Ambiguous Name: Bonus Boss

I'd think a Secret Boss is, logically, a boss who's existence is a secret. Or for short, a non-final True Final Boss. Secret Character pretty much covers the idea ^examples You can't find it by just exploring, don't get a side-quest for it aside of perhaps a brief hint. You have to significantly backtrack, poke every wall, talk to every NPC in the region, or even manipulate system clock to even have it appear., the main point is that not every unlockable boss is a Superboss. Though a Superboss is usually hard to find as well, I'd rather it be defined for difficulty.

Why I don't like the idea of merging Optional Boss and Bonus Boss is just my linguistics. "Bonus" is like "the goodies", they're not necessary, so by that logic mandatory RouteBosses and True Final Boss can't be a Bonus Boss, while "optional" is a more broad word.

We could sort and expand the Sandbox.Bonus Boss Wick Check by categories (not just by order) for an easier view. The colors are nice, but numbers would probably help.

If we did things the way Primis proposed, we wouldn't be using the name Bonus Boss for any of the tropes. The supertrope would be called Optional Boss and Bonus Boss would only exist as a redirect to it (for the sake of preserving inbounds).

Edited by GastonRabbit on Sep 20th 2021 at 2:59:03 PM

What comes to mind is

• Optional Boss, the boss is optional, you do not have to do it at all. Where it appears does matter.
  • Post Game Bonus Boss, End Game Bonus Boss or New Game Plus Bonus Boss, The Super Bonus Boss that comes out after you beat the game or only shows up at the end of the game and is nothing but a challenge. The latter appears in games without a Post Game of some sort, such as returning you to the final Save Point with new stuff.
  • Route Boss, you only fight the boss via a specific route/choice.
  • Winnable Unwinnable Boss, Unwinnable Boss Fight that is designed for to lose on but can win with extra optional work such as level grinding or a second playthrough. Many times the game just continues without any changes while others actually give you unique endings or scenes.
  • Difficulty Exclusive Boss, A Boss you only fight if you choose a specific, usually higher, difficulty. May also be True Final Boss.
  • Skippable Boss, the boss can be skipped via some method technically making it optional.
  • Sidequest Boss, The boss is part of a Side Quest and to complete that Side Quest you gotta beat it... thus being optional and not optional, especially in games which push Side Quests as a large portion of content.

Edited by Memers on Sep 20th 2021 at 2:46:41 AM

Just thought I'd mention that Unwinnable Boss Fight is a redirect to Hopeless Boss Fight, so maybe Not So Hopeless Boss Fight could be used for mandatory battles that don't have to be won and usually aren't in most playthroughs, but can still be won with enough effort and/or if the player is strong enough.

Edited by GastonRabbit on Sep 20th 2021 at 4:48:36 AM

"Winnable Unwinnable Boss" seems covered by Open-Ended Boss Battle.

I really don't see the point of keeping Bonus Boss as anything other than a redirect/disambiguation. We already have Optional Boss to act as the supertrope, and there isn't any consistent usage demonstrated by the wick check.

I mostly like Amonimus's suggestion, but I'd like to amend it by saying Optional Boss should be a supertrope that can have examples that don't fit anywhere else and Bonus Boss should be a disambiguation.

Blurring the line between True Final Boss and Superboss would be bosses that require you to go very far from the "planned" route of a game, yet defeating them does unlock an ending. One such example is Absolute Radiance in Hollow Knight. To fight and defeat her you must mostly ignore the route that you took for the 3 other endings of the game (beating the Hollow Knight and optionally the Radiance) and instead do the game's hardest Boss Rush entirely. Doing so triggers two endings (depending on a previous choice) that are widely different from the others, to the point you could almost say that the story of the game has gone Off the Rails. So, superboss or TFB?

A Superboss is not required for any ending in my view, so a TFB, especially if after it comes a new endings.

Well, what about Sans from Undertale? Even though beating him unlocks an ending, he is harder than any other boss to the point of being an SNK Boss, beating him is not mandatory to getting the Golden Ending (in fact, the game actively discourages you from going down the route to fight him), and even Wikipedia calls him a superboss.

Small nitpick, but Sans would not be anywhere near being an SNK Boss. Undertale is a single-player game without the competitiveness that is needed for an SNK Boss.

Edited by dragonfire5000 on Sep 20th 2021 at 11:46:21 AM

Point is, he breaks the rules so thoroughly that he's on a different level of difficulty compared to the other bosses. And I think that's what being a Super Boss is all about- being on such a higher difficulty level than the other bosses that most players aren't expected to beat them, so the devs put them in their own section way outside of what is required.

Somewhat related to the topic, the rules that Final Boss / True Final Boss can or cannot be That One Boss are very differently enforced depending on the page. Depending on who you ask, either they cannot be at all, must be especially difficult even by TOB standard to qualify, or qualify in exactly the same way as normal bosses.

As of Bonus Boss, from the definition of TOB...

• Bonus Boss is completely banned from being That One Boss, because it's not mandatory to fight them and easily preparable.

The "easily preparable" part irks me. This isn't true for all games (in some you cannot prepare for any boss period, in others you can prepare for any of them), and even if it was, why would preparing for a boss make it less difficult? If anything, the fact you have to prepare just so that you have a chance against it would be a proof of difficulty!

I am honestly not too much of a fan of the distinction, especially if Superboss is added as a trope since as OP described it, there is a judgement on difficulty, making it somewhat of a subtrope of TOB.

What do you think of redefining Bonus Boss to mean "boss you don't have to fight, but get a significant, special reward for beating"?

I don't think "significant, special reward" is necessarily something that can be defined easily- and plus, the name gives little indication of there needing to be a reward of sorts. This will just lead to the same problem.

Unfortunately many of them only give a Bragging Rights Reward, so I don't think this would work.

Edited by towerator on Sep 20th 2021 at 12:32:15 PM

(tbh, some devs "don't expect most players to beat" even normal bosses, Sans just uses a lot of surprise attacks you need a lot of time to get used to, and not that many players ragequitted on him to my knowledge, even if it takes 2-10 hours.)

Ok, so after long consideration, yes, I think Sans is a Superboss, for the reason that the entire G-Route is practically a Earn Your Bad Ending, and I don't recall the game telling you you can even do it. This is a case Story Branch Favoritism / Golden Path, so Sans isn't really Final Boss even if he's the last Route Boss and you don't do other routes.

I suppose Golden Ending that isn't Omega Ending renders non-obvious tough RouteBosses as Superbosses.

My opinion is that a sub-trope of Bonus Boss feels a bit redundant; I understand not all bonus bosses are Superbosses, but all Superbosses are bonus bosses (or Optional Bosses) which means to be complete you'd effectively have to list the same example on both pages.

This also goes along with the fact that the line between what is objective and subjective about difficulty starts becoming kinda YMMV after a certain point. (There's a reason That One Boss is a YMMV trope)

My suggestion is this:

1) Leave Bonus Boss and its examples as-is, perhaps renaming it Superboss or "Brutal Bonus Boss" (similiar to Brutal Bonus Level)

2) Create an entirely new trope called Sidequest Boss that would be a sub-trope of Optional Boss. It wouldn't count any of the super-hard-endgame bosses, and instead is more about pre-endgame side content bosses. A big part of a Bonus Boss is that they're typically encountered in the endgame or even after the game is properly beaten, while a sidequest boss can be encountered in the very beginning of the game.

Edited by Makir on Sep 20th 2021 at 2:51:41 PM

Sidequest Boss is essentially what Secret Boss is, though. And we discussed the objectivity thing before in the That One Boss cleanup, and it was said that the intended difficulty can be objectively traceable- for example, in RPG games, the Super Boss will be at a higher level than the final boss and will have higher stats, and often more HP. Or in other games, the Super Boss will have more attacks and they will hit harder than the final boss.

Not all bosses are tied to a sidequest, though. Since someone brought up Hollow Knight, there are bosses like Grimm who are fought as part of the Grimm Troupe sidequest. But there are also bosses like the Brooding Mawlek, who has no relevance to any stories whatsoever, and you find it by exploring a secluded room in the first area.

Before exploring the idea of further subtropes, the primary question here "should Bonus Boss be a redirect to Optional Boss or still its own trope?"

If we merge it, that would mean Route Boss and Skippable Boss are subtrope of Bonus Boss...that doesn't sit right with me tbh. The point of Bonus Boss is that they sit well outside the main story path. Both Route Boss and Skippable Boss still sit in the main story path, just in different ways than mandatory ones.

I'm personally in favor of Bonus Boss being made a redirect to Optional Boss, and making an Optional Boss a supertrope.

I still think simply renaming Bonus Boss to something more appropriate (again, Brutal Bonus Boss would keep with the theme of Brutal Bonus Level while also keeping the original name) is the best course of action, as I think the trope itself has value; most of the examples listed there are already about super hard optional endgame bosses anyway.

An example of the difference between a Sidequest Boss and a Bonus Boss, here's one from the same game: Dragon's Dogma, specifically the DLC Dark Arisen.

• Death is an optional, absurdly though encounter that's found roaming around. Part of its difficulty is that he can insta-kill regardless of HP or defence. He's a Brutal Bonus Boss.

• Daimon is the final boss of the Dark Arisen DLC but isn't at all relevant or necessary to fight in the main game. He's a though fight, but much less so than Death. He's a Sidequest Boss

Both are optional, both were introduced in the same DLC, and both are even located in the same area, Bitterback Isle, but they're both fundamentally different.

Edited by Makir on Sep 21st 2021 at 8:38:04 PM

I don't see why you're saying this, because we're basically already going to rename Bonus Boss to Super Boss and move all the "super-hard optional bosses" to there. Personally, I'd say that Optional Boss should be the supertrope and Bonus Boss can just be a redirect to Super Boss or maybe Secret Boss.

And I recommend the name Super Boss (instead of, say, Brutal Bonus Boss) because that's what everyone outside the wiki calls it, so I agree that there is no reason for us to be different.

As for the Hollow Knight thing, I suppose it depends on your definition of sidequest. For instance, some people would consider fighting a hidden optional boss a sidequest even if the game itself doesn't count it as an official quest.

The only thing I'd consider a proper, unambiguous Superboss in Hollow Knight is post-level 3 Zote and post-level 1 White Defender, as you do not get anything (except for a small) for defeating them, and unlike their lesser versions they aren't fought in the pantheons either.

To do a sliding scale, from closest to TFB to closest to Superboss:

- Absolute Radiance: Defeating her properly immediately triggers an ending. Clear True Final Boss.

- Pure Vessel: Defeating them does not trigger an ending, but said defeat is needed to obtain the aforementioned ending. Also part of 100% Completion.

- Nightmare King Grimm: Defeating him does not trigger an ending to the game (although it triggers an ending to his arc), but said defeat is needed to obtain the aforementioned ending. Not necessarily part of 100% Completion.

- Grey Prince Zote past level 3: No ending, not needed in the AR ending, not needed in 100% Completion. Clear Superboss.

A Sidequest boss does not need to be a secret boss, it just needs to be part of a sidequest. The sidequest could be labeled with a big old Quest Marker and such. And a secret boss does not need to be part of a side quest… hell even being part of a quest should disqualify it from even being ‘Secret’.

Oh and another type of Optional Boss that comes to mind, a Limited Window Optional Boss, a boss that only has a small window to fight them. Like say Cerberus in FFVIII who is only available to fight during the last part of disk 2 of 4 disks, if you don’t fight him then he is gone forever, is he hard? No. Just quite easy to miss.

That could just be Permanently Missable Content. Side note- I hate it when I have to look up a walkthrough just to avoid missing some secret that disappears if you go too far in a game, because most of the time I'll miss it. That's why, when looking at a trope page for a video game, I always check to see if it has an entry for Permanently Missable Content.