Gossip Stone: What Makes A Good Dungeon Boss?

Hello everyone and welcome to the latest edition of Gossip Stone! This time around my main focus are the bosses that inhabit the dungeons we traverse in the Zelda series. What make these enemies “bosses”? I have two main points I’d like to discuss today. The first being similarities to earlier encountered enemies and the second being their overall power and size. So without further ado guys let’s hop right into today’s Gossip Stone! 

First of all let’s talk about the similarities bosses have to the enemies previously encountered in their respective dungeons. We will also talk about the bosses fitting a certain dungeon “theme”. So let’s start things off with the enemies you find in the dungeon. A really good example of this would be in Dodongo’s Cavern, which is a dungeon you explore as young Link in Ocarina of Time. Early on in the dungeon you find baby Dodongo’s which in their infant stage are pretty much short explosive worms. Progress a little further and there we have a regular Dodongo. These guys are larger versions of the baby Dodongos except the have front legs and a considerably longer tail. They still retain their explosive capabilities as well which fit in quite well with the fire theme of the dungeon. Progress all the way to then end and you’ll find yourself face to face with the Infernal Dinosaur, King Dodongo. This is the largest Dodongo out of the three types and it has grown hind legs now as well. This Dodongo no longer has explosive abilities but it does have the ability to conjure up massive balls of fire inside itself and then shoot them at Link which fits the fire theme perfectly. I believe that having a sort of enemy progression stage as well as fitting the theme of the dungeon really made this boss what it is and this should be the same with all bosses.

Now let’s move onto the importance of size and power in bosses. Power is one thing but size doesn’t always matter when it comes to bosses. The truth is that, not all bosses have to be mega sized versions of regular enemies. Some bosses can be smaller than others yet still just as strong. For example we with the Diabolical Cubus Sisters from Phantom Hourglass. These enemies were just a big as Link was, maybe a bit smaller but there were four of them making it difficult for Link to keep up with them. When it comes to power, it’s an obvious one. Bosses need to be considerably stronger than regular enemies since they need to feel like they really do have authority and power over the dungeon. It has to be THEIR domain and nobody else’s otherwise they aren’t a difficult boss are they. Basically what I’m getting at is that they can’t be a pushover, even the first boss needs to have some level of challenge involved.