toblix

Minish Cap

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Well that's understandable, but I think veering away from the point of giving a game up with contempt because a boss couldn't be beaten in a couple of attempts. I mean, no shit? It's meant to be the climax of the game; it's designed to be hard and to be challenging. Hitting the balance can be difficult and some games have shit endings because of it, but Zelda gets it right most of the time. :eek:

Bosses have traditionally always murdered you a few times before you work out their attack pattern anyway, at which point it suddenly becomes quite easy. Not being able to kill them without wasting a few lives is intentional. This is doubly true in Zelda games where usually all the bosses are exceedingly easy if you spot the trick or technique for killing them (Pulling on the dragon's tail in Wind Waker's first boss, anyone?!).

What you said doesn't ring home with me though, miffy. I always feel compelled to blast my way through that final chapter, and usually can't get back to it quickly enough. Guess everyone has their own tastes, though. Toblix evidently likes to not have any challenge there whatsoever and to just waltz through the game at the same difficulty level throughout. :fart:

I might sound a bit venty here, but it saddens me that you give up so many high-quality games for such pissy reasons toblix. It seems that nothing is capable of pleasing you, no matter how legendary and/or great it is.

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Yeah, it's just that I always end up playing so late and I'm never sure if I'll have time to beat the boss and still get a decent amount of sleep. Then whenever I get the urge to go back and finish, it's pretty late again and I just decide (again) to sleep instead. I really should go beat Gears, Dead Rising, and Paper Mario though. Maybe that's a project for the latter half of this week.

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You seem to have extraordinary expectations from a game, toblix. I mean, what? You just implied that defeating a boss in one or two lives is to be expected.

Well, since I had only died once before I was sort of expecting it.

I don't know about you, but games have always been pretty hard. You die in them -- a lot. I don't think I can recall any game I've played in recent history where I haven't died a whole bunch of times

Yeah, but dying isn't the problem. Being forced to replay a boss fight, the very nature of which is repetitive action, is.

But that's what makes it so satisfying to kill them, when after the 8th try and the prospect of going right back to the beginning looms, you get that killer blow in just in time.

Yeah, I got that. Then I ran back through the dungeon and was attacked by the next form. And died. And had to start all over.

To give up and deem the game and its unreleased 'sequel' because you can't kill its end boss in one or two tries seems like a seriously stupid thing to do.

Yeah, I can see that. I'm already itching to try this boss again, though, and I'll definitely get Phantom Hourglass. I always say I'll never try again, but then I do anyway. Except with that fucking piece of shit Trauma Center.

I can see why you seem to basically like no game. You don't seem to enjoy what makes a game a game. :fart:

So a game is something that forces you to try the same thing over and over again? Or are you making a comment based on other stuff I've said, too?

The player will expect to see the end soon, and being bogged down for hours by some annoying fight isn't doing anyone any good.

I agree with this. Still, I can see both angles here: "Easy boss" makes for a smooth, fun ending for me. "Hard boss" makes for much work with high feeling of delicious achievement for others.

[...]but a lengthy and epic fight is a great way to end a game.
Obviously the ending should be epic, and it could be hard to reach. But it shouldn't force the player to play through the exact same thing over and over just to perfect some pattern.
Metal Gear Solid 3 for example has a 'boss fight' that lasts absolutely ages and has like four stages. Each stage is incredibly different though, and in fact thanks to an inspired chase scene in the middle takes place over like a mile radius in the game world.
That sounds totally awesome. Do you have to start all over if you die, though?
Another good example is the Wind Waker boss, which takes a whole bunch of different forms and occurs all over the castle it's set in, finalising on the roof. Again, beautifully done and it just seems right (Like most of the game!!!!!).
Again, awesome. Again, repetitive shit?

I have to repeat that when I complain about a game that suddenly gets hard I always exaggerate my hate for it. I'll definitely try again, but like with that shit game Trauma Center, every time I fail I wait a bit longer, and then other games come along, and then... fuck that.

Also, I want to repeat that I also like some games.

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MGS3 and Wind Waker both split the end bosses into bits, so you're not thrown too far back if you do die but you go far enough back for there to be an incentive to not take it too easy. MGS3 probably hits the balance best, since the four (I think) parts that make up the total encounter can be saved as an area and you just go to the beginning of that area if you reload/die.

I think technology does have a role, though. I mean with Minish Cap there really can't be that much they can do to make it interesting, so difficulty is ramped up to make it seem worthy of being called "end-of-game boss". Newer games tend to have much more interesting boss fights that you don't mind being hard so much as they're so beautiful/exciting.

I really can't see how Minish Cap could even begin to make a boss battle truly exciting, and I not many games from the SNES (and before) era managed it to too well either, despite it being the prime of mid-level/end-of-world/end-of-game boss fights.

Clearly what we need is a return to the days of games never ending and just becoming impossibly hard so neither party can be happy! :tup:

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Yeah, I see that there's not much else in the way of negative feedback from the game than taking away health. I find puzzly boss fights, like in SotC, a lot more interesting, but I guess there's a limit for that, both in terms of technology and Zelda tradition. Anyway, something I just thought off that really pisses me off is that when I have died, I can't just start over. I have to travel all the way back to that witch to buy more potions. And I guess I may run out of money too, so I have to grind to be able to continue where I left off. That's just terrible.

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Although, couldn't I just restart the DS when I die and then reload with the potions I had when I saved?

Anyway, it doesn't matter as I tried it again, and completed the game. Not a big fan of the end boss, but the game overall is totally excellent.

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