Is The End boss actually that bad?

[un0_reverse_card]

Please note: I am not against any contrary opinions. I'm just sharing this just because.
You don't have to criticize me because of this.

So I've heard a lot of people hating on The End, and I agree with them.

First of all, there is no origin about this boss.

The End is basically a voice that want's to consume all existence. But why?
Why does it want to consume all?
I mean, yeah it killed the ancients but why?

Why is it just a purple moon?

SPOILER WARNING
When The End reveals itself, it can be seen as a purple moon. A simple, purple moon.
This design is absolutely horrible. I've seen other final bosses in this mainline franchise, and they had good designs too! Perfect Chaos has a creepy design, and it makes sense. But a purple moon? Doesn't match for this game, lol.

It's gameplay is boring.

The End is basically the hacking mission, but harder. The voice lines try to discourage Sonic AND Sage, but it's annoying. "YoU aRe NoT bRaVe, YoU aRe NoT vIcToRiUs" like how will THAT make Sonic and Sage quit?

I guess that's all for this post, you all have a good night!

[ReZisT Lust]

i never play ikaruga so it took me a while to beat on switch my first time and was much quicker the 2nd time on pc. The laser screen wipe really screwed me over with the hits.

[PwnyHipster]

Nah its OK but I like bullet hell so I'm biased.

[Kasamatsu]

I absolutely hated The End. I never liked the shoot em up hacking minigame so the final boss being that made me switch to normal mode just so I could avoid doing something so stupid

[T23]

Originally posted by Ikagura:

Yes, if I wanted to play Ikaruga I'd just play Ikaruga instead.

Also Robotnik should be the final boss in a Sonic game (not as another Nega Wisp Armor clone of course) not some big cosmical monster, it just doesn't feel right for Sonic. Heck even the Kaijus like Chaos and Dark Gaia were more fitting than a planet sized final boss that tried to copy the Kirby type of final boss.

Raising the stakes does not make an antagonist automatically better: this is a big issue with shonens in general and honestly it loses the personal aspect of the antagonist (this is why in some way Raven Beak was a much better final boss to the Metroid series than the Mother Brain or even Ridley in term of narration since Samus already got her revenge on him and that the Space Pirate is just one big organisation when Raven Beak being was a part of her tribe she was raised in.

Hopefully Sega would finally make an epic Final Boss with the Doctor in his masterpiece of a machine (like the Egg Robot in Sonic 2 and 3) than just calling another big monster (that ends up betraying him anyway).

Eggman being the final boss in this game would make zero sense at all. That's what Sonic Lost World did, and it got plenty of hate for that.

[T23]

Originally posted by BirdiiWasHere:

Please note: I am not against any contrary opinions. I'm just sharing this just because.
You don't have to criticize me because of this.

So I've heard a lot of people hating on The End, and I agree with them.

First of all, there is no origin about this boss.

The End is basically a voice that want's to consume all existence. But why?
Why does it want to consume all?
I mean, yeah it killed the ancients but why?

Why is it just a purple moon?

SPOILER WARNING
When The End reveals itself, it can be seen as a purple moon. A simple, purple moon.
This design is absolutely horrible. I've seen other final bosses in this mainline franchise, and they had good designs too! Perfect Chaos has a creepy design, and it makes sense. But a purple moon? Doesn't match for this game, lol.

It's gameplay is boring.

The End is basically the hacking mission, but harder. The voice lines try to discourage Sonic AND Sage, but it's annoying. "YoU aRe NoT bRaVe, YoU aRe NoT vIcToRiUs" like how will THAT make Sonic and Sage quit?

I guess that's all for this post, you all have a good night!

While I didn't like the detraction from the usual Super Sonic bosses, The End is still way better than any of the final bosses we got in the 2010's (looking at you, Time Eater!).

The visuals and music compliment the fight incredibly well.

[GlaceonChireiden]

Not really. If anything, it's better than most Super bosses since it's more than a glorified boost stage for once and forces you to pay attention the entire time.

A common complaint is that "it makes you use a different gameplay style than the rest of the game) which...don't the other final boss super fights already do that? At what point in Unleashed, Gens, hell even Sonic 3 and SA2 are you able to freely fly around and all the commands that come with doing so?
EVERY super sonic fight had a different gameplay style than the rest of the game (except maybe SA1). The End is no different, if anything it's slightly better because you actually do the hacking minigames earlier on so when you enter the The End fight, you immediately know what to expect and how that fight's mechanics will work.

Personally, it's probably my favorite Sonic final boss of the 3D games since it actually keeps you engaged and doesn't play like a 3 minute long QTE.

[Ikagura]

Originally posted by T23:

Originally posted by Ikagura:

Yes, if I wanted to play Ikaruga I'd just play Ikaruga instead.

Also Robotnik should be the final boss in a Sonic game (not as another Nega Wisp Armor clone of course) not some big cosmical monster, it just doesn't feel right for Sonic. Heck even the Kaijus like Chaos and Dark Gaia were more fitting than a planet sized final boss that tried to copy the Kirby type of final boss.

Raising the stakes does not make an antagonist automatically better: this is a big issue with shonens in general and honestly it loses the personal aspect of the antagonist (this is why in some way Raven Beak was a much better final boss to the Metroid series than the Mother Brain or even Ridley in term of narration since Samus already got her revenge on him and that the Space Pirate is just one big organisation when Raven Beak being was a part of her tribe she was raised in.

Hopefully Sega would finally make an epic Final Boss with the Doctor in his masterpiece of a machine (like the Egg Robot in Sonic 2 and 3) than just calling another big monster (that ends up betraying him anyway).

Eggman being the final boss in this game would make zero sense at all. That's what Sonic Lost World did, and it got plenty of hate for that.

Lost World's final boss was the least of the issues there. Zavok as a final boss would've also sucked for being a Bowser knock-off.

[NBOX21]

Originally posted by JustSomeLego:

A common complaint is that "it makes you use a different gameplay style than the rest of the game) which...don't the other final boss super fights already do that? At what point in Unleashed, Gens, hell even Sonic 3 and SA2 are you able to freely fly around and all the commands that come with doing so?
EVERY super sonic fight had a different gameplay style than the rest of the game (except maybe SA1). The End is no different, if anything it's slightly better because you actually do the hacking minigames earlier on so when you enter the The End fight, you immediately know what to expect and how that fight's mechanics will work.

That is actually a very good point you brought up!
However, I can also just as easily say that the Super Sonic fights in those games still share many elements with the core gameplay to not feel like a complete turnoff. When playing as Super Sonic, it is still an action game much like the rest of the game before it - The End, meanwhile, turns what was an action game into a top down shooter and almost feels like a completely different game by comparison.

Super Sonic in those games mainly felt like a twist on the established formula, with a lot of the stuff you do as Super Sonic you've been trained to do organically throughout the entire game. At no point did Super Sonic in 3&K feel off considering I've trained myself to collect rings, dodge obstacles and look out for weak points, all of which I've been doing before reaching the climax. Same with SA1, SA2, Heroes, Generations as well as the GBA and DS games.

Originally posted by Ikagura:

Originally posted by T23:

Eggman being the final boss in this game would make zero sense at all. That's what Sonic Lost World did, and it got plenty of hate for that.

Lost World's final boss was the least of the issues there. Zavok as a final boss would've also sucked for being a Bowser knock-off.

In the case of Frontiers, however, having Eggman as the final boss would've made absolutely no sense at all in context of the story given how he was trapped in Cyberspace for most of the game and thus had no time to develop his latest scheme.

[un0_reverse_card]

Originally posted by Kasamatsu:

I absolutely hated The End. I never liked the shoot em up hacking minigame so the final boss being that made me switch to normal mode just so I could avoid doing something so stupid

same

[Ikagura]

Originally posted by Kasamatsu:

I absolutely hated The End. I never liked the shoot em up hacking minigame so the final boss being that made me switch to normal mode just so I could avoid doing something so stupid

I liked the minigame because I'm a fan of shmups but I agree that it should've been for the minigame only.

[Blackguard]

I mean, we still have no idea what that 'Zap' logo appearing in the sky is

[barrazad664]

Originally posted by Sixtyfivekills:

Why does The End want to consume all? That's like asking why Grim Reaper kills people. It's the end, it ends everything, it's an unknown entity that nobody can escape.

Why is it a purple moon? Because that's what Sonic sees, it's not The End's definitive form. What is the moon to Sonic? A dead planet without a shred of life, it makes sense.

Also disagree about the gameplay, if games like Nier Automata can get away with it then Sonic can too.

Bro the difference is that the Nier Automata boss was either ending C or D, which was a fair challenge but not so difficult. The ending E epilogue isn't a final boss or something wth

[Maximillian Arikado]

I like The End as a narrative concept, but it's clear that the actual fight was the result of Sega once again not giving Sonic Team the time they needed. There's no way the team's grand idea for the final battle against the physical manifestation of entropy was a round of Ikaruga.

[Zenny]

Because it felt anticlimatic. The game had the perfect formula for Super Sonic boss battles, then the final boss comes and you're forced to plan an unrelated mini-game. It wasn't bad. I'd argue it is harder than any final boss from the 2010's games. It just felt boring in comparisson with Giganto and the other titans.

The fight never evolves, never try new things. It is 5 minutes of button mashing and avoiding the same projectiles. Not even cool QTEs in the middle to spice things. Kishimoto agrees the final boss was underwhelming and said Sonic Team will address this issue in future patches.

In regards to The End itself, there's two ways to anylise it:

In Universe The End is the personification of, well, the end. The unnavoidable death, the truth we all are born with and cannot cheat. I also want to add my own headcanon here: The End is the personification of "The Great Filter". It is a theory that states every civilization that reaches space exploration will be wiped before they can explore new planets and galaxies. Said theory tries to explain why the human race was never visited by other inteligent species despite our advances in space flight.

We don't know exactly why The End destroyed the Ancient's home planet and followed them to the next planets to kill them. The game implies it is because they used the Chaos Emeralds, but I think that's not the case. Through the game we discover the Ancient's technology was highly advanced, enough so they could digitalize their own minds and memories, and create entire virtual dimentions where even a cosmic infinite being like The End could be trapped for eons. The Ancients simply grew too much, became too inteligent, challenge the gods. They reached their species limit and The End consumed them.

In Meta of Sonic, The End represents the death of the Sonic franchise, at least as a game IP. Sonic Frontiers is the most meta game in the franchise. In this game Sonic and his friends are sent to a literal graveward (Starfall Islands are the deathbed of the Ancients), where they are trapped and forced rethink their actions in the last 10 or so years of the franchise. I don't think this works for all of them, because Amy has been spreading love ever since SA1. I think this worked best for Knuckles, who had to return to his previous role as guardian of the Master Emerald, and Tails - who had to go through his SA1 character arc all over again.

In this meta analisys, the soundtrack does a better job, as the lyrics of each vocal theme state how much Sonic needs to reclaim his identity (I'm Here), that he should stop pretending the past (2000's games) never happened (Undefeatable), that eventually he (and Sonic Team) will find his footing again (Find you flame), and that his journey wasn't a pointless one like all 2010's games, as Sonic and his friends (and Eggman too) are all transformed after these experiences. And said experiences will shape the next advetures (One Way Dream).

[TheForestSpirit]

It's not that deep lol