10 Bosses That Stopped Games Being 5 Stars

Oh, Lawrence Barrett. You had so much potential. After all, your nickname was The Bull and you were a seemingly imposing member of terrorist mercenary team the Tyrants. Your fight with hero Adam Jensen should’ve been awesome, especially since it’s the first major showdown in Deus Ex: Human Revolution.

Alas, that was not the case.

Armed with enough mechanical augmentations to make Robocop jealous (including a huge minigun mounted to his left arm and shields protecting his front and back), the condescending Barrett forces Jensen to participate in a run-of-the-mill arena match in which Jensen must hide behind pillars to avoid Barrett’s fire. When possible, Jensen needs to throw explosive barrels at him, too.

It’s a dynamic that’s been done to death, and the location (a dull industrial complex) and tendency for Barrett to dish out disses along the way were similarly old hat by 2011. Plus, it feels incongruous to the stealth-laden gameplay that preceded it, resulting in an unfair difficulty spike.

At least the Director’s Cut made the sequence better (if still not great) by offering players more ways to settle the score.