Are end of level boss battles still needed in game design?
My understanding is a game should be a fun but challenging/engaging experience that matches the players ability and if done correctly the player ‘Surfs’ through progressively harder waves ideally getting into a flow state.
But should the level end or last wave be a tsunami or boss battle?
Or have you played a game where you managed to flow through the boss battle?
I think there’s psychological value in having the difficulty vary. For example, a lot of well-designed puzzle games periodically have a harder puzzle, followed by several easy ones. The idea is that you get a bigger challenge which you have to work harder to beat, and get a greater sense of accomplishment for clearing. And then you get a bit of a break to recuperate. If the challenges were all hard, many players would conclude the game is just too much work and give up on it.
Boss battles serve the same purpose, I think. They’re not necessary, but without them I think you would need some other means of varying the difficulty.
Personally, I don’t buy that the goal is for players to “surf” or “flow” through a game — you want to engage them, which means mixing things up and keeping them on their toes. But on the other hand, I’m not one of those designers or players who believes that difficult == fun.
To paraphrase Mr. Miyagi: Balance good, game good, everything good. Balance bad, might as well pack up go home.
Dramatic structure! (jagged rising and falling action, eventually reaching the climax, which is the boss battle, or the big decision in other games) Jesse Schell talks about this a bit in his book, The Art of Game Design.
Failure is important. It impacts flow, motivation, and the Interest Curve. So, boss battles are still relevant, whether they are easy, medium, or impossibly difficult.
Food for thought - Candy Crush would be less successful without the periodic ‘impossible’ levels.
Gigi
Boss battles make alot of games interesting! 
Not all levels need an end of level boss though.
And not all games need one.
But:
Take Metroid Prime one, on Gamecube as an example.
The magmoor caverns was a “Hot,” and a very cool stage. 
Retro Studios had planned on making a end level boss for that stage.
But due to a tight shedule, had to cancel that idea. 
After gamers beat that Metroid Prime game so many times…
They posted on the Nintendo forums that they wish that, that lava Stage had a end level boss creature.
Because the magmoor caverns stage, felt incomplete without one.
I agree.
So yeah,…in some cases like this one, it may be relevant.
It also depends on the type of game you are making too.
That game was a masterpiece. I’ve got several saves on my gamecube with it that all ran out the game timer lol. The environments and exploration are beyond amazing. And speaking of bosses, if you explore the phazon mines you can discover a secret boss 
Boss battles are usually the most interesting part of the game.
Proper pacing makes everything better, and combat is no different. You need periods of ease to feel like you are talented and powerful, and periods of difficulty to feel challenged and gain satisfaction from your victories. Lost either one and you remove a great deal of satisfaction from the player.
The ‘boss battle’ doesn’t always need to be a traditional boss, but having difficulty climaxes and lulls throughout the game is almost always a good thing.
One of the most memorable parts of a game for me are the boss battles. It’s actually sad that there are less of them these days. especially in FPS games. They just wrap up a level in such a way that makes it memorable for the players ( If the boss is good, that is ).
Having a swarm of enemies as the “final boss” is actually a lazy way developers choose these days when they are out of time/budget IMO. Nothing beats a good end-level-boss to finish up a good level.
Just for the nostalgia
As a pacing mechanism, they work alright to capstone a level and finish it off in a crescendo. At this point though, I’m prone to say that not every level needs a boss.
Most of my notion has to do with modern level design. For one, what now defines a “level” is debatable. When seamless worlds became the norm, the difference between “levels” was the tree textures changed hue a bit. The idea of a level as a clearly distinguishable segment of space that maintains it’s own internal pacing is antiquated.
Another issue is capping a level with a boss at the end is pretty repetitive. It’s pretty easy to start seeing trends four or five levels in that each level is going to start in diminuendo and linearly ramp up to the climax at the boss. It’s too easy of a pattern to fall into, where the pacing of a level ends up taking over the pacing of the game as a whole. I would be willing to bet that more people could make a better paced game with thirteen levels and five bosses, than thirteen levels and thirteen bosses.
Is a boss needed for every level? no. not at all. there are many very successful games out there that don’t use bosses as the cap of every level.
what is needed, in my opinion, is some form of dynamic difficulty structure, which bosses usually are, but there are other ways of achieving that. interesting or intense sequences of game play can achieve the same effect, as can - oddly - taking a step back and a smoother slope for a bit of a breather, then hitting back full force again.
another perk to mixing it up is that any boss encounters in the game will be more memorable, rather than feeling like a given one is going to jump on you at any moment.
I think historically, bosses have been used as sort of ‘tests’ for players - how well do you know [insert mechanic in your game here]? If you’re skillful enough, you may pass. The problem I see with this, is it isn’t always necessary, and after a while gets boring and repetitive…you know, the same way tests in school do.
What I like is actually the way Bravely Default uses bosses - quite a few of the bosses teach you new mechanics, in all possible ways. The Eternian Forces hold special gems called ‘Asterisks’ which let you use a particular job. Of course, they won’t just give you their asterisk; the party gets put in a brutal fight to the death for a new Asterisk. In these boss battles, the Eternians use some of the basic abilties of their class on you, which you have to figure out how to work around; for instance, the Summoner (who routinely kicks my butt) will attack, but periodically summon the basic ‘summoned creature’ (read: powerful, MP-costly spell that hits all enemies) for massive, terrible, terrible burst damage. Upon defeating a boss, you can start to use (and level up) their character class on your characters. Because different classes are biased to different general tactics, and a great deal of the game relies on the player finding effective synergies, this radically changes the game.
This also leads to the player needing to “discover” new tactics on the fly. For instance, against the Summoner boss, at full HP you probably have enough HP to survive one casting of Girtabulu. You need to find a way to heal to full immediately, or you’re going to lose the battle. In this way, I think a good boss can fulfill the role of a good tutorial - by having a clear challenge, and clear points of failure, we can teach our player the skills they need to win our games. That’s a powerful thought.
This question is absurd. Not all games have boss battles. The question is aggressive. Are you attempting to abolish boss battles?
Conclusion: If you don’t want boss battles in your games, don’t design them into your game.
If you have levels you should have boss battles near the end. If you have quests you should have a boss to finish it off.
There is a valid debate as to weather games should be structured around levels or quests.
I think the reason bosses exist is to balance out the non-bosses. ie there’s a reason why the regular fodder are smaller and less capable, it’s so that there can be a contrast against the big ones. Also this made me think of music, how there can be swells of emotion and intensity and then pulling back again, gradually building up to a peak near the end. It also I think has to do with energy and what’s happening with the player’s emotions… they gradually fight through stuff which wasn’t too challenging and the challenge gets harder and more intense, their feelings get intense, and erupt in the big battle, then there is a RELEASE of all that tension and a sense of relief… and you kind of can’t have things getting intenes (tense) without that relief to contrast it. If I imagine a big long endless level where things just get harder and harder and there is no break and no rhythm and everything just gets worse and worse, those can be kind of… one-dimensional and repetitive in a certain relativistic way. When there are hills and valleys and extremes, I think it’s a more interesting adventure. A rollercoaster ride. It makes for drama. How you symbolize that in the game I guess is up to you. Like others said, the boss battles are often the most fun because they’re the most intense and difficult but have the biggest reward.
“Let there be spaces in your togetherness” - Kahlil Gibran
ie a game is not just about what is crammed into it, but also about the spaces between those things… room to breathe, contrast.
The Prophet, by Khalil Gibran, right? Excellent epic poetry. Mom got me that when I was 10, and I still read it every now and again. Most insightful book I own.
Yup
Personally, I believe that bosses aren’t always needed like most people have been saying. I think it depends on the game. Some need and some don’t. What I do believe though is that the games that use bosses shouldn’t just be put in for the sake of having a stronger enemy. They should be put there to not only make a player think outside of the box, but to also help change pace of the game.
Like most people are saying, there should be ups and downs in climactic experience, but not in the form of waves of endless enemies or just an extremely powerful one. I think they are the same thing. The bosses should do something else to the player. In a game, like Bravely Default, you are shown and taught something else. Other games the bosses are a test in order to see if the player remembers the mechanics of the level. Sometimes its four mini bosses that have a key to open a main door to the next room.
I also think that not all bosses need to be an increase in tension. What if there is an increased wave of enemies just before a simple boss as the reward. It would have to more depend on story in order to be understood, but it is something that I have been thinking about for a while now. I would be interested in what people think of that…
Do you need a boss at the end of each level? No
Are bosses even required in games? No
Do a boss make sense in your game? Maybe
What is even a boss?
A boss typically serves a purpose in good game design. It can be anything from a special level to a special enemy. Your method of defeating him can be interaction, resources or attacks. They don’t even have to appear in a linear fashion, they can be spread out all over the place… some close to each other and others far apart.
The extra difficult levels in Candy Crush function as a time sink and as a motivation for the player to purchase power-ups. Metal Gear bosses served mostly as the end of each chapter of the story and was thus spread unevenly across the game. Ocarina of Time had bosses that served as a confirmation to the player that he had cleared an area and so on… Anyone remember Fallout? The final boss could be defeated in different ways, you could even talk it to death 
Or the Castlevania games where you can typically access several bosses at the same time, it is up to you to figure out which one you got the best chance of defeating at this moment. Hmm… We also got Evolve and L4D where the players are the bosses
This is just a few examples of how bosses can be flavored and you should consider your game and the audience when you balance the difficulty. There are different type of players, some love to explore, some are there for the story, others love insane fights. Some wants it easy while other wants something to bit into. You can add difficulty settings to cover a bigger audience but that can also backfire because some people will feel like poor players when they enter the game at “easy” and have a negative, first impression while the oblivious hardcore crowd can start claiming that the “insane” option is how the game was meant to be played and the rest of the settings was meant for cry-babies…
Who is it that will be attracted to your game? How much time do they have? What kind of difficulty do they enjoy? How do they prefer to interact with your game? How does challenges in general make sense in your game? What is the reason for the increased difficulty?
You got a good start at creating an awesome boss if you can explain the reason why the boss was added, how he adds something and know your audience.