So you’ve grinded your way to the end of the game, you’ve saved up every last consumable item for this moment, your stats are optimally tuned and your weapons are fully upgraded to take on the final boss.
You enter that final room and are greeted by the game’s last encounter, the climax of the game, the end is finally in sight.
You begin the fight, only to find out that the boss is so easy that you could have beaten them with your eyes closed.
Unfortunately, this has been a far too common occurrence in video games over the past twenty years. So much so, that we have compiled a list of some of the most notable offenders. Here are seven final bosses that were total pushovers.
We’re going to start this list with a very obvious final boss, but consider this your spoiler warning for the rest. There’s only one game from this generation and it’s Middle-Earth: Shadow of Mordor, the final entry in case you’re worried about anything recent.
The Legend of Zelda: Ocarina Of Time – Ganon
You might be asking yourself, “How can one of the best games of all time make it on this list?”
The answer is simple, Ganon’s final form is a complete pushover.
For as great as Ocarina of Time was and continues to be, the adventure you go on and enemies you face easily overshadow the final encounter of the game.
To defeat the final boss of the game, the player simply needs to dodge a very missable swing by Ganon, then wail on his obviously glowing tail until he is defeated.
Don’t feel like dodging? No worries! Just shoot him with a single light arrow to cause a massive amount of stun and wack his tail until he falls.
There is no nuance in the battle, no different attack patterns from Ganon, and no other forms that make the battle more difficult. The hardest part of the battle is the test of patience it will put you through when you realize how easy it is.
Although the visual setting is dramatic as you fight upon the rubble left by Ganon’s castle, the battle itself is quite anti-climatic considering the legendary journey you went through to get there.
Fable 2 – Lucien
The mentally deteriorated member of the Fairfax family is one of the easiest bosses in video game history. In fact, he is so easy, it’s hard to even describe him as a boss.
Much like Lucien’s backstory, this final battle in Fable 2 is absolutely tragic.
The protagonist is introduced to Lucien early on in the game as he kills the hero’s sister in cold blood. The stakes then rise even higher as Lucien also decimates the rest of the protagonist’s family (including their dog) to fulfill some absurd prophecy.
If your hate for the character hasn’t boiled over yet, it will when you see how pathetically easy he is to eliminate.
In order to defeat this final boss, all the player needs to do is casually play a music box to drain his shield and shoot him ONE time, then the game is over. During this time, Lucien won’t even attack you, as he just stands there practically asking for his death.
Not only is the final blow extremely unsatisfying, but his death animation leaves even more to be desired.
Once Lucien is shot, he makes a few moaning sounds, and then simply falls backward off of the platform to his death like a stereotypical 80’s action movie villain.
Given the fact that the rest of the bosses in the game are no slouches, it is odd that Lucien is such a pushover considering how distraught he makes our character over the course of Fable 2.
For as much terror and pain Lucien brought to the main character, the fact this is such an easy final boss makes you question what took you so long to kill him in the first place.
Bully – Gary
There is nothing quite like getting revenge on your high school bully. Well, unless that revenge amounts to you easily defeating him by relentlessly mashing the punch button until the game ends.
Rockstar has never been known for ending their games on a satisfying note, and unfortunately, Bully is no different.
Gary is the protagonist’s devil on the shoulder throughout the game. He is constantly influencing Jimmy, the main character, to do things he wouldn’t normally do in order to earn acceptance from Gary and his goons.
After a long and drawn-out chase scene where you race around the school on foot as you try and catch Gary and end his torment, you find yourself on a teetering scaffold as you and Gary go head to head for one final time.
However, for all the buildup this final battle gets, the fight itself is laughably easy.
In order to defeat Gary, all the player must do is mindlessly mash the punch button until he goes to the ground. The player must then repeat this process until Gary’s health bar is depleted.
For an entire game centered around the conflict between Jimmy and Gary, the final conclusion amounts to nothing more than a button-mashing exercise and a completely unsatisfying cutscene that seems to roll the credits far too quickly.
Castlevania II: Simon’s Quest – Dracula
It is no spoiler that the final boss of a Castlevania game is Dracula, however, what is surprising is how laughably simple this form of Dracula is.
Castlevania 2: Simon’s Quest is notorious for its obtuse puzzles that are nearly impossible to complete without a guide. This includes having to randomly sit in a corner for five seconds with a particular item equipped until a gust of wind takes you away.
Although the game gives hints, the translation errors make the hints far more confusing than helpful. Often leading players to scratch their heads as to what to do next.
Due to these various translation errors, the game becomes far more difficult than it already is. However, that only remains true until you reach the final boss encounter.
Dracula himself can be beaten so easily that he won’t even touch you if you play it correctly.
If the player hops onto the platform that Dracula spawns in on, they can simply mash their whip attack in his direction until he is defeated. Doing it in this fashion won’t only beat him, but he won’t even get a single attack in, and the player can beat him before he finishes spawning.
Compared to other final bosses in the Castlevania series such as Dracula X and Castlevania III, this one is by far the biggest pushover in the series’ long history.
Halo 3 – 343 Guilty Spark
Halo 3 launched on the Xbox 360 in 2007 to millions of patient fans all over the globe as they waited to see what Master Chief would look like in full HD.
Not only was this Halo’s big return from a three-year-long hiatus, but it came attached with the tagline “Finish The Fight”, suggesting that fans were in for a massive final battle to end Halo on a high note.
If only those patient fans knew how easy finishing the fight would be, they may have been fine waiting even longer for a more competent finale.
343 Guilty Spark is a recurring character in the Halo franchise, usually appearing towards the end of each game in the trilogy up to that point; an elusive baddie that remained a mystery to fans for years before they got a chance to take 343 Guilty Spark, AKA The Oracle, down.
It wasn’t until Halo 3 when the player was equipped with a giant Spartan Laser that they finally get the chance to eliminate 343 Guilty Spark.
To beat this final boss, the player just needs to shoot the enemy four times with the Spartan Laser and watch as the final cutscenes play out.
For someone who has the nickname of The Oracle, it’s astonishing how much foresight it lacks as it seems unable to dodge your giant laser beam gun.
343 Guilty Spark sits in the middle of the level, barely moves at all, and practically refuses to make the battle even the slightest bit challenging.
For a game that is so beloved and praised in history, the battle that is supposed to “Finish the Fight” is an unsatisfying conclusion for those that poured their time and effort into the series for nearly six years.
Borderlands – The Destroyer
How can something with the name The Destroyer be so easily destroyed? Ask Gearbox, developers of the original Borderlands.
Borderlands was one of the most unique games of its generation that promised to include “87 bazillion” different guns within the game.
Unfortunately, no matter which gun of the 87 bazillion you choose, The Destroyer remains a breeze.
The Destroyer remains entirely stationary throughout the entire battle, making it far too easy to hit the target’s weak points to take them down.
The player just needs to take cover behind the perfectly placed giant rocks and unload magazine after magazine into the amorphous blob.
This final battle makes it feel like The Destroyer doesn’t want to destroy you at all. His giant tentacles that are meant to smack the player around are so slow and obvious that you would almost have to go out of your way to get hit by them.
Although Borderlands was a fantastic game, its final boss was far too easy for the amount of time and effort the player poured into it.
Let’s hope Gearbox can give us something more substantial when Borderlands 3 hits store shelves Sep. 13.
Middle-earth: Shadow of Mordor – Sauron
Although the game was met with high praise, even earning some publications’ 2014 Game of The Year Award, it earned those honors in spite of its final battle.
Sauron, the legendary antagonist of the Tolkien Lord of the Rings books, should have been an easy finale to nail.
Unfortunately, the final battle with Sauron is nothing more than a glorified series of quick-time events.
Middle-earth: Shadow of Mordor was an innovative game that introduced us to the Nemesis system and expanded on the Batman-esque combat that the game took heavy inspiration from. However, the final battle with Sauron is far from innovative or inspired.
The most exciting part of the final battle is the small fights with the various Hands prior to reaching the Black Gate to face Sauron, but those battles are just more of the same that you face throughout the regular game.
When you finally reach Sauron, you might be expecting a grueling combo-laced, dodging brawl that the game has taught you how to perfect from the beginning.
Instead, the game massively subverts the player’s expectations by removing a battle altogether in place of a series of simple quick-time events.
The fact that such a brilliant game is reduced to such an anti-climatic battle to defeat the evil of all evil makes the ending feel lackluster and makes Sauron look like a wimp.
It’s clear that the developers agreed too, as DLC released post-launch allows you to actually fight Sauron in battle, helping reduce the negative backlash towards the end of the game.
Unfortunately, had Warner Brothers and Monolith Studios included that battle in the base game, they may have avoided our list of final bosses that are total pushovers.
The games on our list, regardless of their final battles, are all fantastic. Even though the final bosses were kind of jokes, they remind us all that games are more about the journey rather than the destination.
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