battles are going to be fast one way or the other and never drag on. Omega is about knowing your abilities while Shinryu is about equipping your party well to cover weaknesses. Even though Omega even requires a pretty game breaking special to beat him, as I mentioned above, Neo ExDeath has defenses in place to keep it from breaking him. Other than that, I prefer optional superbosses in games like the Souls series or Bloodborne since they're more skilled based along with equipment, so victory is never always guaranteed unless you just become a zen master of the game.