Stealth Based Games and Boss Fights

[AmberSword]

I recently came across a dilemma after reading some stuff about ninjas.. I don't know if the answer is obvious, but how does a stealth based game... Handle boss fights? I mean, if its a stealth based game, chances are you can't even let the boss know you're there, or at the very least, you'll have to be actively avoiding it while it's aware of your presence, so how do you avoid an anti-climatic battle?

Most stealth games these days (especially the triple A ones) mix stealth with other genres like water and tea bags, and when it comes to a boss what little stealth in the game is often completely thrown out of the window. I'm really curious to know if there are any games out there that somehow managed to maintain the stealth aspect even through bossfights.

 

[josemlopes]

I guess it worked well in Batman in the fight with Mr. Freeze

 

[Casual Shinji]

The Last of Us only has one real boss fight and it's completely depended on stealth. It's like hide and seek with a switch blade, and if you play it without Listen mode it's incredibly tense.

 

[Chimpzy_v1legacy]

Metal Gear Solid 3 has The End who pitches you in a sniper battle that makes you sneak around a large area trying to track him down, while he is trying to do the same to you. The only example I remember of a boss that actually uses stealth against you.

Metal Gear Solid 4 has Crying Wolf, who can be beaten with stealth by hiding under a supply truck and quickly snapping off some shots when she comes out of her mech suit to look for you.

 

[Pink Gregory]

The Last of Us only has one real boss fight and it's completely depended on stealth. It's like hide and seek with a switch blade, and if you play it without Listen mode it's incredibly tense.

Now here's where some boss fights miss out on a concept. Hide and seek. Not 'the boss is totally visible at all times, but you can hide', but that + 'the boss is hiding'; though I haven't played the game so I wouldn't know.

Much as I haven't played it in forever, I imagine the closest is the End in MGS3.

 

[Casual Shinji]

The Last of Us only has one real boss fight and it's completely depended on stealth. It's like hide and seek with a switch blade, and if you play it without Listen mode it's incredibly tense.

Now here's where some boss fights miss out on a concept. Hide and seek. Not 'the boss is totally visible at all times, but you can hide', but that + 'the boss is hiding'; though I haven't played the game so I wouldn't know.

Well, there's three stages to the fight and only in the final stage will he start hiding himself. But when he does, and assuming you're not using Listen mode, it's incredibly hard to find him. And when he hears you he'll come after you like a maniac.

 

[rofltehcat]

Oh god, Deus Ex HR with its stupid boss fights... I hated them in my (nearly) pacifist ghost-playthrough. Still, the last boss fight was actually ok stealth-wise.

I'd say the boss fights in Mark of the Ninja did it right. There is a very challenging boss fight in which you are locked in a room with some very elite enemies but even thought they have ultra sound/radar/whatever you can still do it in a wholy

You'd think concept of boss fights actually lends itself to games well. Normally, in boss fights you are facing an enemy that is much stronger than you so you need to use your brains, gadgets and reflexes to avoid, dodge and trick him. Often you simply use the boss's larger power or their self-certainty against them.
So for example a good stealth boss fight would be: Hide, attack the boss once he gets in a good position. Then the boss learns a little, you have to change your tactics and actually lure him somewhere. Then the boss maybe backs into a corner and shoots everything he sees. So you just leave. Or you leave and find the light switch and turn that off. Or you damage some piping to release toxic/flamable gas to force him to get out of the corner (or you just leave and let him burn/suffocate).

I also think one of the (few) boss fights in the new Thief is good. You can either work to kill the boss. Or you can just avoid him and then leave. Or you just leave, leaving him to shout at shadows and make a fool of himself.
The boss fight of the last Splinter Cell game was also okay, I guess. You have to avoid an enemy and slip from cover to cover until you have a chance to get him in melee. I also think there was a timer on it so you had to keep up the pressure.
Hitman Absolution also had some "bosses", well protected and very strong when contronted directly, key targets: You could for example sneak around, find your target and strangle her off into the shadows in the two seconds her guards were not looking. Or you could sneak around and kill every guard. Or you could just get to a good position and shoot her (and all the guards... or was there a no alarm-thingy for that mission?). Or you could do the completely unexpected, sneak to somewhere else in the building, break into the special weapons collection vault, steal the rare poison and then poison her sushi.

Overall, I'd say that a boss fight does not always have to be about actual combat or even killing/incapacitating your enemy.
Imagine some big security guys sent to catch you and you just slip by him in the shadows, leave and rob some other part of the building blind while he directs his men to search for you in the other wing. You might not have killed the guy but his boss might, or at the very least fire him so he is no real danger to you anymore anyways (unless he then goes full arch-nemesis in which case he'd probably end up in an asylum).

 

[Lieju]

The best 'stealth boss battle' (Apart from Metal Gear) I can think of was with Mr. Freeze in Arkham City.
It was okay I guess.

I think the kind of scenarios where you'd face several weaker enemies at once, that wander around the place might work?
Maybe you have to fight a team of enemies that power up if they become alarmed, so the best way to fight them is to take them out without them noticing?

The Arkham games had many similar scenarios, like the one in Arkham Asylum where you need to approach Harley without anyone noticing.

It adds the challenge of not just being undetected, but doing it in the way that no-one even knows you were there.

 

[Vegosiux]

I recently came across a dilemma after reading some stuff about ninjas.. I don't know if the answer is obvious, but how does a stealth based game... Handle boss fights? I mean, if its a stealth based game, chances are you can't even let the boss know you're there, or at the very least, you'll have to be actively avoiding it while it's aware of your presence, so how do you avoid an anti-climatic battle?

The problem here isn't stealth, the problem is that for some reason people expect bosses to be "epic one on one battles that songs will be written about" as opposed to "the exam that puts your abilities to the test".

Sneaking through a deathtrap course while working your way to the boss is the true "epic" bit, even if all you do when you get to the boss is whack it with a crowbar and it dies.

Why does it have to actually be a "battle", why doesn't it count if it's a different aspect of gameplay?

 

[beastro]

The first Thief games worked well with their end encounters.

First one was sneaking passed the Big Bads to switch a MacGuffin with one that would explode in his face and kill him, the second was screwing with the next Big Bads factory to make it go bonkers and tear itself apart as he died hiding in his bunker within it as he rants and mocks you through a speaker system.

The first was a little weak and anticlimactic, but I have a feeling that was the point the encounter was trying to make giving that it was an amusing way to kill a supernatural villain, while the second was fleshed out with you spending the whole last level running around hiding from robotic minions as you went from each part of the factory and messed with it also giving you the option to visit the outside of the villains bunker and stare at him through the observation mirror unable to actually get at him.

 

[AmberSword]

Seems like a few gems I've missed here, the Mr. Freeze fight in Batman: AC I definitely remember, it was pretty well executed, I thoroughly enjoyed it, but still felt it just sort of lacked something.

You'd think concept of boss fights actually lends itself to games well. Normally, in boss fights you are facing an enemy that is much stronger than you so you need to use your brains, gadgets and reflexes to avoid, dodge and trick him. Often you simply use the boss's larger power or their self-certainty against them.
So for example a good stealth boss fight would be: Hide, attack the boss once he gets in a good position. Then the boss learns a little, you have to change your tactics and actually lure him somewhere. Then the boss maybe backs into a corner and shoots everything he sees. So you just leave. Or you leave and find the light switch and turn that off. Or you damage some piping to release toxic/flamable gas to force him to get out of the corner (or you just leave and let him burn/suffocate).

What that fight lacked was the increased desperation of the villain I suppose, it was repeating
"use tactic > boss learns > change tactic", maybe it was just Mr. Freeze's ego at work, not wising up and completely avoiding guerilla jumps completely, but wel.. you're playing a Batman game, his reputation and calibre has to have an effect somehow.

About The Last of Us and the MGS Series... PS exclusives, I really want to try them... but console gaming here in my country (SEA region) is pretty darn expensive, used games are almost non existent, and shelf prices remain constant even after a year or 2, I don't want to pirate, so there's that.

Mark of The Ninja is definitely on my radar now, thanks for the heads up. The new Thief game seems to have abandoned its roots for Indiana Jones during the chapter climaxes, at least that's what I read in reviews, which kept me away from it. The older thief games... I'm not sure if I'll be able to stomach, I mean, I am playing through the first Half Life right now, and Thief was around the same period, but doesn't have the benefit of being called a legendary game.. I'm a little apprehensive about purchasing really old titles, call me spoiled but that's reality.

snip

Fair enough I guess, in certain games this would work, one game I recall which worked like this would be Dishonored, you could kill the boss right where he stood if you wanted. What sold me on the game though was the choice of ridding the boss in alternative rather crafty ways, and come to think of it, the game did manage to incorporate stealth into its boss fights if you chose to, like sneaking a tranquillized boss out and leaving him in a dumpster (or was it a dumpster?).

I guess we can agree to disagree on the path leading to the boss being the real epic challenge, because I expect a Boss to be a little more than a regular mook.

 

[Someone Depressing]

Mixing them up with puzzle elements seem to work pretty well. Haunting Ground, a very under rated game for the PS2, is 95% running away from the nonthreatening but still sorta creepy villians before getting your blonde ass under a bench and silently weeping, 5% awesome puzzle boss fights with blazing techno music. But the stealth part isn't really a big part of the fights, though it can occasionally be helpful.

The Harley Quinn sequence in Arkhum Asylum was also, like, really fucking awesome. Hated the rest, though.

Siren: Blood Curse has an interesting boss fight against some dude with a gun whom I can't name because it would ruin the story. You can both find each other instantly by using "sightjacking", so you've got to be careful, and know what you're doing; you have to both stay away from him and also progress through the stage like normal, except you can't rely on your good old friend, Conveniently Placed Wardrobe.

Hitman is also pretty cool about this. You can... either go through a tedious process in which you pick shit up to get more shit before you do the thing that kills the person, pick up their shit, and go to the next stage, or you can push them into pool where they Insta-Drown!

..Really, "boss-fight" implies that it's a big, climactic, tension-relieving showdown. And that's not what stealth's about. Or really any genre other than straight-up action. So the two don't mix well, I guess.

 

[Vegosiux]

I guess we can agree to disagree on the path leading to the boss being the real epic challenge, because I expect a Boss to be a little more than a regular mook.

Well, a regular mook wouldn't be able to design an death trap obstacle course. Not every evil overlord rules through brute force alone.

Least that's the way I see it.

 

[EvanJO]

Oh god, Deus Ex HR with its stupid boss fights... I hated them in my (nearly) pacifist ghost-playthrough. Still, the last boss fight was actually ok stealth-wise.

I'd say the boss fights in Mark of the Ninja did it right. There is a very challenging boss fight in which you are locked in a room with some very elite enemies but even thought they have ultra sound/radar/whatever you can still do it in a wholy

You'd think concept of boss fights actually lends itself to games well. Normally, in boss fights you are facing an enemy that is much stronger than you so you need to use your brains, gadgets and reflexes to avoid, dodge and trick him. Often you simply use the boss's larger power or their self-certainty against them.
So for example a good stealth boss fight would be: Hide, attack the boss once he gets in a good position. Then the boss learns a little, you have to change your tactics and actually lure him somewhere. Then the boss maybe backs into a corner and shoots everything he sees. So you just leave. Or you leave and find the light switch and turn that off. Or you damage some piping to release toxic/flamable gas to force him to get out of the corner (or you just leave and let him burn/suffocate).

I also think one of the (few) boss fights in the new Thief is good. You can either work to kill the boss. Or you can just avoid him and then leave. Or you just leave, leaving him to shout at shadows and make a fool of himself.
The boss fight of the last Splinter Cell game was also okay, I guess. You have to avoid an enemy and slip from cover to cover until you have a chance to get him in melee. I also think there was a timer on it so you had to keep up the pressure.
Hitman Absolution also had some "bosses", well protected and very strong when contronted directly, key targets: You could for example sneak around, find your target and strangle her off into the shadows in the two seconds her guards were not looking. Or you could sneak around and kill every guard. Or you could just get to a good position and shoot her (and all the guards... or was there a no alarm-thingy for that mission?). Or you could do the completely unexpected, sneak to somewhere else in the building, break into the special weapons collection vault, steal the rare poison and then poison her sushi.

Overall, I'd say that a boss fight does not always have to be about actual combat or even killing/incapacitating your enemy.
Imagine some big security guys sent to catch you and you just slip by him in the shadows, leave and rob some other part of the building blind while he directs his men to search for you in the other wing. You might not have killed the guy but his boss might, or at the very least fire him so he is no real danger to you anymore anyways (unless he then goes full arch-nemesis in which case he'd probably end up in an asylum).

HR wasn't really a stealth based game, though. It has stealth elements, and you could surely play the entire game via stealth, or you could just kick doors open, punch your way through walls, and turn the levels into a blood-soaked paradise in which lead was god and you were his prophet.

 

[WhiteFangofWhoa]

Some folks said this already, but most of the Metal Gear bosses that aren't confined to a small room.

After the opening cutscene when they introduce themselves, they do actually have to spot you before shooting you, and you have lots of combat options compared to some other stealth games. It is possible to beat Vulcan Raven (at least on Normal) without ever letting him see you by using Claymore mines and Nikita remote missiles, or simply shooting him in the back and running into cover. Same for The Fury- dude starts cussing like a sailor when he's injured and can't find you, it's funny.

The trouble happens in games like Deus Ex with nonlinear character development where you could potentially put all of your skill points and gear purchases into stealth, and reap the benefits of never being detected... until you find a mandatory boss battle and have poor combat options for dealing with them, particularly if the developers took the shortcut of automatically making them know your location (rather lazy IMO since as early as Winback on the N64 I can remember bosses that would stop shooting and search the room when they lost sight of you). The obvious thing would be to spend at least some points on a sidearm in case of such an emergency, but ideally there shouldn't be a 'bad skill build' that can screw you over that way in such an open game.

 

[sXeth]

You need a boss that can't be defeated conventionally. An arena that allows for stealth, but still has some danger (active searching from the boss, or traps), and an objective that allows the hero to strike the boss or by pass them. This latter could simply be the bosses blind spot, disabling their shield generators or similar targets, or the areas exit. You could probably even combo it and have to maneuver the bosses blind spot to plant a bomb on a generator and have to exit the area unseen, leaving the boss to be buried in the explosion after.

It's not a hard concept, but you get a lot of games that just turn it into some generic mess (Far Cry 3), or more commonly overpower the protagonist by that point to where stealth makes no sense and they're often only doing if forced by a meta-requirement auto-fail (Assassin's Creed is terrible for this).

So I'm not all-Ubisoft bashing, Hitman Absolution's final boss was also terrible, even if you ghost to him you get seen due to a scripted sequence.