10 of the Hardest Bosses in Gaming!

For as long as there have been video games, there have been bosses. Some can be pathetic and undeserving of their title while others can be stressful, annoying, psychotically hard, carpal tunnel syndrome inducing bastards that grab you by the balls and say, “Hey…f@#$ you!”. I have encountered many of such monstrosities in my time and, as much as I’d hate to admit it, I have simply given up on a couple occasions and never looked back. So for those who have fought tooth and nail for hours and days on end to defeat these bosses, this list is for you.

Please keep in mind before reading on that:
1. These are mostly final boss’ and therefore, the article WILL more then likely contain spoilers.
2. There are so many bosses out there so to make the list NOT take my entire life to make, I’ve excluded handheld games.
3. This is my PERSONAL list. It is in no specific order and everyone will surely find at least one boss they believe should be included. I love to hear your contributions but please keep the negative comments to yourself.

Emerald Weapon – Final Fantasy VII

Final Fantasy 7 was an amazing game. Players can debate it all they want but it’s a fact that 7 is, and always will be, the most popular title in Squaresoft/Enix’s series. Near the end of the game a group of powerful monsters called, “Weapons” are released from the Earth and the last 3 become optional bosses for the player to confront. “Ruby Weapon” and “Emerald Weapon” are both extremely challenging unless you have the perfect setup and strategy.

Emerald being the harder of the two (Ultima Weapon, not so much). Emerald weapon is found under the Ocean, floating around and unless you do a special side mission before hand, a 30 minute timer will be included in the battle. It’s highly recommended that you get rid of that timer unless you have that previously mentioned setup and strategy. It is worth mentioning, however, that once you do have the perfect plan for Emerald, he can be beaten in minutes but to the players without that knowledge, especially when the game first came out in ’97, he was crazy hard.

King Bohan – Heavenly Sword

If this list was in any sort of order, King Bohan would definitely be near the top. Heavenly sword was a pretty unpopular game when it was released as one of the first for the PS3 but, to be honest, it’s not all that bad. It was one of the very first games and came with the first released of the PS3 as a bundle so it had it’s issues but it had some really neat dynamics that made it unique. The game itself wasn’t overly hard (minus a couple instances) but it was when you finally reached King Bohan in the midst of a war zone at the end that many players tossed their controllers at the TV.

The original fight with Bohan is difficult, but not impossible. It was when he sprouted demon wings and upped his game by about a thousand that things got rough. I had my best friend over fighting this guy for hours with no success. He was simply too fast, too strong…too impossible. I never beat him but to those who have, I congratulate you.

Adam the Clown – Dead Rising

Adam may be more of a personal thing for me but I’m sure there are a number of players out there who agree with me when I say this clown is a straight up piece of shit. He’s scary as hell and seems to be able to take clip after clip of bullets to the face without stopping.

Dead Rising offered a lot of really hard bosses and, for many, was more of a “kill some zombies in your spare time” type of game due to it’s constant ticking clock through, which meant you were constantly on a time limit but Adam was something else for sure. This clown would chase me around his dark little section of the mall with his chainsaws while I pissed myself, unloading everything I had in him. Dead Rising’s odd system allowed me to keep doing the same missions over and over to level up my character and eventually I came back and beat the living crap out of him. That was, of course, after much tiresome leveling.

Zeus – God of War 3

I went into God of War 3 expecting to have a few pretty difficult encounters throughout the story but Zeus was one of the most epic battles I’ve ever had. He was the perfect ending to the trilogy and proved to be quite the opponent. I didn’t exactly expect the God of all Gods to just let me beat him but he kicked the crap out of me quite a few times before I emerged victorious.

The battle takes on a couple different “phases” before you finally get the rewarding opportunity to have your with his face…with your FISTS! Nevertheless, Zeus was a hard guy for sure and I look forward to seeing how they plan on topping him in the next installment of the God of War series.

Kessler – Infamous

Kessler is only revealed in voice for a good portion of the game; hearing his rusty voice through recordings found throughout the city. When he is finally revealed, I knew he wasn’t going to be a fun fight. He can move lightning fast and move anything from a rock to a city bus with his mind.

The final confrontation with Kessler takes place in the crater you woke up in at the start of the game and playing through a second time definitely made me shutter, waking up in the place where I will defintiely have my ass handed to me 15-20 hours later. It took me 12 attempts to finally best Kessler and even then, it was just by a hair and, frankly, I’m too afraid to try it a second time.

Jecht/Final Summon – Final Fantasy X

I am a huge fan of the Final Fantasy series and “X” is a close tie with “VII” for favourite title in the series. An emotionally driven story finally reuintes a young man with his, much hated, father. They share some emotional little dialogue before he transforms into “The Final Summon”, which just looks amazing and incredibly intimidating. To be honest, playing through the game now, I can beat him without having to retry usually because I make sure to get every weapon possible and do some serious levelling beforehand but for a player going through the story normally, Jecht becomes next to impossible.

Halfway through the battle, Jecht will pull a huge sword from his chest and up the difficulty that much more. Also, the stone collumns on either side of him that constantly regenerate his health and always keep coming back after death don’t exactly help either. (It’s worth mentioning that an optional boss called, “Omega” is considered the hardest in the game but for some reason or other, I just didn’t find it hard)

Sigma: Final Form – Megaman X

Let’s just get this covered before I say anything. Megaman bosses have always been and will always be very hard. They are made to have one specific strategy used to defeat them and, without it, you’re usually dead. Sigma is a much larger step above the rest as the final boss of Megaman X. He starts off as a humanoid looking character, who then transforms upon his death into some sort of robot that takes up most of the screen. I’m not going to lie, I’ve never beat Sigma in his final form and don’t much care to. He is one tough cookie for sure.

Zedonius (2nd encounter) – Ninja Gaiden 2

Zedonius was only crazy hard during the second battle with him. During this fight you can get lucky and have Zedonius spend most of his time on the ground, in which the fight isn’t incredibly hard. If you aren’t so lucky like most of us, Zedonius will stay in the air for the most part and hurl wave after wave of fireballs at you that will take down your health at a ridiculous speed.

As much as I’ve looked around, no one seems to know a way to force the demon down to Earth. He will land when he pleases and there’s nothing you can do about it. This fight is 90% dodging and 10% getting a lucky shot in.

Punch-Out – Mike Tyson

We all played Punch-Out as kids. The game was fun but no one really tried to make their way through the entire thing. You fight a few guys until it gets hard and you stop but once the player rose through the ranks, they received the opportunity to face the man himself; Mike Tyson. Tyson must have had a large ego to feed because they made his character crazy hard. One good punch could easily knock your character out for good and Mike would just stand there with his stupid smile, mocking you…please don’t kill me Mr. Tyson.

Absolute Virtue – Final Fantasy 11

I definitely saved the most unbelievable sounding boss for last. This was a boss that I had to experience through a friend who actually played the game. Final Fantasy 11 was solely an online game and I had never found intrest in games of the sort (before DC Universe) so I sat and watched him crusade to fight this crazy being known as “Absolute Virtue”. The beast was confronted by a group of players after it was first released years ago and the battle went on for an alleged 30 some hours before five players quit the game completely on the spot. It was also said that the long and physically stressful time in front of the screen in intense combat actually caused some players to vomit. If that’s not a hard boss battle, I don’t know what is.

A video was released by the game creators, hinting at how to defeat the beast and it can apparently be beaten within a half hour now. For the record, my friend did not triumph over Absolute Virtue.

*Feel free to shout your input, who’s the hardest boss you’ve ever encountered???