10 Video Game Bosses Defeated By A Cutscene

WhatCulture

Video game bosses who defeated themselves.

Transcript

00:00The video game boss has changed across generations.

00:03Skill, strategy, health management and recognising attacks all play a role.

00:07But from Bowser to Arkham Asylum's Joker,

00:09the idea is to test every lesson the game hopes you've learned to that point.

00:13However, what's more rarely talked about is death by cutscene.

00:16Some go down in history, others... not so much.

00:19I'm Scott from WhatCulture.com and these are 9 Video Game Bosses Defeated by a Cutscene.

00:24Number 9, Super Joe Gibson, Bionic Commando.

00:28Bionic Commando's 3D debut was met with very mediocre reviews,

00:31despite having one of the coolest physics-based grappling hooks in gaming

00:35over a decade before they'd be everywhere like right now.

00:38The final boss sees Nathan Rad Spencer take the fight to his former comrade, Super Joe Gibson.

00:43After swinging around and dismantling several mechanical archangels,

00:47Spencer's revenge on Joe is handled away from your controller.

00:50At first, Gibson has Nathan crushed in an iron grip.

00:53Then to get on top, our hero violently headbutts his way into Joe's cockpit,

00:57finishing the job by ripping out his power core.

01:00While it may look visually impressive at first glance,

01:02the way Bionic Commando's climax pans out is just as 6 out of 10 as the rest of the game.

01:07How did we not have a final boss mechanic themed around our titular Bionic arm?

01:12Number 8, The Prophet of Truth and The Gravemind, Halo 3.

01:16For the final entry in the Halo trilogy, two primary antagonists remain.

01:20The first was The Prophet of Truth, who after backstabbing his fellow prophets,

01:23became the supreme master of the Covenant forces.

01:26The second was The Gravemind, leader of the Flood and a big ol' fleshy mess

01:30intent on consuming all organic life.

01:32Rather than bringing back the wobbly boss fights from Halo 2,

01:35Bungie instead had The Prophet killed in a cutscene.

01:37It's a fitting story culmination as the Arbiter plunges his sword through the individual

01:42who deceived and manipulated both himself and his whole race.

01:45As for The Gravemind, though, it was killed offscreen,

01:48along with the eradication of the Flood at the game's conclusion.

01:51While players did briefly fight 343 Guilty Spark in the final moments,

01:55there was no similar fight with these other long-form foes.

01:58Halo 3 was a life-defining release, regardless of how everything wrapped up,

02:02and it's down to you in the comments.

02:04Would you rather have fought these two enemies, or were you happy with the way it went down?

02:08Number 7, The Elders, XCOM 2.

02:10XCOM Enemy Unknown had a final boss in the form of the Uber Ethereal,

02:14the leader of the initial invasion.

02:16With a higher health pool and psychic psionic attacks that rarely miss,

02:19it's a suitably climactic battle to one of the best turn-based strategy games ever made.

02:24Enter XCOM 2, a sequel that by many accounts just couldn't keep that momentum up.

02:28Putting you up against three stand-in avatars for the big finish, one for each Elder alien,

02:33once they were down, that was it.

02:34A final cutscene shows you resisting and finally overcoming the Elders' own mind control

02:38as you escape the base for good.

02:40Considering how hard-fought a victory can be in any XCOM, let alone this much-hyped sequel,

02:45the backlash was so substantial that Firaxis released the immaculate War of the Chosen expansion,

02:50introducing three unique new opponents who could show up on missions,

02:53the Assassin, the Hunter, and the Warlock.

02:55It's up for debate whether any of this would have even been created

02:58if the original game had nailed its ending.

03:01Number 6, The Locust Queen, Gears of War 3.

03:04The Locust Queen is a consistent presence throughout the Gears trilogy,

03:07often narrating why the Locust are your main enemies in the first place.

03:11After first seeing the Queen at the close of Gears 1,

03:13come Gears 3, it was time to kill her and the Locust off for good.

03:17For the final encounter, however, you'll be fighting the Queen's monstrous mount, the Tempest.

03:21Not exactly cut out for combat, downing the Tempest takes gameplay away

03:25as the Queen gets stabbed by Marcus Fenix using best friend Dom's knife.

03:29It's a supremely sweet moment to watch as the Queen dies along with the Locust and the Lambent,

03:34purging the planet Serra of all deadly threats, at least for that particular trilogy.

03:39Number 5, Atok Navarro, Uncharted Drake's Fortune.

03:43Typically, Uncharted games rely on two main antagonists,

03:46with the first game featuring Roman,

03:48a rival treasure hunter tipped off by Nate's mentor Sully,

03:51and Atok Navarro, leader of a band of mercenaries and Roman's right-hand man.

03:55For most of the game, Atok hovers over Roman's shoulder,

03:58guiding him towards the El Dorado treasure.

04:00However, in the final moments, he tricks this explorer and takes the statue for himself.

04:05Reaching Navarro's tanker, it's time for a showdown.

04:07You fight your way through the most difficult enemies in the game

04:10and reach the other end for the climax.

04:12However, after a weird cover-system-based advance and a quick-time event,

04:15Navarro is dragged into the ocean along with the El Dorado statue,

04:19as Nate's shoulder barges a helicopter into the sea, killing him off in a cinematic.

04:23Number 4, Harley Quinn, Batman Arkham Asylum.

04:26Thanks to Margot Robbie's portrayal across the DCEU,

04:29it's easy to forget Tara Strong's iconic take across Batman animation,

04:33and specifically the Arkham series.

04:35Beginning with Arkham Asylum, she proves a major thorn in Batman's side,

04:39triggering the Joker's takeover of the prison and kidnapping the warden, Quincy Sharp.

04:43After being tracked to the main penitentiary, Harley is finally cornered in the control room.

04:48Quinn has never been a match for Batman in physical combat,

04:51so the cutscene that follows is very fitting.

04:53After taking out her goons, Harley flips towards the Caped Crusader for one final attack,

04:57only to be immediately countered and subdued.

05:00This would become a running gag across the Arkham trilogy,

05:02with Arkham Knight even having Batman sling Harley over his shoulder,

05:06simply because she presents zero real threat.

05:08Number 3, Elliot Salem, Army of Two, The Devil's Cartel

05:12Of all the co-operative shooters that try to get you and a friend on board,

05:16Army of Two was one of the first, putting players in the shoes of Tyson Rios and Elliot Salem.

05:20While it delivered a pretty unique feeling co-op experience with dual emotes and lots of team tactics,

05:25the end result never fully shook that lukewarm critical reception.

05:29Army of Two ended up getting three main entries, which all settled into the AA space quite nicely.

05:34As former PMC operatives turned mercenaries tackle threats for the highest bidder,

05:38the most well-received was Army of Two, The Fortieth Day, which saw Salem turn on his former partner.

05:43Elliot ended up going insane after Tyson abandoned him in combat to save a hostage.

05:47Thus, he becomes a main antagonist later on in Army of Two, The Devil's Cartel.

05:51In one of the game's many disappointing elements, though, you don't even get to battle Salem,

05:56as instead you fight through scores of foot soldiers instead.

05:59With Salem wounded among some flaming wreckage, he ends up being hauled off by Mexico's Special Forces,

06:04providing an anticlimactic end to both The Devil's Cartel and the series as a whole.

06:13In the original Ratchet & Clank, the duo went head-to-head with Chairman Drek,

06:16the corrupt leader of the Blog who sought to construct a new settlement from the pieces of other planets.

06:21The final battle unfolded fittingly on Ratchet's home planet of Veldin.

06:25Some 14 years later, though, the original game in the series got an updated facelift for the PlayStation 4.

06:30For this awesome 2016 remake, many changes were made to levels and story,

06:35with a narrative voiceover approach that let Insomniac address the past while preparing for the future.

06:40While he appears to be the main primary antagonist, Drek is now unceremoniously written out the story

06:45when Dr. Nefarious turns him into a sheep and shoots him out an airlock.

06:49While this twist may have landed well enough with younger audiences, long-term fans had mixed reactions.

06:54Abruptly swapping to supposed fan favourite Dr. Nefarious was fine enough,

06:58but the final encounter felt rushed as hell.

07:05While Aliens is an undisputed classic of sci-fi cinema,

07:08Gearbox's outsourcing development of the much-anticipated Colonial Marines

07:12marked one of the most notoriously bad releases of all time.

07:16Misrepresented and misleading to the fanbase, it was a colossal disappointment.

07:20The few ambitious moments this had were swamped by poor programming, atrocious AI and a supreme lack of polish.

07:26In addition, Colonial Marines focused far too much on battling generic Weyland-Yutani mercenaries rather than the Xenomorphs.

07:32Slogging your way through this disappointing game isn't even worth the effort, as the climactic boss fight is pitiful too.

07:38After battling your way through the ruined surface of LV-426, it's time to make an escape.

07:43Much like the 1986 movie though, the Xenomorph Queen is right there to block your path.

07:48Now, you'd think a final encounter with the Queen would be a worthy showdown.

07:51Maybe use a power rig to smash its gooey face in, but no.

07:55Much like the rest of the game, it's hopelessly disappointing, letting you engage by just hitting some switches.

08:01Afterwards, the nastiest Xenomorph of them all is just taken care of by the commanding officer instead.

08:07And those were just nine video game bosses defeated by a cutscene.

08:10Let me know your favourites, or the ones you hate the most, down in the comments below.

08:14Also, please subscribe to the WhatCulture Gaming Podcast, as we have three shows a week,

08:17with myself, Josh Brown, James Dowse, and of course, Jules Gill.

08:21For now, I've been Scott from WhatCulture.com, and I'll catch you soon.

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