Marathon Boss/Playing With

Everything About Fiction You Never Wanted to Know.


Basic Trope: Boss battles that takes ridiculously long time to beat.

  • Straight: In the RPG Heroes of Troperia, the Final Battle against Emperor Evulz lasts for about 40 minutes.
  • Exaggerated: It takes about 10 hours to defeat Emperor Evulz.
  • Up to Eleven: It takes at least a WEEK to defeat Emperor Evulz.
  • Justified: Emperor Evulz has recently obtained a power that makes him nearly impervious to most attacks.
  • Inverted: Rush Boss
  • Subverted: Wielding the Sword of Plot Advancement can overcome the damage cap in the Final Battle, making the fight way shorter than it normally is.
    • It doesn't take you that long to fight him, you just need to take that long to get an achievement.
  • Double Subverted: ...which means instead of 10 hours battle, you get 40 minutes battle.
  • Parodied: Emperor Evulz actually urge the player (yeah, you) to take a break every now and then in the Final Battle.
  • Deconstructed: The heroes may have vanquished Evulz, but the player vanquished their sanity.
  • Reconstructed: They take a long rest thereafter.
  • Zig Zagged: Depending on the whim of the Random Number God, Emperor Evulz can have anywhere between ten thousand HP to ten million HP.
  • Averted: The battle against Emperor Evulz is only slightly longer than average boss battles in any RPG.
  • Enforced: The developers realized they slacked off on level design and made their game shorter than players expected; in a desperate attempt at last-minute Padding, they made the Final Boss take ridiculously long to beat.
  • Lampshaded: "Prepare for a long fight!"
  • Invoked: Emperor Evulz studies defensive tactics above all else, in order to make the inevitable fight with the heroes take as long as possible.
  • Exploited: He does this so that they give up in frustration and/or go insane after fighting him for an hour.
  • Defied: Emperor Evulz realizes that while turning himself into a Stone Wall may be practical, it makes for an incredibly boring fight, so he becomes a Glass Cannon instead.
  • Discussed: "We do have the power to take on Emperor Evulz' generals... but do we have the time?"
  • Conversed: "You've been fighting this boss for what, an hour?" "Yes! And I cannot even save in mid-fight!"

Take this! And this! And this! Argh why won't this guy die?! *40 minutes later* Okay, you may go back to Marathon Boss.