10 Hidden Video Game Bosses You Weren't Supposed To See
You were never supposed to know about these secret bosses.
Making even a rubbish video game is really, really hard, and we as players absolutely take for granted everything that doesn't even make it into a game before it hits stores.
Ideas are thrown out all the time, whether in the earlier drafting stages or perhaps even weeks prior to release.
Sometimes it becomes clear that an idea isn't quite working, or maybe there just isn't enough time to get an ambitious element finished before that apparently unmovable release date.
And so, video games tend to ship with a ton of extra game data for features that, for whatever reason, were cut or scrapped during production.
But sometimes these elements are "complete" enough that enterprising players have managed to reconstitute them, employing sneaky hacks and clever mods to bring them back into the game in some form.
And so, we come to these 10 boss battles which, despite the clear time and effort that went into crafting them, were given the chop during development.
Some are basically entirely playable regardless, while others are nothing more than fascinating remnants buried deep within the game code.
Either way, the developers sure didn't want you to see these unused bosses...
10. The Egg Janken - Sonic Mania
The Sonic games are absolutely jam-packed with secret and half-finished bosses, though perhaps the most interesting example of all occurs in Sonic Mania.
Shortly after the game hit stores and reversed the series' critical fortunes overnight, fans discovered an unused Robotnik/Eggman boss hidden within the data of the Studiopolis Zone.
Named the "Egg Janken," the boss is an egg-like mech piloted by Robotnik with two screens on it, on which the player and Robotnik to play a game of rock, paper, scissors.
Hitting the underside of the egg causes both screens to draw their hands - if Robotnik wins the player will suffer through a barrage of tricky attacks, while if the player wins Robotnik will incur damage. Such is the formula until one side is KO'd.
Unlike a lot of cut bosses still residing within a game's code, the Egg Janken is actually fully functional as a boss fight, and considering its conceptual cleverness it's surprising it ended up being left on the cutting room floor.