History ThatOneBoss / BeatEmUp

* Gnarly Gnome, the boss of Area 2 in ''Series/MightyMorphinPowerRangers''. HE constantly teleports around the stage, and you can only get one or two (three if you're lucky and qucik) hits on him. As if that wasn't bad enough, his weapon of choice, a rake, has some good range on him, and it can deal a lot of damage. To add on to that, once he reaches half-health, he starts teleporting rapidly, meaning you'll be seeing lots of copies of him before he quickly attacks you. And to make things even worse, he has two ranged attacks that are difficult to see coming. And this is only the second boss of the game.

* The Green Goblin from the ''{{Spider-Man}}'' arcade game. There are three stages to the fight; in the first and third, you fight him hand-to-hand and he's a wimp. During the second stage, however, he rides his glider and goes back and forth across the stage, dropping about twenty pumpkin bombs on you at once. They're damn near impossible to dodge, and on the rare occasion he decides not to bother with bombs, he flies across the stage so fast he's basically a purple and green blur trying to ram you. He eats up more quarters than any other boss in the game, and he's the last boss of the SECOND stage out of FOUR. When you have to fight him again in the fourth stage as part of a mini-boss rush, he's even faster and supported by goons. The final bosses are Dr. Doom and an infinite army of Venom clones, and neither are anywhere as near as hard as the Green Goblin.

* Haman Khan at the end of [[Anime/MobileSuitGundamZZ Judau Ashta]]'s story in ''DynastyWarriorsGundam''. Judau's story is 2 levels long, giving you almost no time to grind either the pilot or the Mobile Suit, and Judau switches Mobile Suits just before the final level. This leaves you with a low-leveled pilot, and a MS which will be level 2 at best, and have no equipment by the time you fight Haman. It doesn't help that you have to fight her four times in this mission: the first three are bearable, but the fourth fight doesn't have any MechaMooks that you can use to charge your [[LimitBreak SP Attack]] or get [[MedKit armor repairs]] from, and when you get her down to 25% health, she recovers all her armor and TurnsRed.
** The Devil Gundam in ''DynastyWarriorsGundam 2''. You have to kill the tentacles before you can touch the head, and the head is the only way to kill the boss... unlucky for you, the tentacles shower FrickinLaserBeams and fall on you more or less the second you touch them. Even more evilly, some missions require you to take this boss on in a [[JokeCharacter really weak mobile suit]], or as part of a BossRush sequence, or as part of an EscortMission where naturally the person you need to protect insists on running directly into the laser barrage.

* Hookah from Dragonica. It has a powerful OHKO slash with his hook. Not to mention the shoot who tangles you and stops you from moving and the poison shoot. Expect him to be a nightmare when you're facing him alone. In harder stages, he's even worse, because he can summon his minions and you're screwed if you don't have a party or no potions.

** ''DynastyWarriorsGundam 3'' fixed the issues with giant enemies: they now lack their super armor and can be attacked normally (this is especially nice with Devil Gundam, since you can attack him anytime without killing the Gundam Heads first). However, they also introduced Knight Gundam, who in certain stages has permanent SuperMode and such ludicrous attack power that he can kill anything in two hits. That's two ''basic attacks''. Fights with him can last mere seconds on these stages.
* In ''DungeonFighterOnline'', many of the bosses past level 30 are made to be tougher, but one boss stands out. Isadora from the GBL Arad Branch dungeon. Out of all the bosses at the end of the game, she stands out as ThatOneBoss of this game. Her attacks include a [[DeathFromAbove Meteor]] spell, [[EnemySummoner summoning spirits]] to fight with her, a move to detonate said spirits for large amounts of damage, a copy of the Mage's Phase shift spell, teleporting close combat moves that inflict Freeze or Blind, in addition to all of this, she's not alone either. She has several of the Mooks of the dungeon with her, plus two of the more annoying enemies in that dungeon as well. Oh and if you thought [[spoiler:her HeelFaceTurn]] in Metastasis meant you were safe, she's still at Iced Wall!

* Fire Leo in ''ViewtifulJoe'' - insanely fast, massively strong, on fire, shoots deadly fireballs, and can take off four hearts in one attack. Oh, and he appears at the end of a BossRush. On higher difficulty settings you don't even get notification on where your enemy is attacking so it is harder to dodge them. Most common enemies give away other visual cues to make dodging them just as easy (like the common MechaMooks bounce on their feet if they intend to deliver a low sweep kick), but not Fire Leo; the only clues he gives are audio ones. In other words, you can only guess where he is going to attack you during his tornado attack by identifying ''the sounds and grunts he makes''. "Damn you, Fire Leo!"

* ''{{Streets of Rage}}'' for the Sega Genesis has the twins Mona and Lisa. In the first game, they're palette swap clones of Blaze, and behave more like the player characters than any other boss. They're fast, agile, and hit hard, making them very dangerous. The fire-breathing fat guys are a much cheaper version of a That One Boss. When they're charging, they can only be attacked from behind, making it difficult to get at them without getting flattened. When they're not charging, they hide around the edges of the screen, usually making them impossible to attack. They're also the only bosses that can't be thrown or suplexed.

* The evil ghost Ezerhorden in the second Dungeons and Dragons arcade game, ''Shadow over Mystara''. Considering if you beat the BonusBoss from the FIRST game you already know how to beat the BonusBoss of this game AND the final boss, it's Ezerhorden who wrecks your shit. He has a lot of invulnerability frames, and has resistance to everything but lightning. Since he seems to be a mad spirit it's kind of reasonable he ISN'T the final boss though.

** And if you thought that was bad, take a look at the fight against the [[GoldfishPoopGang Three Evil Stooges]]; Conchita has a whip that she loves to use to grab you from anywhere, Bruce has a giant boomerang that once thrown, remains spinning around causing havoc for way too long, and Felix just hurts like hell. Now, [[OhCrap imagine fighting them]]... ''[[TrioBoss ALL AT ONCE]]''.

** And if you thought that was bad, take a look at the "Three Evil Stooges" boss fight. One has a whip that she loves to use to grab you from anywhere, one has a giant boomerang that once thrown, remains spinning around causing havoc for way too long, and the third just hurts like hell. Now imagine fighting them... ALL AT ONCE.

* ''VideoGame/{{Executioners}}'': It's hard to say which bosses of the 9 levels would qualify for this trope. Mega-Midget(s) of level 4 is one, because he can summon a group of Midget-Men to harass you, and has the "Midget Power!" attack, in which he flies like {{Superman}} to try to grab you, and as soon as he goes off-screen, he'll try to stomp on you from above. You must dodge his grab and stomp, grab him just before he can punch you, and punch him up to stand a chance. Blade-Rumbler of level 7 is one, because he has a stomp attack he telegraphs by yelling "Let's Rumble!" and you must jump to avoid taking damage. He can throw some bladed weapon that flies pretty fast and pretty weirdly and I don't know if dodging it is even possible. To stand a chance against him, you must put moderate distance between him and you, avoid getting hit by his bladed(?) fist, grab him just before he can punch you, and punch him up!

* Raoh in ''FistOfTheNorthStar: Ken's Rage''. The final battle with him being the worst, where he gains the ability to use Musou Tensei and become intangible, forcing you to do the same so you can hit him at all.

** ''Dynasty Warriors 6'' Lu Bu is actually not exceptionally hard by himself - he has the biggest stats, but merely adequate moveset, and is no longer a top tier character. The problem is, he's always in hyper mode, when you fight him.
*** This may have been a starting trend in the ''Warriors Orochi'' series; he was powerful as an NPC but a bit lazily strong as all he did was buff himself instead of being naturally strong. He was even more underwhelming as a playable character from that game onwards due to heavy nerfs on his moveset.
* In the same vein, Honda Tadakatsu and Maeda Keiji in ''Samurai Warriors 2''. Sure, the computer-controlled ones have a slow wind-up speed to most of their attacks, but heaven help you if you get caught in even ONE of these attacks. There is a reason that in every story battle you come across them, your commanding officer strongly "suggests" you keep well away; especially since the former has his leitmotif.

** And for more fun, the only way to damage him involves a hidden property of one of your powers: [[spoiler:if you attack an object enough times using Mach Speed, Joe will catch fire, which renders him able to attack the burning Leo]]. [[GuideDangIt The game never mentions this property.]]
*** The worst part is that earlier in the game, Mach Speed is used to PUT OUT fires. Contradictions much?
*** At least the game makes use of this property for a few puzzles, so anyone who played up to that point knows about it. Of course, if you fail to figure that out, then you beat him with an even better hidden tactic.[[spoiler: A zoomed in Red Hot Kick (a skippable upgrade) turns into a fiery dragon kick which beats the barrier]]. Of course, it amounts to ScratchDamage against the guy, so fighting him this way takes a ''long'' time.
** Know what's worse? Even if you ''do'' manage to get him close to death, he gets ''even faster''.

* Speaking of Licensed SNES games, Gnome, the boss of Area 2 in ''Series/MightyMorphinPowerRangers''. HE constantly teleports around the stage, and you can only get one or two (three if you're lucky and qucik) hits on him. As if that wasn't bad enough, his weapon of choice, a rake, has some good range on him, and it can deal a lot of damage. To add on to that, once he reaches half-health, he starts teleporting rapidly, meaning you'll be seeing lots of copies of him before he quickly attacks you. And to make things even worse, he has two ranged attacks that are difficult to see coming. And this is only the second boss of the game.

** [[EvilTwin Another Joe]] counts for this in his entirety.
*** It's even worse when you get to the fifth level and [[spoiler: realize that you have to fight a BossRush where all of the bosses you previously defeated come back as ThatOneBoss.]]

** Abadede -[[NoCelebritiesWereHarmed who is totally, totally not The Ultimate Warrior]]- in ''Streets of Rage 2''. His style consists mainly of a single running punch that cancels out your attacks, repeated until your controller bounces off the T.V. screen.
** R. Bear from the same game is the hardest boss in the game, hands down.
*** Abadede was much harder, as R. Bear was vulnerable to quick grabs from behind (you can't hold on long but long enough to act.) Abadede couldn't be grabbed long enough to do anything with, and his short range punches had priority over pretty much everything else, going as far as to not take damage from your attacks as they hit him, even if he hadn't hit you yet.
**** Madness. Abadede is one of the easier bosses, you just wait until he runs at you, Grand Upper, rinse and repeat ad infinitum, no damage. R. Bear conversely can only really be hurt when he attempts to attack you first, and you have to get in at that split second before his attack lands. Unlike Abadede, you can't see the attack coming from across the screen, not to mention on the harder difficulties there's a Firebreathing Fat Guy and an endlessly-spawning Galsia during the R. Bear fight just to piss you off and get cheap hits.
***** If you're playing as Max, you can actually catch Abadede with an energy-crushing atomic drop or German suplex if you can get behind him while he does his Ultimate Warrior-style jumping splash. A few of those coupled with a baseball slide to break his charge, and you're home free. R. Bear, on the other hand, is frustration in pixel form.

*** Axel breaks Streets of Rage 2. Playing as other characters can be hell with these bosses, especially Max who is really, really slow; Blaze, whose melee attacks can't wear the bosses down quickly; and Skate who just gets constantly intercepted by R Bear.

*** AllThereInTheManual: In the comic series the game is based on, it's explained that the FF are out of town and Spider-Man had to break in to their HQ to get their sonic gun, so the security machines activated (in the comics, the fight with the robots happened ''off panel.'')

* Slice, the fourth stage boss in Creator/{{Capcom}}'s ''Cadillacs and Dinosaurs'' ArcadeGame. He can blaze about the screen a-la [[VideoGame/FinalFight Rolento]], and he has ridiculous range and priority with his boomerang attacks... especially the multi-boomerang one which covers half the screen. To top it off, the seventh boss, Slisaurs, are mutated versions of that SAME DAMN BOSS! (three if you're playing a two/three player game)

* Lu Bu in the Hulao Gate stage of any ''VideoGame/DynastyWarriors'' series is a textbook example of this trope--particularly when he powers up mid-fight. It's the only guy where the suggestion of "run away" is a good one. Of course, as they say: "DON'T PURSUE LU BU!" Or, have his iconic theme play while you're running the hell away or just getting hacked away at with no effort; that is, until you level up someone well enough or if a CPU ally has high enough morale against him offscreen.

* Lu Bu in the Hu Lao Gate stage of any ''VideoGame/DynastyWarriors'' series is a textbook example of this trope--particularly when he powers up mid-fight. It's the only guy where the suggestion of "run away" is a good one.
** Lu Bu in the Xia Pi stage of ''Dynasty Warriors 4'' if you kill Diao Chan. This will enrage Lu Bu, who will power up into "hyper mode." If you want to kill Diao Chan, it's suggested that you weaken Lu Bu to a sliver of life before killing Diao Chan, and then have all of your generals dog pile Lu Bu. (Allied officers whose AI isn't set to "move to location" as top priority will tend to dogpile the enemy commander in a ''Warriors'' game.) In general this rule applies, although ''Warriors Orochi 2'' may have averted it at least once.
*** On a related note, Wei's Act 3 qualifies as [[ThatOneLevel That One Act]] precisely because you ''have'' to beat Lu Bu at some point (if he flees at Xia Pi, he'll face you in the very next battle). If you can do that, nothing Liu Bei or Sun Jian can throw at you should faze you.
** Then there's Lu Bu in Dynasty Warriors 5, which added a fun little feature called Musou Rage. Normally a player-only power-up which made you nigh-unbeatable while using it, Lu Bu could also use it. And while you have to find a Musou Token to use yours once, Lu Bu can use his repeatedly. Combine that with a few attacks that are probably impossible to block, and he will turn you into a bloody smear on the wall if you stand toe-to-toe with him while he's in a Musou Rage.

** Dynasty Warrior 6 Lu Bu is actually not exceptionally hard by himself - he has the biggest stats, but merely adequate moveset, and is no longer a top tier character. The problem is, he's always in hyper mode, when you fight him.
* In the same vein, Honda Tadakatsu and Maeda Keiji in Samurai Warriors 2. Sure, the computer-controlled ones have a slow wind-up speed to most of their attacks, but heaven help you if you get caught in even ONE of these attacks. There is a reason that in every story battle you come across them, your commanding officer strongly "suggests" you keep well away.

* Armstrong from ''VideoGame/MetalGearRisingRevengeance''. Every single attack does 25% of your health, he can self-heal and automatically counters all of your attacks while he does so unless you hit a specific weak point, and the only way he can be beaten is through an insanely hard quicktime event. He can hang on at 0.1% of his health for an infinite time unless you get the final QTE perfect.

* And following Lu Bu's example in ThatOneBoss-ism (but not the treacherous nature and Berserker status) is Honda Tadakatsu in ''SamuraiWarriors'', especially in the second game where he is a regular character, frequently shows up if you oppose the Tokugawa faction and ALWAYS COME with Hyper Mode. All that can be said is... good luck if you ever try to take him down with a low level character, especially those who are not physically strong. (We're looking at you, Oichi.)

* ''RiverCityRansom's'' Dragon Twins are [[ShoutOut pastiches]] of the main characters of ''VideoGame/DoubleDragon'' and attack you with Billy & Jimmy Lee's famous spin kick while the title theme of Double Dragon plays. Not only do they predate post-modernism becoming fashionable in video games, but they make the final boss, Slick, look like a total chump.

* ''RiverCityRansom's'' Dragon Twins are [[ShoutOut pastiches]] of the main characters of ''VideoGame/DoubleDragon'' and attack you with Billy & Jimmy Lee's famous spin kick while the [[PenultimateBossTheme title theme of Double Dragon plays]]. Not only do they predate post-modernism becoming fashionable in video games, but they make the final boss, Slick, look like a total chump.

* The Doctor from ''[[{{Shank}} Shank 2]]''. He's incredibly fast, his attacks usually do major damage, and he's super tough. He can also heal himself. Admittedly, he's not ''quite'' as bad if you just spam him with the shotgun, but even then he's still harder than the actual final boss. If you're legitimately playing the game on hard mode, he's a nightmare.
* Armstrong from Metal Gear Rising: Revengeance. Every single attack does 25% of your health, he can self-heal and automatically counters all of your attacks while he does so unless you hit a specific weak point, and the only way he can be beaten is through an insanely hard quicktime event. He can hang on at 0.1% of his health for an infinite time unless you get the final QTE perfect.
* Catwoman in ''Batman Returns'', who's faster than you, has a longer reach than you, has annoying tendency to constantly backflip (which renders her invulnerable) and camp out over your body after she knocks you down so she can get in a free hit after you get up, and the first time you fight her she has a dashing slash attack that can kill you in two hits. If she's hanging out in one of the corners of the arena on the same side you are when the attack starts, it's pretty easy to dodge, but anywhere else is mostly down to luck whether or not you get hit.

* Oda Nobunaga in [[VideoGame/SengokuBasara Sengoku Basara 3]]. Normally, he isn't hard, but he'll absorb the souls of his fallen army (up to 6 times) and his attacks will do more damage but at the cost of his defense. The last time is the worse, here he summons a demon to surround him, making his attacks more powerful and unblockable.

* MadWorld has a pair of That One ''Mini-''Boss. The second actually is a pair, the Cyber Slicers, a pair of robots in the main [[{{ShoutOut/MadWorld}} Shout Out level]] who have enhanced defense and range, attack simultaneously, coordinate with the Mooks, and will stay back if you near an environment hazard, or chase you to the ends of the earth if you don't. But the most universally reviled MiniBoss is the aptly named Death Blade. This Grim Reaper wannabe can ''instantly kill you'' if he touches you with his scythe, which may not be that hard, as his roller blades make him faster than you, and the scythe has pretty good reach. He doesn't coordinate his attacks to the extent of the Cyber Slicers, but it's still just as bad, because if it does happen, the standard zombies will grab you and trigger a weapons clash in which you have to shake yourself free, but the shaking isn't always recognized and you still die. The best approach to killing him is to hit him with an exploding barrel (there are exactly enough in the level to get the achievement for doing this to him several times).

* ''{{Executioners}}'': It's hard to say which bosses of the 9 levels would qualify for this trope. Mega-Midget(s) of level 4 is one, because he can summon a group of Midget-Men to harass you, and has the "Midget Power!" attack, in which he flies like {{Superman}} to try to grab you, and as soon as he goes off-screen, he'll try to stomp on you from above. You must dodge his grab and stomp, grab him just before he can punch you, and punch him up to stand a chance. Blade-Rumbler of level 7 is one, because he has a stomp attack he telegraphs by yelling "Let's Rumble!" and you must jump to avoid taking damage. He can throw some bladed weapon that flies pretty fast and pretty weirdly and I don't know if dodging it is even possible. To stand a chance against him, you must put moderate distance between him and you, avoid getting hit by his bladed(?) fist, grab him just before he can punch you, and punch him up!

* Missing Link from Konami's ''{{Vendetta}}''. At seemingly random intervals he would roar and spread his arms, damaging the player and interrupting their attack. Not only was he nearly patternless, but he often didn't flinch from normal hits, having something almost like a super armor ability. Also, it goes without saying he could take a punch and beat you down fairly handily. In comparison, the last boss of the game had a machine gun, but even he moved in patterns and would flinch when you hit him. Also, the Missing Link was in an area with almost no weapons, compared to other bosses who at least had weapon-carrying minions.
** See also Drigger in the post-apocalyptic Konami beat 'em up ''ViolentStorm''. Thankfully there is no Boss Rush as in Crime Fighters and Vendetta, although the final boss being a parody of Tetsuo from Manga/{{Akira}} more than makes up for that. The obviously palette-swapped ninja turtle boss is also aggravatingly fast.