History Main / GetbackhereBoss

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->''"We give up, Merasmus, you're too scary for us. Now come out so we can '''kick your ass!'''"''
-->-- '''The Soldier''', ''VideoGame/TeamFortress2''

*** Volvagia pops out of his lava pit to attack. He's actually a [[SpellMyNameWithAnS differently-translated]] version of old-school villain Barba (it all comes from バルバジア, ''barubajia''), with a similar MO.

* An enemy who can step into things you cannot, such as a lava pit, high up in the sky or underground, or worse, the background/foreground. They will come out to attack, but once they have finished firing at you, or as soon as you take the offensive, they will move away to their safe place where you cannot attack them. Compare TakeCover when the player can do this too.

** [[WesternAnimation/TheLionKing1994 The hyenas]] in the sequel, since in order to get information out of them, you have to chase ''all three'' down and beat them up. And, if nothing else, they're damn fast (yet hella fun to chase after since there's no time limit).

** You think you'll use a Pokémon that knows a trapping move? They're faster than you are, so they move first and can leg it before your move even happens. You've boosted your Pokémon's speed to ridiculous levels and use the trapping move? They all know Roar, which makes YOUR Pokémon run for it - and if you're playing the ''[=FireRed/LeafGreen=]'' remakes, this makes the roaming Pokémon lost. The trick is to use the trapping move, pray that they don't use Roar on their first move, and then put them to sleep so you can do some damage to them. Luckily they don't heal from damage between encounters, letting you whittle them down over time. Encountering them at all isn't easy, either - you have to randomly encounter them once before you can track them with the Pokedex, and even then, they change locations every time you change from one route to the next, or enter or exit a city. If you're actively hunting one, you have to jump back and forth over the border between two routes and check the 'dex each time until they're on the same route as you.

* Some boss characters in ''VideoGame/{{Tekken}} 6'''s "Scenario Campaign" will appear mid-stage for a quick fight, and then quickly get away when their life gets dangerously low. The one who applies this trope best is Ganryu, however, who attempts this ''twice'' before the final true end-of-stage battle.

* The fight against Dr. Neo Cortex in ''Videogame/CrashBandicoot2CortexStrikesBack''. The whole fight, he's trying to run away from you with the crystals, and you have to chase him through an obstacle course. [[TimeLimitBoss Let him get to the end and you lose a life.]]

* In ''VideoGame/PokemonMysteryDungeon'', You can get missions where you have to apprehend an outlawed Pokémon. When you find them, half of the time they will try to turn tail and run for it. If the outlaw makes it to the stairs, you fail the mission. Arceus help you if the outlaw is an [[TeleportSpam Abra]].

* Dark Sun Gwyndolin in ''VideoGame/DarkSouls'' is this. He fights you within an endless hallway, shooting at you from a distance with his magic and arrows. When you get close to him he teleports further down the hallway.

* ''[[VideoGame/{{Touhou}} Subterranean Animism]]'' tosses out the whole "defeatable" part and has [[HardDrinkingPartyGirl Yuugi Hoshiguma]] sit there onscreen, still throwing [[BulletHell bullets]] at you. While the stage still progresses. Meaning you not only have to dodge the boss onscreen, but the {{Mooks}} from the sides as well.
** There's also stage 4 of ''Imperishable Night'', which has either Reimu or Marisa as the midboss and boss. It is the ONLY stage for which the boss' music plays at the midboss, and it continues playing as you're chasing them down through a horde of mooks (they don't return to the screen until the boss battle, though.)

* Most "[[LongRangeFighter zoner]]" characters such as ''VideoGame/StreetFighter''[='s=] Dhalsim or ''VideoGame/GuiltyGear''[='s=] Axl qualify as this, having many long-range attacks that can keep an opponent at bay. Special mention should go to [[SNKBoss Nu-13]] from ''VideoGame/BlazBlue'' who has a meterless multi-hit projectile combo that hits from 3/4 of the screen away, plus gravity wells that drastically reduce the opponent's movement speed and a 30-hit projectile super that inflicts a lot of block-stun. She was so overpowered in the first game, ''[[VideoGame/BlazBlueCalamityTrigger Calamity Trigger]]'', that the developers removed her from [[VideoGame/BlazBlueContinuumShift the next game]], killed her in the story, and replaced her with Lambda-11, a SuspiciouslySimilarSubstitute with an identical appearance, but a different, more balanced move-set. Nu-13 later returned, but was heavily de-powered on her reappearance.

* ''VideoGame/MarioAndLuigi'':
** The third Giant Bowser battle in ''[[VideoGame/MarioAndLuigiBowsersInsideStory Mario & Luigi: Bowser's Inside Story]]'' is against the Fawful Express, a train that is constantly moving away from Bowser. It stops occasionally to refuel, which is when you can damage it. If you can't defeat it before it reaches a bridge, you automatically lose and have to start the battle over.
** The fourth Giant Luigi battle in ''VideoGame/MarioAndLuigiDreamTeam'' is against [[spoiler:the Zeekeeper]], who constantly flees from Luigi into dimensional rifts and stuff, forcing Luigi to have to counter his attacks to get a chance to fight back. Of course standing still and letting [[spoiler:the Zeekeeper]] flee wouldn't be an option because he comes back to do swooping attacks and firing energy projectiles at you.
** Antasma does this when assisting Dreamy Mario as one of the attacks. He taunts Mario with Peach into giving chase while sending invincible Dreamy Mario clones after you and spitting purple smoke to obscure your vision.
** Torkscrew has an attack where he steals one of the bros and forces him to drop coins, while you have to jump over and doge land mines.

* Croco from ''VideoGame/SuperMarioRPG'' is a variant in that you only need to chase him long enough to initiate the fight. Once you catch him good and proper, he'll stick around until he runs off for your victory.

* [[spoiler: Naoya]] from ''VideoGame/DevilSurvivor'', as the first boss fight in [[MultipleEndings Atsuro's Route]] on Day 7. To win, you have to defeat him. Simple? Heck no, there's a bunch of [=COMPs=] lying around, spawning demons unless you picked them up. Then, [[spoiler:Naoya]] can simply throws ''more'' [=COMPs=] if you take too long. Oh and guess what? [[spoiler: Naoya]] got Devil Speed (7 Movement) and Phantasma (teleportation) to move around.
* ''VideoGame/TheElderScrollsVSkyrim'' has Dragons, which circle around, hover, and only occasionally land in order to attack. Even when they ''do'' land, it's usually out of range of melee weapons, and even sometimes in an area the Dragonborn can't reach by any means, to say nothing of doing so before the dragon takes off again.

** ''VideoGame/{{Metal Gear Solid 3|SnakeEater}}'' gives us The End, a well-camouflaged sniper who only attacks from elevated locations and only moves around if he knows he's been spotted or to keep you from figuring out his location.

* On that note, cavalry and horse archers in ''VideoGame/MountAndBlade'' will ''not'' stand and fight. Lancers charge into battle, then charge away, then repeat, while horse archers try to play helicopter as long as their arrows last.
** Fighting any Cavalry Archers very quickly turns into one of these in ''VideoGame/MountAndBlade'' if you don't have a ranged weapon or aren't properly skilled in horseback archery. If you're on foot, you can't really catch up with them and they won't get close enough for you to hit them beyond abusing the "invisible wall of doom". If you're on horseback, they're going to just keep running away from you taking potshots until one of you dies. And their horses are almost always either faster or more maneuverable than yours.

** By the way, in ''[[VideoGame/PokemonDiamondAndPearl Pokémon Platinum]]'', they have FIVE roaming legendaries. FIVE. Unless you have five Master Balls, a Pokémon that knows a trapping move that works on the legendary AND is faster than it, or a Wobbuffet, you'll probably spend days hunting them down and capturing them all.
*** Also in ''Platinum'', a Galactic Grunt detonates a bomb in the Great Marsh, and you are ordered to chase him down. Every time you catch up to him he makes up an excuse why he doesn't have to fight you, which keeps repeating itself a couple of times until he finally gives up running in Valor Lakefront. When you fight him, his team consists of a single Croagunk (as expected of a lowly Grunt), which would probably explain why he's such a CowardlyBoss.

* Croco from ''VideoGame/SuperMarioRPG''.
** A variant in that you only need to chase him long enough to initiate the fight. Once you catch him good and proper, he'll stick around until he runs off for your victory.

* In ''VideoGame/StarFox64'', your first boss on Venom (blue path) is a giant robot encased in stone who runs away while throwing obstacles in your way. Slippy even lampshades this with "Why is he running away?" The boss could probably swat you out of the air quite effectively because it's possibly the tallest boss in the game.
** There is also the train on Macbeth that you keep following throughout the entire level. Even when it releases the robot that acts as the boss in the strictest sense, the train keeps moving.
*** This is rather hilariously used to Star Fox's advantage. One of the ways to defeat it is to hit a number of switches that forces the train onto a track leading to one of the weapon depots. The train is destroyed because, as the conductor screams, the brakes apparently won't work and it crashes into the building.

** Invoked by ''players'' in order to deal with some of the more monstrously powerful Notorious Monsters in that game. The original strategy to fight [[BonusBoss Kirin]] was a perfect example. In order to keep Kirin from ''really'' unloading on them with his most powerful attacks, the main tank would run their ass in circles around the area Kirin was fought, while debuffers would keep Gravity on Kirin to slow his movement speed. Square Enix started developing [=NMs=] with "Draw-In" that would, er, [[ShapedLikeItself draw in]] potentially everyone on the hate list, if the player on the top of the hate list got too far away, in order to make players vary their strategies.

** [[VideoGame/KingdomHeartsI The first game]] has several bosses like this, including [[WesternAnimation/SleepingBeauty Maleficent]] (who stands on a platform that slides up and down the hallway), [[BonusBoss Phantom]] (who, in addition to [[DeaderThanDead slowly eliminating your party members for the rest of the battle]] AND only being damageable by a [[GuideDangIt somewhat complex strategy novice players may not get early on]], but is a '''complete pain to hit''' because you're [[IBelieveICanFly both flying every which way during the battle]]), [[WesternAnimation/{{Aladdin}} Jafar]] (who flies around the room in an impressive display of completely non-canonical powers), and [[WesternAnimation/{{Tarzan}} Clayton]] (who rides an invisible lizard).

* ''VideoGame/AfterBurner Climax'' has the pseudo-BonusBoss of Stages 6 and 7, the stealth bomber. In Stage 6, you have to chase after it without falling too far behind, and if you keep up, you must finish it off in Stage 7 using your guns. If you fail either, the game keeps going, but you will be locked out of the last 2 stages (as is the case with failing any other Emergency Order).

*** In the Verdant Wind (Chapter 18) and [[spoiler:Silver Snow (Chapter 17)]] versions of the Fort Merceus battle, after several turns pass or if you get close enough to the Death Knight, he'll start running away and you have to chase him down. Unlike earlier battles where he's an obscenely powerful BonusBoss, you ''have'' to defeat him to complete the chapter. [[spoiler:(It turns out that he's not running away from ''you'', but from an impending "javelins of light" strike from "those who slither in the dark" that will destroy the fortress and everyone in it, and the Death Knight wants to be TheOnlyOneAllowedToDefeatYou.)]]

* Jackle in the first ''[[VideoGame/NightsIntoDreams NiGHTS]]'' game pulls this, flying backwards and throwing cards at you.
* In ''VideoGame/PrinceOfPersia2'', FinalBoss Jaffar will run away from you as long as you're strong enough to kill him.

* The first boss in ''VideoGame/{{Rayman}}'', Moskito, does this.
* The ''VideoGame/SonicTheHedgehog'' games [[SuperSpeed naturally]] has numerous examples of this trope.

** The [[VideoGame/SonicTheHedgehog18Bit 8-bit version of]] ''[[VideoGame/SonicTheHedgehog18Bit Sonic the Hedgehog]]'' has the Bridge Zone boss, which pops out of water (your only chance to hit him), but he fires bullets at you. You could get him a few times before he goes under again, though.
** The bosses of Hill Top and Oil Ocean in ''VideoGame/SonicTheHedgehog2'' both use the third variation, popping from their hiding places long enough to attack before retreating back down.

** In ''[[VideoGame/Sonic3AndKnuckles Sonic and Knuckles]]''[='s=] Mushroom Hill Zone, Eggman simply flew away from you, and you had to jump through spiked ball walls and get close enough to hit him.

** It's not just the 16-bit outings; Sonic games are full of this sort of boss. The final Sonic vs. Shadow fight in ''VideoGame/SonicAdventure2'' (where you must keep up with your opponent as pieces of the ground fall to the Earth below), ''every single'' boss fight bar the final boss in ''[[VideoGame/SonicAdvanceTrilogy Sonic Advance 2]]'', and the fights against Eggman's robots in ''VideoGame/SonicHeroes'' and ''VideoGame/SonicUnleashed'' count too.
** ''VideoGame/SonicTheHedgehog4: Episode 1''[='s=] Mad Gear Zone boss starts out copying the boss from ''VideoGame/SonicTheHedgehog2''[='s=] Metropolis Zone (which the Zone itself is modelled after), then does this after you hit him enough times. The first stage of Lost Labyrinth Zone's boss also does this, mimicking the boss from the original game's Labyrinth Zone. However, unlike that one, the Lost Labyrinth zone boss actually stops and fights you after the chase.

** [[ThatOneBoss King Arthur]] in ''VideoGame/SonicAndTheBlackKnight''. Any time he's fought, he spends the whole fight galloping away on his horse. The first time, he stops and waits for you after a bit, [[JustToyingWithThem since he's not really serious about the fight]]. As for the [[DiscOneFinalBoss actual fight]], he'll keep galloping while firing off lightning and spells at will, forcing Sonic to time his movements for dodging and eventually catch up so he can flip over Arthur's head and engage in a horseback-and-mid-air sword duel while they're still moving.
** In ''VideoGame/SonicGenerations'', all three rival bosses (Metal Sonic, Shadow, and Silver), as well as the Modern-era bosses of both versions[[note]]Egg Dragoon in HD, Egg Emperor on the 3DS[[/note]], all work this way.
** The final boss of ''VideoGame/SonicLostWorld'', while the rest of the game averts this trope completely, also utilises the "running battle" format in a style very similar to that of the final boss of ''VideoGame/SonicColors''.

* The fight against [[BigBad Gnasty Gnorc]] in the original ''VideoGame/SpyroTheDragon'' had you charging after him, hoping that when he paused to taunt you, you were close enough to scorch him once before resuming the chase.

* ''VideoGame/EtrianOdysseyIIITheDrownedCity'': The first stratum boss, Narmer, will flee after losing half its health. Your party will need to use various passages around the area in order to bring it to bay.

* ''[[VideoGame/EtrianOdyssey Etrian Odyssey III]]'': The first stratum boss, Narmer, will flee after losing half its health. Your party will need to use various passages around the area in order to bring it to bay.

* ''VideoGame/DangerGirl'' for the [PlayStation=] have it's FinalBoss, Natassia Kassle, who spends her entire fight running away from Abbey Chase while being pursued down a narrow corridor, where she will repeatedly throw mooks at Abbey's direction until she's cornered at the edge of a pit, leading to a boss fight.

* Most "[[LongRangeFighter zoner]]" characters such as ''VideoGame/StreetFighter''[='s=] Dhalsim or ''VideoGame/GuiltyGear''[='s=] Axl qualify as this, having many long-range attacks that can keep an opponent at bay. Special mention should go to [[SNKBoss Nu-13]] from ''VideoGame/BlazBlue'' who has a meterless multi-hit projectile combo that hits from 3/4 of the screen away, plus gravity wells that drastically reduce the opponent's movement speed and a 30-hit projectile super that inflicts a lot of block-stun. She was so overpowered in the first game, ''[[VideoGame/BlazBlueCalamityTrigger Calamity Trigger]]'', that the developers removed her from [[VideoGame/BlazBlueContinuumShift the next game]], killed her in the story, and replaced her with a new character that looked identical, but had a different name (Lambda-11) and move-set. She later returned, but was heavily de-powered on her reappearance.