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Tactics also apply in case of Rhino Rampage.

"That looks distinctly like a target. And here we have a bull. Hmm... I think I get the idea now!"

A boss, usually four-legged and ferocious, roars and charges at your character, but you can avoid its attack by jumping out of its way and letting it pass you by (saying "¡Olé!" is optional). Unfortunately, it then turns around and charges at you again. And again. And again...

This is a Bullfight Boss. After charging at you, it is usually vulnerable for a few moments before regaining its senses. Sometimes, it throws a couple long-range attacks at you before charging again. Sometimes, it tires out after charging several times and is vulnerable, or may have this type of attack in its attack pattern. Sometimes, it has a weak spot on top which you must hit as you are sailing over it. And sometimes, simply dodging the charge isn't enough, the only way to beat it is through Deadly Dodging, baiting the boss into a stage hazard (which may harm it directly or leave it vulnerable). Usually an easy boss to fight. (Usually.) If it's an actual bull, you can probably puzzle out the color of the item needed to provoke it into charging.

Related to the second type of Puzzle Boss.


Examples:

    open/close all folders 

    Action Adventure Games 
  • Frogger's Journey: The Forgotten Relic: The Sphinxes in the pyramid charge at Frogger when he's in their line of sight. By combining the Time Stop and Push Blocks abilities from OPART, Frogger can push a block in the arena into their path to trick them into running headfirst into it, damaging them.
  • The Legend of Spyro: A New Beginning: Since the Conductor's train is always on the move on the circular tracks of the area it's fought in, you have to trick him into going in the middle tracks and dodge, which can end with him crashing Steam against the walls of the arena, giving you some time to pummel him.
  • The Legend of Zelda:
  • Shadow of the Colossus: The 11th and 14th Colossi can be for a short while, but you can't damage them that way, and it's very risky, as they will stun-lock you as soon as they get a single hit in.
  • Junkie Ram from Exit Limbo: Opening spends the entire game charging at you with a fierce tackle, which you can't stop by punching or kicking. However, the area you fight him contains a set of spinning gears in the back, hidden behind a set of descending doors, and the entire fight have you lowering the doors to trick Ram into charging into the gears.
  • Ōkami: Oni (both red and blue) and the appropriately-named Bull Charger. If you try to attack them head-on, you can't damage them and you're likely to get smacked senseless, but if you attack from behind or hit them when they've dropped their masks, you can take them down fairly easily.
  • In Crossing Souls, General OhRus' Clipped-Wing Angel form makes him charge around wildly, who can be defeated by luring him into the energy rocks around the arena.
  • Mirror's Edge: The "white assassin" is best defeated by evading all attacks and striking from behind.
  • Boktai: One of the vampires attacks by charging wildly at you. If you set things up right, you can fight him in a room with a skylight letting in a giant ray of sunlight in one corner of the room. You can see where this is going.
  • The Binding of Isaac: A number of bosses have this tendency. Dingle charges you three times in succession and gets pooped (heh) after the third charge. The Gurglings also charge you, as well as leaving a trail of red creep behind. Gurdy Jr. is the most annoying in this regard because it likes to track you.
  • Clash at Demonhead: Gazh, one of the first bosses the player is likely to face, attacks primarily by riding back and forth on his motorcycle. Unusually for this type of fight, his seat acts as a shield that protects him from all attacks from behind. You can only shoot him in the face, and every time he takes a hit, he yelps and shoots a stream of fireballs (which you then have to shoot out of the way to get another clear shot at him).
  • LEGO Batman: The DS version has a boss fight against Bane, who isn’t fought in other versions. Bane can only be properly hit after you trick him into charging into a storage crate.

    Action Games 
  • One of The Lord of the Rings games had a boss fight against Lurtz, who was invulnerable until he swung at you and got his sword stuck in a statue, at which point you could attack him. There's also a later fight against orcs on wargs — you can only do a little bit of damage to them until the wargs rear up to attack you, at which point you can run in and slash at their belly.
  • In Orphen: Scion of Sorcery, one boss literally plays on this trope. It involves a Minotaur-like boss charging at you and knocking you back, eventually knocking you down a hole to your death, which is a Game Over. And unless you have perfect timing to knock him back with a sword, this battle can end very quickly.
  • Spider-Man (2000) features a fight against Rhino. True to form, his primary attack consists of a charge. The key to victory was positioning yourself so that each charge would either cause him to get his horn stuck in a wall — giving you a few seconds to hit him from behind — or charge directly into a big power generator. This is the tactic for fighting Rhino in basically any Spider-Man game, mind you.
  • Time Commando featured a boss fight against an actual bull.
  • Hotline Miami: The second boss (the biker helmet man) isn't exactly an example, but one of his attacks plays out exactly like this trope, gameplay-wise. He tosses his cleaver at you; you dodge, the cleaver flies all the way to a far wall and gets stuck, the boss runs up to the cleaver (while he's on his way, he's inexplicably immune to your attacks) and begins pulling out his weapon, at which point he's vulnerable to you approaching him from behind and bashing his skull in.
  • A variation occurs in Middle-earth: Shadow of Mordor with the Great White Graug. You need to stay far from it to force it to charge. While the Graug's charging, you must shoot an arrow at its head to disorient it so that it runs into the wall and gets stunned, allowing you to do a button prompt and deal heavy damage to it.
  • Turned from BloodRayne 2 are massive, hulking monsters with horns in lieu of eyes who can, if you're far enough from them, charge at you, demolishing anything in their paths. If they hit a wall, they stay down for a few seconds, allowing you to slice them up. One in Xerx's skyscraper can be dispatched easily by tricking him into charging in a window, resulting in a Disney Villain Death.

    Beat 'em Ups 
  • River City Girls: In the fight with Misuzu, she will sometimes do a charge attack. If the player is behind a pillar she'll be stunned after hitting the wall, opening her up for attack.
  • Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles: The Arcade Game: The fights against Bebop, Rocksteady, and Bebop and Rocksteady. In the fight against both of them at once, they can be tricked into charging into each other. Which is a Shout-Out to how the Turtles defeated them in for the first time in the 1987 cartoon.
  • MadWorld: It's more like a bull fight mini boss and there are three of them. The first two are Big Bull Crocker and Big Long Driller, who charge like a bull and elephant, respectively. Keep in mind that the former fights with two chainsaws strapped together and the latter fights with a huge drill. Yee Fung is a fat guy that does a charge, spin-dash style. He's pretty quick too.
  • Fist of the North Star: Ken's Rage: While not necessary to defeat Shin, tricking him into lodging his fist in one of the pillars will let you get some free hits on him.
  • Hades: Asterius the minotaur will sometimes begin charging after Zagreus with his horns down, and can be tricked into colliding with a wall or pillar to knock him out of it. Asterius is smarter than many bosses that use this tactic, will course-correct, and has a pretty good turning radius, so the player needs to dodge while quite close to whatever they want him to run into.
  • Ultra Toukon Densetsu has the Red Kings, a trio of bosses who attacks by ramming all over the screen, where once they're charging, can't be stopped - the only way is to dodge them until they tire out, and then land some quick hits before they can recover. Fighting all three at once is suicidal, though players can fight them one or two at a time by staying in the same screen and proceeding to the next after defeating one or two of them.

    Fighting Games 
  • Most bosses in Super Smash Bros. Brawl Subspace Emissary, while not entirely based on this, will do it every once in a while as part of their routine.
  • In Astro Boy: Omega Factor for the GBA, Astro Boy had to fight the Blue Knight this way. Every time you crossed, you had to press A in time to parry his charge, with the window (and recovery times) shrinking until it devolved into near Button Mashing. Don't miss.
  • In Street Fighter IV, El Fuerte can be played this way — he's got two versions of a charge that can end in any of four attacks, or be canceled in two ways, he has a separate running chest slam attack, and he's a Wall Jumper.

    First-Person Shooter 
  • Metroid:
    • Several of the (boss) fights in Metroid Fusion, especially the first, easily degenerate into bullfights, most notably the golden space pirates and SA-X.
    • Metroid Prime: the Plated Beetle mini-boss/enemy, and the second half of the Ridley boss fight.
    • You'll be doing a lot of bullfighting in the Torvus Bog section of Metroid Prime 2: Echoes. Both the grenchler and Baby Sheegoth enemies, as well as the Grapple Guardian, keep their vulnerable backs to you unless you goad them into charging (or grabbing electrified pillars, in the Guardian's case). The Alpha Blogg also reveals its weak point while charging, with a twist: it's on the front, and it opens about halfway through the charge (which hurts a lot, so it can be a hard battle before you get the timing right).
    • Mogenar, the Bryyo Seed boss (and first Leviathan Guardian) also does this in Metroid Prime 3: Corruption, as does Helios (the Elysia Seed boss and second Leviathan Guardian) in one of his forms, and hunter Ghor. The Final Boss (AU 313) starts doing this in the final phase.
  • Atlas aka Fontaine from BioShock. Also, the drill-endowed Big Daddies.
  • Hunters from Halo. They're not four-legged, and they do have a ranged attack, but the primary way of fighting them is matador-style.
  • The Antlion Guards from Half-Life 2.
  • The Were-bulls in Serious Sam charge at you full speed, but take a while to turn, making it possible to sidestep them to avoid getting hit. In fact, one of the best ways to take them out without using a lot of ammo is to use the chainsaw, sidestep out of the way at the last second, and slash them as they run past. Rinse and repeat. On at least one occasion, you have to use one to bust down a door for you.
  • The Maulotaurs from the Doom spinoffs Heretic and Hexen are almost literally bulls that charge at the player. They still have quite a fierce long-range attack, using their fiery hammers.
  • In Wolfenstein (2009), the Altered is immune to all conventional weaponry, forcing B.J. to get him to run into a series of electrical pillars around the arena. Once they are destroyed, the Black Sun portal he came in through collapses and pulls him back inside, killing him.
  • The Charger in Left 4 Dead 2. You most definitely do NOT want to be in his way when he charges towards you.
  • In Team Fortress 2, the Demoman's Chargin' Targe and Splendid Screen essentially allows him to become one of these.
  • Though not bosses, the Fiends from Quake are typically fought in this manner, as their leap attack leaves them immobile and vulnerable for a couple of seconds if they miss. The typical strategy (when not simply mowing them down with the Super Nailgun) is to get far away from the Fiend, sidestep out of the way when it leaps at you, blast it with the Nailgun or Super Shotgun, and then back away to repeat the process.
  • Berserkers in Shadow Warrior (2013). These Elite Mooks can adjust their charge if you dodge, but won't stop it if you hide behind a wall or tree, exposing their vulnerable back. Curiously averted with the game's first boss, a giant bull-headed suit of armor. He charges you, but is only vulnerable in a short window before the charge.
  • In Perfect Dark Zero, this is the preferred technique during the Final Boss fight against Big Bad Zhang Li.

    Light Gun Games 
  • The second phase of the Highway boss battle in Silent Scope. Sniper on foot versus bad guy in hijacked semi truck. The goal is to headshot him through the windscreen before he gets to you, as each near-miss pass costs a life square, but simply rapid-firing as quick as you can go will eventually get him.

    Mecha Games 
  • Viola AI from Zone of the Enders: The 2nd Runner is much like this. The first couple of times are just pretty much an all-out brawl, but when fighting when there are barriers that deal collision damage, the general tactic is to lurk next to the wall, and have her smash right into them when she charges. A variant is her other fights, where you have to have her smash into an object you're holding — generally other enemies or an oddly placed steel plate.
  • Armored Core has AF Stigro. You have to run him into buildings, slowing him down enough to shoot at and therefore destroy. Unfortunately, he's not invincible against laser blades, meaning you can blade him as he charges you at the start. This often makes the mission loading time longer than the mission itself.

    Metroidvanias 
  • Hollow Knight: The Massive Moss Charger's main attack is to charge headlong at the Knight across the floor of its arena. At the start of the game this attack is best jumped around, but, by the time Godhome is reached, Quick Slash and Mark of Pride allow for a strategy of simply knocking the boss back repeatedly until it goes down before finishing a single charge.

    MMORPGs 
  • Icehowl the Yeti in World of Warcraft does this every so often. If he tramples anyone, the victim dies and he goes into a rage, but if he misses, he crashes into the wall and becomes more vulnerable. Especially in the heroic mode, this pretty much decides the battle.

    Party Games 
  • Mario Party: Island Tour: Chain Chomp, the second boss fought in Bowser's Tower, will frequently charge at the player's character. At one point, it'll perform a big leap to try to land onto the character to harm it. The character can trick it into hitting one of the four chainlink-made tiles of the floor, making it so it touches part of the lava when it completes its Ground Pound (as the battlefield will briefly sink at that moment). This tactic has to be repeated until the Chomp's HP depletes in full, though when it goes under half it'll charge faster at the character and the ground pound will be so strong that lava will splash upward from all chainlink-made tiles, potentially hurting the player's character if they aren't careful.

    Platform Games 
  • In 102 Dalmatians: Puppies to the Rescue, there are a couple of toys like this — some clowns that roll at you and penguins that slide at you. The penguins are much faster than the clowns and attack from further away, so they're harder to kill.
  • Afterimage: Given that it's a creature resembling a bull, Lava Horns has an attack where it charges straight towards Renee's direction.
  • Ape Escape 2 has a T-rex that did this. You had to make him crash into the wall to damage him. You also fight bull-shaped mechs piloted by Pipo-Monkies in at least two missions. You can either make them get tired (or rather, make the pilots get tired), then hit them, or outrun them to get their backs and hit them, which ends being faster.
  • SNES game Asterix & Obelix had the eponymous two fight against an actual auroch combining it with Deadly Dodging similarly to how Asterix had to deal with one at the end of the respective comic Asterix in Spain. Which was nearly his end as he had no potion at the moment.
  • Banjo-Kazooie has this for the first stage of the Final Boss fight against Gruntilda.
  • Bug featured a bullfight mook in the first stage, a beetle of sorts. Not particularly dangerous, one hit stripped it down to its boxer shorts and made it useless. Other than that, the yeti boss qualifies in three of its attack patterns.
  • Conker's Bad Fur Day has a Mini-Boss fight with a bull early on (Bugger Lugs), complete with stereotypical Spanish music and inexplicable crowd cheers. You have to lead him into ramming targets, one of which he gets stuck on so you can hop on and ride him by the horns.
  • Donkey Kong:
  • The penguin, the first boss of Fancy Pants Adventures. It even holds its fins up like horns.
  • In Grapple Force Rena, General Hurgh mounts a spiked vehicle and uses it to charge at you repeatedly. If you don't lure him all the way to the wall, he'll flip the spiked hood around and charge at you again.
  • Looney Tunes games:
  • Jak II: Renegade has three miniboss Metal-Head creatures, the rhino like ram-heads located in the Mountain Temple level. To defeat them, you need to shoot their unarmored underbelly, which is only exposed when they rear up on their hind legs after you dodge them charging you down.
  • Mega Man
    • Mega Man 2 has Heat Man and his stupid, stupid shield.
    • A common complaint about Mega Man X3 is how many of its Mavericks use this fighting style. One particularly bad boss at this was Blizzard Buffalo, who has a glitch that forces him to dash in the opposite direction if you jump just as he's about to charge.
    • There's also Dive Man from Mega Man 4 who can often stop his charges early, as well as Hard Man and Concrete Man from Mega Man 3 and 9, being vertical bullfight bosses. Then there's the aptly named Charge Man from Mega Man 5 who uses this as his primary means of offense, only occasionally pausing to launch some coal chunks.
  • In Ninja Senki, the bosses on levels 4 and 8 have a 3-5 meter tall red demon as a miniboss right before them. His only attack is to jump several meters towards you and inflict Collision Damage if he gets you. The first time, it's possible to let him fall off into the Bottomless Pit, but he has to be shot the second time.
  • In Nitrome's "Super Treadmill", the final level is a boss fight with Uncle Rico, whose attack pattern is strictly this. Since the main goal of the game is to not get too close to either side of the screen, it's best to avoid him. Stomps on his head is the weak point.
  • An enemy in Prince of Persia: The Forgotten Sands does this.
  • Psychonauts:
    • El Odio is a literal bullfight boss; you even have to stab him with banderillas. But then subverted halfway through the fight, when the real boss, the matador, appears, forcing you to fight him while protecting the bull.
    • The Brain Tank has the habit of charging the player. Unfortunately, it also has a confusion attack, which messes with the controls so that you dodge into the path of the tank.
  • Sonic the Hedgehog
  • This is the easiest way to defeat Hulk Davidson in Viewtiful Joe (though not the fastest). Dodge three axe swings. Jump onto a platform once he begins his charge animation. Jump down and hit him until he recovers from his daze. Lead him closer to the center to make the dodging easier (optional), and repeat.
  • Buzz from Spyro: Year of the Dragon. Also the charging bulls in the original Spyro the Dragon. They're chasing gnorcs at first, and charge you after you bbq their targets. Just jump aside and torch them.
  • Super Catboy has a literal example with the valley's boss, an andromorphic bull who tries trampling you on sight. The bull is invincible when charging, and you lure it to tackle one of the two walls on either side of the arena so it will be Left Stuck After Attack thanks to it's horns. You then land a few hits as the bull struggles to release itself, rinse and repeat.
  • Super Mario Bros.:
    • Bowser in Super Mario Bros. 3 is a vertical bullfight boss, continually crashing into the floor until he breaks through. The Bowser fights in Super Mario Galaxy and Super Mario Galaxy 2 are similar, the first case being tricking him into smashing the glass covering the core of his generators, and the second being getting his fist stuck in the planet before smashing a meteor into him.
    • The Big Bully and the Chill Bully from Super Mario 64. All they do is charge, and are Made of Iron, so dodging and punching them from behind is how you win. This also applies for Prince Bully in Super Mario 3D World, only now you're pushing him into clear pipes to shrink him and then hit him.
    • Topmaniac from Super Mario Galaxy, though only if you defeat the Topmen it summons; you can ignore them and push the boss to the electric fence right away.
    • Rollodillo in Super Mario Galaxy 2 will try to steamroll you, but leaves himself open from dizziness after you dodge it, allowing you to get a hit in on his butt.
  • This turns up a couple of times in various Tomb Raider games:
    • In Tomb Raider: The Last Revelation, on the level "Guardian of Semerkhet", Lara must outmaneuver a gigantic black bull (the titular guardian) and lure it into ramming and breaking three blocks of stone. Just to make it difficult, the bull is immune to every weapon Lara has.
    • The Tyrannosaurus rex in Tomb Raider: Anniversary attacks this way and is killed with Deadly Dodging. Also, because of the game's Enrage feature, where when you shoot a monster enough times, they will charge at you. Combined with the Adrenaline Dodge feature, it turned EVERY monster fight - be it bosses or regular animals - into a Bullfight Boss.
  • "Bull" the razorback boar from Ty the Tasmanian Tiger is fought this way, coupled with Deadly Dodging. Considering he's the size of a small house, you really don't have much choice. He's also smart enough to skid to a halt if the player moves out of the way too soon.
  • Several bosses in the first two Wario Land games. The final boss of Wario Land: Shake It! for the Wii charges at you, but crashes if you bounce on his head once or twice as he does.
  • In Skylanders: SWAP Force, the first fight is a bullfight boss where, in order to damage the boss, you must make it charge at you, only to get out of the way and make it charge a wall (thus lowering its defenses and letting you damage it). The boss is simple; wait in its sights until it Turns Red, and then it charges. If you're using Stealth Elf or Stink Bomb and have them turn invisible, then the boss won't follow you around — because he can't see you.
  • Ori and the Will of the Wisps has the Horn Beetle, which like its mook cousins, is only vulnerable to attacks from behind, and has a habit of stunning itself by smacking into the walls, but makes the additional tactical error of jumping mid-charge, allowing Ori to dash underneath.

    Puzzle Games 
  • The last boss fight of Bendy and the Ink Machine Chapter 4 starts with a phase where the boss, Boris, charging at Henry. After he charges, he stands still for a moment as thick ink spurts out of his open ribcage, which Henry can use to make himself a weapon.

    Real-Time Strategy 
  • Pikmin 2: The segmented crawbster rolls after your captain in order to crush him, and must be goaded into hitting the walls of its cave in order to stun and make it expose its weak spot. However, this also causes rocks to fall from the ceiling and potentially crush Pikmin.

    Role-Playing Games 
  • Bloodborne: The Maneater Boar often charges toward you, and you guide it into crashing toward a wall and land a visceral attack. However, if you aren't cautious enough, it can land a back kick toward you when you approach its back.
  • Crypt Of The Necrodancer has a few enemies that fit this category
    • The armadillo enemies travel in a straight line towards you until they hit a wall or other obstacle, at which point they lie on their backs for a few beats (during which you can hit them). Hitting them while they move makes them change directions. The lowest level version of these can only go in orthogonal directions, but higher level armadillos can also go diagonally
    • The minotaur miniboss has a charging attack and when it hits a wall/obstacle sleeps for a few turns
    • With the Dead Ringer Boss, there are 4 bells that you must get it to run into, after which, the battle is over. Of course, you could hit the bells yourself if you want to summon minibosses and make the fight much harder.
  • Dead Island has aptly named Rams, a large type of zombie who attacks with, you guessed it, charges. The only way (or at least most effective way) to defeat it is to dodge its charge at the last minute and attack its back, the only spot which takes more than 1 damage.
  • Diablo III: The Butcher, the final boss of Act I. There's even an achievement for finishing him off while he's stunned from the charge.
  • Dragalia Lost: While a few dragons employ this kind of attack, the most fitting is the Ox Dragon, Gozu Tenno. His shikigami replica in Cursed Connections makes use of this and it must be dodged... preferably by guiding him into the sealing stones at the edge of the arena. Said stones provide a permanent 20% Defense buff to the shikigami per stone, giving another incentive to having them destroyed.
  • Dragon Age II: The Final Boss of Mark of the Assassin, Duke Monfort on his pet wyvern Leopold, can be made to fall off the arena’s cliff which lets the player damage them without retaliation as they climb back up the edge.
  • E.V.O.: Search for Eden: Nearly every boss is fought this way, but this may have more to do with the game being Nintendo Hard than this trope, however. The first boss does play this completely straight, however.
  • Exile: The crusader boss is ludicrously easy due to a conveniently placed floating platform which means that all one has to do is stab down repeatedly as he charges back and forth under your sword.
  • Horizon Zero Dawn: Aloy is pitted against a Corrupted Behemoth with none of her weapons when Helis captures her. In order to get her weapons back and even the odds, she has to lure the raging monster into smashing the pillars holding up the platform where her weapons are kept.
  • Kingdom Hearts II features an enemy called a Hotrod. It repeatedly charges at its target several times until it gets tired. It is implemented unusually as it is possible to block its attack if there's only one of them, but the game encourages the player to dodge it.
  • Legend of Legaia: Xain is a minotaur who attacks the support pillar holding up the ledge on which an underground town had been built (by charging at it head-first over and over). The party has to stop him before he is successful. During the fight, he employs several standard Bullfight Boss attacks and tactics.
  • Mega Man:
    • Mega Man Battle Network: DrillMan and ChargeMan are almost constantly trying to ram into you while you fight them, only pausing briefly to perform some of their other attacks. This is made more complicated by the fact that both have other things charging down the rows they aren't on (Drills for the former, train cars for the latter).
    • Mega Man Star Force: Taurus Fire, an anthropomorphic bull boss, attacks by charging you. It's an easy attack to avoid due to its rather long start-up as well as the combat design of the series requiring that to not get run over you merely have to press left or right... once. The move's startup animation is very similar to that of an attack that needs to be shielded instead, and the aforementioned move can't be shielded. It's also extremely fast in the final rematches.
  • Monster Hunter: The series is all about fighting huge-ass beasts that can fling you around like a ragdoll without the proper skills, items, and equipment. Even small monsters like Bullfango and Rhenoplos are known for charging at hunters. Later bosses, however, mix it up in different ways: some will charge at you, do a skid turn, and charge again before you can attack; others recover too fast to take advantage of their moment of weakness (you need to exploit other movements and not attack when they charge); and there are a couple of monsters for which you have to watch their body language so you know when to dodge (the actual attack is too fast to dodge).
    • Monster Hunter 2 (dos): One early-stage boss monster, the Bulldrome, is the King Mook of the Bullfango and inherits their trait of attacking hunters with a charge attack.
    • Monster Hunter Freedom 2 introduces the Tigrex, a Flying Wyvern that charges at you almost non-stop, rarely interspersing them with bite attacks. Sometimes it brakes so hard that it launches boulders with its claws, which can inflict status conditions depending on the terrain, while other times it scrabbles for purchase and turns around several times, ending with a spin attack that swats away any Hunters or small monsters it hits. Sidestepping its charges is the key to defeating it, as they wear down its stamina like crazy, causing it to get tired and happily gobble up any Drugged, Tinged or Poisoned Meats you set out for it.
    • Monster Hunter 3 (Tri) introduces the Barroth, who doesn't charge straight forward; it will adjust its course during a charge in order to hit you. One also has to be careful of the tail swipe that follows right afterwards.
    • Monster Hunter 4 introduces the Seltas, a rhinoceros beetle-like creature that will fly straight towards you, intending to spear you with its horn. If you dodge while near a cliff face, the Seltas will get its horn stuck briefly, allowing you some free hits. Then he takes it even further by performing a Fusion Dance with the Seltas Queen, upon which their combined charge does massive damage. The fact that it wears out the Queen's stamina quite rapidly is not such a smart move on the Seltas' part, since a hungry Queen can and will eat the Seltas accompanying her.
  • Phantasy Star Online 2: The Quartz Dragon spends most of its time trying to ram into you, shooting lasers at you, or swiping at you with its horn (which is one of its weak spots) the rest of time. Sometimes, it'll loop into the air and dive at you from above if it misses with the initial pass, and when it gets lower on HP, will try to fake you out by feigning a charge.
  • Pokémon Legends: Arceus: Lord Kleavor attacks mainly by charging at you while swinging its axes. Defeating it involves baiting it into charging the walls of its arena, stunning it and giving you the chance to battle it directly.
  • Shin Megami Tensei III: Nocturne inverts this with Matador. His schtick is to buff his evasion and aim to max, and if you don't debuff him, you'll suffer misses, which carry Press Turn penalties. In other words, he turns you into a Bullfight Boss.

    Real Time Strategy 
  • Dawn of War: Retribution has Daisy, Ork battlewagon. It has ridiculous amounts of HP and tends to become invulnerable during the fight, so massed lascanons won't do much. Constant and quite numerous Ork reinforcements also don't help. Luckily, while its charge attack can easily wipe squads, it allows you to lead the vehicle into explosive barrels that will take down 90% of its HP. Several bosses of the first mission also have charge attacks. Seeing as you only have the very basic (and incredibly squishy) troops and level one heroes, dodging them is highly preferable.
  • Heart of the Swarm: One of the Primal Zerg bosses has this as his main attack, along with summoning mooks and shooting you.

    Shoot Em Ups 
  • Several story mode spellcards from the Touhou Project fighting games were like this:
    • Marisa's "Stardust Reverie" and Remilia's "Bad Lady Scramble" in Immaterial and Missing Power; Iku's "Acanthodii of the Thunder Clouds," Remilia's "Bombard Night," and Aya's "Sarutahiko's Guidance" in Scarlet Weather Rhapsody.
    • Even the danmaku games do this: Shikigami "Ran Yakumo" has one of the two bosses spinning around the screen, occasionally locking in on your character's position.
    • There's also Marisa's Last Word spellcard from Imperishable Night, "Blazing Star," in which she turns herself into a giant laser comet and launches herself at you. Sort of subverted in that you can't hit her, and because it's a Last Word, you can't bomb to escape; your only option is timing it out.
    • Double Spoiler gives Reimu "Fantasy Dimensional Rift", Suika "Missing Power", and Koishi "DNA's Flaw". Though that last one only has it as a relatively minor element.
    • The second-to-last spellcard of Fairy Wars, "Fairy Overdrive", can work this way if Luna is the lead boss.
  • Several of the bosses in Stargunner fit this trope (as if the game wasn't hard enough already). Unfortunately for you, your ship's weak shields mean that getting hit by one is instant death. Hope you had some lives to spare.

    Simulation Games 

    Sports Games 
  • Bald Bull from the Punch-Out!! series is similar, except the trick there is to take him by the horns (i.e. hit him with a jab just as he's about to unleash his Bull Charge).

    Stealth-Based Games 
  • Almost every Metal Gear game ends with an unarmed one on one duel (there are two in MGS1). Evading and striking at the opponent's back or sides after a miss is the only way to get through these, as they can usually punch out Snake with only two or three good hits. The last boss of Metal Gear Solid 2: Sons of Liberty acts like this for a part of his duel, leaving flame trails with each charge.
  • Bane and the titan mooks in Batman: Arkham Asylum. Unlike many Bullfight Bosses, they're smart enough to pull up before running into the walls, unless you enrage/distract them with a batarang in the face while they're charging.
    • Batman: Arkham City has Clayface. It's not necessary to do so, but you're in for quite a long battle if you don't bait them into crashing into the bombs in the corners of the arena.

    Survival Horror Games 

    Third-Person Shooter 
  • Garradors are like this in Resident Evil 4. Their only vulnerable spot is on their back, and if they hear you, they'll come charging. If you move in time, they'll end up getting their claws stuck in the wall long enough to shoot them in the back for massive damage. The other option is just to walk, in which case they can't hear you, and you can sneak up on them at your leisure.
  • This is also how you deal with Jaws when you first meet him in James Bond: Everything or Nothing.
  • The Berserker in Gears of War. You actually need to lead her to a door, so she bashes it in with her charge, allowing you to take the fight outside. Where you shoot her with a massive space-laser.
  • Most enemy types in Oni have some sort of charging attack which can be anticipated and dodged, leading to an easy counterattack. For the more powerful enemies, these attacks are unblockable and dodging is the only defense.
  • Sam from Red Dead Revolver is fought like this. Initially, you can use the tables on the bar floor to knock him off balance, then using the showgirls stage when you run out of tables.
  • Brutes in Dead Space should be treated like this (with liberal use of Stasis) until you remove a limb, whereupon it becomes playing tennis with the boss. Killing one without taking damage in Dead Space 2 earns the "Brute Juke" achievement.
  • In Mega Man Legends 2, a few undamageable elephant reaverbots in one room can only be beaten by luring them into holes in the floor. You also need to jump over the holes or the elephant reaverbots will stop short.
  • One of the bosses in Heretic II is the Trial Beast, and its primary attack involves it roaring before charging at you in order to trample you underfoot, but you can run out of the way and cause it to slam into a wall, stunning it briefly (this can also be achieved with a powered-up Phoenix Bow shot). One way this fight varies from the norm for this trope is that it can be damaged at any time by your weapons, not just during the stun period, but this is a fairly lengthy process of killing the Beast, and it chews through your ammo. Fortunately, there's an easier and quicker way: lure it into smashing both of the pillars holding up a bridge overlooking the Trial Pit you fight it in, causing the bridge to fall on it for an instant kill. Just be careful not to get run over while you're doing this.
  • The first boss in Splatoon (and the third in Splatoon 2) is the Mighty Octostomp, a big metal cube with legs and a face whose main strategy boils down to "run or slide towards the player, jump, and try to land on them face-first." The player has to get the Octostomp to notice them, get out of the way before they get squashed, and then cover one of the sides of the machine in ink so they can swim to the top to attack an exposed tentacle. Later fights against this boss add other elements the player needs to consider (un-inkable side panels, a machine gun, buckles holding on an ink-proof cover that will prevent the player from climbing until they shoot them off, extra faces that prevent the player from dodging sideways, etc.), but it all ultimately boils down to the same strategy for both the boss and the player. It's even easier in the sequel if the player uses Dualies, as pressing the jump button while moving and shooting will have them perform an evasive somersault in that direction.

    Wide Open Sandbox 
  • Russell from Bully is a textbook example. He even paws the ground with his feet before charging. And the Bullworth Bulls mascot also embodies this.

    Non-Video Game Examples 
Comic Books:
  • Madame Mirage manages to defeat the massive elephant-themed supervillian Pachydoom by tricking him into running off a skyscraper in this fashion.
  • Captain America: An early Silver Age story had Cap face a whole small army of goons with one big goon in a primitive non-powered Iron Man suit. Cap took care of him by taunting to charge at his shield and dodge the goon (complete with an "¡Olé!"), who rams headfirst into a fireplace and is buried in a pile of rubble, out of action.
  • Robin (1993): The Teen Titans defeat Brutus, a minotaur, by having Dodge teleport out of the way of a charging attack at the last minute leading Brutus to set off an explosion one of his own allies had hidden.
  • In Day of the Dollmaker, Supergirl dodges Baroness Blitzkrieg's charge, letting the villainess crash into a row of Christmas trees.

Fan Works:

Films — Live-Action:

  • Man of Steel: Superman was the bull and Faora was the bullfighter. She landed a couple of good ones on him by reading that he'll fly at her and then weaving out of the way before hammering him in the back.
  • When Professor Brainard is confronted by the two goons guarding his stolen car in The Absent-Minded Professor, he uses this not so much to deal with them as to trick them into busting the door open so he can get the car out of the warehouse. In fact, the fact that it involves them taking blows to the head starts to work against him as they eventually get knocked out before the door is down, and he has to revive them to get them to give it one more go.
  • Confessions of a Psycho Cat: After being goaded and wounded, Rocco loses all of his fighting finesse and blindly charges like a bull at Virginia, who is fittingly dressed as a matador. She dances around him like a matador playing with a bull before finishing him off with an espada de matar toros ('sword for killing bulls').

Live-Action TV:

  • Doctor Who: In "The Stones Of Blood" the Fourth Doctor uses this tactic to lure one of the Ogri over a cliff, waving his coat to lure it to the edge and then sweeping the coat aside with an "¡Olé!", complete with accompanying Spanish background music.

Tabletop Games:

  • Dungeons & Dragons 3.5 has a rare player example with the Dungeoncrasher Fighter variant. This class has the ability to bull rush an opponent and slam them against a wall, dealing heavy damage.

Web Original:

  • In The Order of the Stick, Roy realises he can't beat the half-orc Thog in full Berserker Rage mode, so he goads him into smashing Roy into the pillars of the arena one-by-one (relying on his own Super-Toughness rather than actually dodging). He finishes the fight by kicking Thog into the wobbliest pillar and running away as the roof collapses on him.
  • Underling has this with Lazarus in Chapter Six.
  • Zero Punctuation: Yahtzee references this trope in his review of Batman: Arkham Asylum, annoyed at how common the trope is in video games.
    Yahtzee: And then there's the fight with the roided-up juggernaut fellow which is repeated something like twelve times, which you win by—and I hope you're wearing a sturdy hat, because this may blow your mind—sidestepping their charge so that they run into a wall, a gameplay mechanic that is only slightly less common than the fucking start button.
  • In Devil Man The Birth: One of the people transforms into a dragon/dinosaur demon with long horns. When he faces off against Akira, who's fused with Amon to become Devilman, he charges at him with his horns trying to impale him. Akira jumps out of the way, grabs his horns, and throws him off the catwalk to his death.

    Real Life 
  • Happens quite often in foil fencing. Two fencers will run at each other and try to score a point. The director will have to decide who attacked first, and therefore got the point. The director often has to throw out the point. Unless it's epee, in which case he just awards the point to both.
  • In bullfighting: bulls.
  • A pretty good war strategy is to make the enemy send all their firepower somewhere critical, and evacuate everything. Then, when they have absolutely no manner of defense, you hit them with your weapons until they surrender.

 
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Video Example(s):

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Paper Macho Koopa Troopa

The Koopa spins in its shell at Mario and he has to dodge it and make it slam into a wall, then hammer it afterwards.

How well does it match the trope?

5 (2 votes)

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Main / BullfightBoss

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