Build a boss worth beating.

Take a game you already made and add a boss that is hard, fair, and completely yours.

0 of 12 done

Finish the step above first

01
Open your game

This is the game you built last lesson - it carried over, so you are NOT starting from scratch. Now you give it a BOSS.
Open Astrocade and look at your game. Remember what the player does in it.
your project so far
We build on this - you do not start over.
Open Astrocade (new tab)
In a few words, what is your game and what does the player do?
Finish the step above first

02
Name your boss

Every great boss has a name you remember. Make it sound a little scary or a little funny.
Say it out loud. Does it feel like a boss? Good.

Type your boss name. Just the name. Example: Ironjaw.
Finish the step above first

03
Paint it with words

Now describe your boss so anyone could picture it in their head.
Give it a size, a color, and ONE detail that stands out, like a glowing eye or a cracked shell.

Type what your boss looks like. Example: a giant rusty crab with one glowing red eye.
Finish the step above first

04
Give it attack one

A boss with no attacks is boring. Give it one thing it does to hurt the player.
Keep it simple and clear. You can make it wild, but you must be able to picture it.

Type attack 1. Example: snaps both claws and shoots two rocks, one left and one right.
Finish the step above first

05
Add the tell

Here is the secret to a fair boss: the TELL. A tell is the warning the boss gives right before it attacks.
Bosses flash, glow, or wind up first. That warning gives the player a fair chance to dodge. No tell means a cheap, unfair hit.

Type the tell for attack 1, the warning right before it lands. Example: its claws glow red for one second first.
Finish the step above first

06
Now a harder attack

Great fights get tougher as they go. That climb is called the difficulty curve - easy first, hard later.
Make attack 2 harder to dodge than attack 1.

Type attack 2, harder than the first. Example: slams the ground and sends a wave you have to jump over.
Finish the step above first

07
Tell it again

Harder attacks STILL need a tell. Hard but fair, always.
This tell can be quicker or trickier than the first one, but it must be there.

Type the tell for attack 2. Example: it rears back and its eye flashes twice before the slam.
Finish the step above first

08
Turn up the heat

The best boss fights change partway through. When the boss is hurt, it gets angry and fights harder.
Make it FASTER or add one new move - never cheaper or impossible. Skill should still win.

Type how the fight gets harder later. Example: after half its health is gone, it speeds up and adds a third rock.
Finish the step above first

09
Find the weak spot

A boss you cannot beat is not a boss, it is a wall. So give it a weak spot: the one place it can be hurt.
The best weak spots open for just a moment, right after an attack. That rewards a player who watches and waits.

Type the weak spot AND the move that hits it. Example: the eye opens right after a slam - jump and hit the eye then.
Finish the step above first

10
Build your boss brief

Look what you did: a boss with a look, two attacks, two tells, a difficulty curve, and a weak spot. That is real game design.
Press the button to snap it all into one clean Boss Design Brief.

Do the steps above and your Build my boss brief shows up here.
Finish the step above first

11
Build it in Astrocade

Time to make it real. Copy the designer prompt below, open Astrocade, and paste it into the build box.
Astrocade will add your boss to your game. Then play the fight one time and feel it.

what will really happen
Astrocade builds from your words, but it almost never nails it on the first wish.
Your boss may look right but fight wrong, or fight right but look off - that is normal.
You will likely need a few tries before the tells and the weak spot actually work.

Open Astrocade (new tab)
You are a boss-fight designer for a 2D arcade game. Add a boss to my game called [game]. The boss is named [bossname]. It looks like: [bosslook]. Give it two attacks. Attack 1: [attack1]. It must show a clear warning first: [attack1tell]. Attack 2 is harder: [attack2]. Its warning first: [attack2tell]. As the fight goes on, make it harder like this: [rampup]. The boss can only be hurt at its weak spot: [weakness]. Rules: every attack must telegraph its tell before it lands, so a skilled player can dodge. Nothing should be impossible to avoid. Keep the weak spot open for only a short moment. Make it hard but fair.

Did you rebuild it a few times, or stop at wish one?

Play your boss fight once. Type: did it feel HARD but FAIR? Name one thing you will change.
Finish the step above first

12
Ship it to the wall

Your boss is done, and it is yours. Nobody else designed this exact fight.
Post it on the class wall with #Glunty and dare your friends to beat it.
hold on - judge it, do not celebrate
- Is this the fight you pictured, or just the first thing Astrocade gave you?
- What is the ONE attack or tell that feels off, too easy, or unfair?
- What would you change to make it harder but still fair?
Type the dare you will post. Example: Can you beat Ironjaw without taking a hit?

The class wall - share yours

Loading the class wall...

You built a real boss fight.

You did not just crank up an enemy health bar and call it done. You built a real fight with tells, a difficulty curve, and a weak spot - hard but fair, and one hundred percent yours.

Back to the academy Your progress

Embedded tool from glunty.com

Build a boss worth beating.

Save your work, or lose it.

Open your game

Name your boss

Paint it with words

Give it attack one

Add the tell

Now a harder attack

Tell it again

Turn up the heat

Find the weak spot

Build your boss brief

Build it in Astrocade

Ship it to the wall

The class wall - share yours

You built a real boss fight.

The cheap boss trap

Here is how it works