The Mass Effect Trilogy is considered one of the best video game series of all time, with great worldbuilding, storytelling, and characters. While much of its storytelling remained consistent throughout the series, its combat and game design changed from game to game, losing many of its classic RPG elements from Mass Effect to adopt more action-RPG characteristics. With its combat varying so much between the games, there is also a discrepancy in the quality of the boss fights across the Mass Effect Trilogy, with some criticizing their repetitive nature and boring mechanics. This is a weakness in the Mass Effect Trilogy that needs to be fixed in Mass Effect 4.
Lackluster boss fights especially stand out when the rest of the game has great encounters. Boss fights that often draw criticism in Mass Effect are the Thorian fight in Mass Effect, the Human Reaper in Mass Effect 2, and the underuse of boss fights in Mass Effect 3. These fights are characterized by waves of enemies, or repetitive shooting at a static enemy with little strategy or thought involved on the part of the player. To avoid these pitfalls, Mass Effect 4 needs to draw from the examples of good boss fights in the Mass Effect Trilogy, which implement payoff, strategy, and teamwork.
Mass Effect 3 Player Points Out Unsettling Ending Detail
A Mass Effect 3 player online notices an unsettling detail about the game's ending that would be easily missed by most gamers.
Standout Boss Fights in the Mass Effect Trilogy
Mass Effect has examples of good boss fights; the standouts include the fight against the Shadow Broker in Mass Effect 2: The Lair of the Shadow Broker, and the clone battle in Mass Effect 3: Citadel. The Lair of the Shadow Broker's boss fight with the Shadow Broker involves the progression of several stages, a unique enemy who uses never-before seen tech, and the heavy involvement of a squadmate, Liara. These elements all make the boss fight interesting by raising the stakes as the fight progresses, utilizes teamwork between Liara and Shepard, and makes clever use of the environment to make the boss fight feel rewarding in a visual way.
Lessons From Lair of the Shadow Broker
This boss fight also, importantly, reinforces the narrative of Lair of the Shadow Broker. As the story of the DLC progresses, the reveal of the Shadow Broker is a defining moment in the series thanks to the story's foreshadowing. The fight also serves to reinforce the bond between Shepard and Liara, who only defeat the Shadow Broker by working together. Instead of the Shadow Broker becoming an ammo-sponge like the Thorian's waves of thralls, or the Human-Reaper's mindless menacing, the Shadow Broker is instead a problem that the narrative anticipated and is overcome thanks to Shepard and Liara's skills.
How Mass Effect 4 Can Implement These Lessons
As Mass Effect 4 is in development and eagerly anticipated by many people, it needs to create more boss fights that go beyond mindless combat. While the fight against the clone in Mass Effect: Citadel was more mindless than the fight against the Shadow Broker, facing a copy of Commander Shepard in the Normandy that uses all of Shepard's skills and abilities provided a payoff of its own. This was also because of the narrative that came before it, with Shepard surviving the encounter because of the bonds they had built with their squad.
Mass Effect 4 needs to create boss fights that are not only visually interesting and engaging, but ones that are narratively meaningful. This means they need to have a purpose beyond presenting an obstacle to the player progressing the story, such as the Human-Reaper needing to be defeated just because there needs to be a big fight at the end of the game. Mass Effect has proven that it can deliver boss fights that go beyond this, and it needs to take them a step further with the skills it already has in Mass Effect 4.
Mass Effect Trilogy
Mass Effect Trilogy is a compilation featuring BioWare's Mass Effect, Mass Effect 2, and Mess Effect 3. The Trilogy also contains all of the downloadable content for the first two games including Lair of the Shadow Broker, Stolen Memory, Bring Down the Sky, and Overlord.
