Boss Battles
Boss Battles Mode is a Unlockable Stadium mode introduced in Super Smash Bros. Brawl, which is very similar to All-Star Mode, except you fight all bosses rather than all characters. Boss Battles Mode is unlocked after the player completes both Classic Mode and 'The Subspace Emissary' for the first time, or in other words, has faced each boss other than Crazy Hand at least once.
Gameplay
The goal of Boss Battles Mode is to defeat every boss in the game with a single stock, or two characters in its co-op mode. When a player begins Boss Battles mode, they are immediately dropped into combat against one of the ten bosses. Once a boss is defeated, the player is brought to the rest area. The rest area displays all defeated bosses as trophies, a screen that displays the face of next boss to be fought, and has three heart containers, or five in co-op mode, which, like in All-Star, do not reappear even upon later visits to the rest area. This format continues until all bosses are defeated. This format is the same as All-Star Mode. However, the player is not allowed to continue after losing their stock, as it is a stadium mode. The battles occur in random order, except for the battle with Tabuu which always occurs last. Each boss has their own Stamina Bar as one would normally fight them in the Subspace Emissary, including both of the Hands. The player is treated with a picture of one of the bosses upon completing Boss Battles: this picture varies depending on the difficulty level chosen. You cannot use any stickers in Boss Battles.
The battles in this mode include:
Tips
- Play conservative.
You're facing 10 bosses instead of one, and have 1 life instead of 4, so you can't give a frenzy of attacks at once. Wait for the gaps between attacks, then strike briefly, then prepare to evade the next attack.
- Abuse powerful moves.
Moves like Rock Smash, Yoshi's Dair, and Bowser's Forward smash inflict tons of damage. Use them, as long as they don't make you vulnerable. Kill moves like Rest and Falcon Punch work well, but use them only if you know they will defeat the boss in that hit. Kill move lag will almost surely leave you open to an attack. The lesser time it takes to defeat a boss, the lesser chance there is you'll receive damage.
- Use a character that is effective against or counters at least one boss.
Fox and Lucas are effective against Duon and Meta Ridley in that they have reflectors or absorbers. Marth is effective against many bosses in that his Counter inflicts massive damage, as does Ike's.
- Take Advantage of the Boss's Size
Some attacks like Knee Smash have very limited range and are hard to use in normal brawls. For bosses, though, it is very easy, in that you can simply be touching any part of the boss, which easily take up a quarter of the stage, to inflict damage.
Challenges
There are eight Challenges in Super Smash Bros. Brawl involving Boss Battles Mode. Golden Hammers cannot be used to break them, in order to avoid spoilers for Adventure Mode: The Subspace Emissary.
- First row, #1: Clear on Intense difficulty.
- First row, #10: Clear on Easy difficulty.
- Second row, #16: Clear with 20 characters.
- Second row, #26: Clear with 10 characters.
- Third row, #23: Clear on Normal difficulty.
- Fourth row, #6: Clear on Hard difficulty.
- Fourth row, #26: Clear on Very Hard difficulty.
- Fourth row, #32: Clear with every character.
Differences from Bosses from other modes
Several of the bosses are slightly altered from their appearances in other modes.
- Bosses in the beginning are easier than those towards the end, meaning that the difficulty system is different than in the Subspace Emissary.
- Crazy Hand is a boss itself, rather than together with Master Hand.
- Master Hand and Crazy Hand has a Stamina Bar like other bosses, rather than the usual HP shown at the bottom.
- Except in higher difficulties, Tabuu's Off Wave do not instantly kill a player who comes in contact with them.
- In lower difficulties, all the bosses' speed, attack power and health are greatly decreased.
- Petey Piranha's cages are empty, as when he is faced in The Great Maze stage of The Subspace Emissary.
- The individual boss themes are replaced with generic music, Boss Battle, except for Master Hand, Crazy Hand and Tabuu. They use the music Final Destination (Melee), Giga Bowser (Melee), and Boss Battle Song 2, respectively.
- Stickers cannot be used, as they only appear in The Subspace Emissary.
- Items do not appear.
