We’re all just waiting to get to the Fireworks Factory. Final bosses are supposed to be the exciting reward waiting at the end of your journey. A truly epic final battle fills your heart with hot-blooded determination, but sometimes the last boss is a total letdown. We’re pointing the spotlight at some of the weakest conclusions in recent memory, and we’re really only reserving this list for the absolute nadir.
If there was a boss that you could fight for real, or if the developers tried even a little bit to give a satisfying final battle, then you won’t find the boss on this list. This is for the true dregs. I’m not a picky man, so only the most egregious examples even generate a blip on my lame-o-meter. We’re counting them down in no particular order; these are some of the lamest battles in recent memory.
WARNING: There are major story spoilers ahead! We’re going to be talking about final bosses, after all. Every game on our list is many years old, so you won’t find any recent games here — except for Ghost Recon: Breakpoint. But I don’t think anyone played that, so we’re good.
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Ganon [Link: The Faces Of Evil]
Nothing about this infamously bad Phillips CDi game is good — but the final battle might be one of the worst things ever. The Legend of Zelda series is known for having some pretty memorable final encounters with Ganon. He’s transformed into pig-monsters and more in his long-running role as series protagonist, and this time he goes down with barely a fight.
All you need is a magic book. When Link breaches Ganon’s lair, all you have to do is throw a book right in Ganon’s non-canon face, and that defeats him instantly. No life bar, no battle, no nothing. Weirdly, the book you need to throw is described to hold the ‘secret method’ for defeating Ganon. I think someone got confused — the book is supposed to explain how to beat Ganon! That’s like smacking Dracula with the Bible to defeat him. It makes no sense!
Lambent Brumak [Gears of War 2]
Gears of War 2 is a triumphant sequel, a game that improves basically everything about the original. Heck, in some ways this lame final battle is an improvement over the incredibly annoying final boss of Gears of War 1. But, I’m a jerk, so I’m putting Gears of War 2 for its wet noodle of an ending battle. At least Gears 1 had something!
After a fun final mission where you go nuts riding a T-Rex sized monster strapped with multiple machine guns, you’ll escape a huge crater and “fight” an impressively monstrous transformation. The Lambent Brumak looks cool, but there’s a reason why I put “fight” in quotes. You’re stuck to a turret, and it’s your job to shoot this poor thing until it dies. That’s it.
I’m not even sure it can kill you. What seems like a final battle turns out to be a dud. According to the devs, all the art for the last boss was complete, they just ran out of time when it came to adding the ‘battle’ into the final battle.
Discover more disappointing, dreary, and just plain lame final bosses on the next page.