Ranking Every 3D Mario Boss

shockingly there is a ton of 3d mario bosses i thought we'd take the time and try to rank every single one we're also going to include mid bosses and separate variations if they're different enough this list is based off of how fun the fights are which is determined by creativity challenge and overall flow so with that let's get her ranked 75 big slash chill bully these are probably the worst bullies of all time they don't even have arms or anything you simply jump on them and knock them into the lava or in the case of the chill bully you dive and slide on the ice to knock the bully into the ice water in one quick swoop they don't really feel like bosses nor do they really have challenge at all 74 big boo similar to the bully enemies big boo is stupidly easy their hitboxes are only on the back side but that doesn't mean much when you can slide kick through them or just ground pound in one spot it feels like you're fighting a normal boo but with three hits instead of one 73. stink bug parrot this barely counts as a mid boss all you do is ground pound the bug one time and they're a goner with good timing the stink bug will be squished in a matter of seconds there is a chance that maybe you'll get hit if it charges at you but even so this just isn't difficult 72 prince bully i debated on even including prince bully but they're technically a mid boss that take three hits you defeat this fella by stopping him into a pipe so he can squish down and then you kick him afterwards it's a fun idea but again it's really simplistic and fairly forgettable 71 big mr eye i know really creative name on this one just like the normal eyeball enemies you run around so the eye gets dizzy and instead of spawning a blue coin you get a star the only reason this is labeled higher in the rank is because the room you're in is slightly narrow otherwise this fight is overly basic 70. wiggler from mario 64. by far the most guilty boss to fight we start by flooding wiggler's home with water and now we're stopping on his head three times and despite his large size you'll finish this fight in about 20-30 seconds i mean it is cool that wiggler gets progressively faster but that's all he's got going for him and i feel bad for flooding his house 69 womp king now we're at the point where boss fights start to get fun the objective is the hip drop womp's back three times and normally the challenge is to go around him when he's dropping down but this is mario 64. you can hip drop through his body and still get the hit in it's dumb fun but also really short 68 pom pom from 3d land in 3d world you love to see it boom boom sister mrs pompom busts out the ninja star and splits into multiple illusions it's too bad it's blatantly obvious which clone is the real one and the fact that she moves at the speed of a sloth the 3d land and 3d world versions of pom pom are so similar that i decided to morph them together 67 boom boom from 3d land in 3d world they might call him a mad lad but he really isn't boom boom will very slowly spin around or fly in the air but before he gets a chance to attack you you step on his head then he goes into a shell trying to hit you but his attack patterns are always really predictable like with pom pom it made sense to blend the 3d land and world versions of boom boom together 66. i rock the n64 had a weird fascination with bosses being giant hands and iroc is no exception you land hits by attacking the eyeball in the hand's palm and if you're fast enough they will never attack you the hands are normally very active and fast but the exploit is so easy to pull off that this boss isn't as great as it could have been 65 proto piranha the gatekeepers of some levels and stars and mario sunshine you simply spray the piranha's mouth with water and they jitter all around you also need to be careful of the swoop and stews as they can't hit you if you're not paying attention so i like that you have to worry about staying out of the goo while also attacking but honestly the obstacles are meaningless 64. king ka thunk our official winner for world's most awkward boss name the king of thunking moves on a grid and when it crashes down you have to step on the red x you're given ample time to figure out which spot he's gonna land in removing any sense of challenge it's an interesting idea but not more than that 63. monty mole this is another boss that barely counts as a boss these moles shoot bullet bills and bob owns when you get close to them and somehow spring water at the bottom activates it then you just chuck the sucker back at them while there's not much depth to this fight aiming your bobbum throws and hitting the mole is really satisfying since it can be hard to judge your aim at first 62. big bobbum one of the most classic 3d mario bosses out there run behind the lords bob pick him up and before snapping mario's backbone toss him through the air sometimes getting behind him can be tricky but you really feel an oomph when you throw this big boy 61. rango it sure was a breath of fresh air to not fight koopalings and mario odyssey but their range and difficulty in comparison to the bunnies remains the same rango throws his hat and you have to flip it to bounce off the spring inside and finally land on his head it's different from a typical koopaling fight but it's not very difficult even the later versions of this fight are fairly easy 60 topper topper attacks you with hats by throwing them or spinning around on the ground you basically just throw your hats at him until they're knocked off and stop on his head it's a cool idea but doesn't get engaging to fight until much later versions in the game 59. madame brood the thickest boss of them all madame has a pet chain chomp that will try to bite your plumbing off when you capture the chain chomp madam will swipe at you a few times but then get tired and you just flick the chain chomp back at her face it's a simple idea but definitely intimidating at times 58. eely mouth i absolutely love the concept of this boss the idea of cleaning an eel's teeth with your flood pack is just ingenious the goal is to clean the gunk off of the eel's eight teeth my only real gripe here is the controls now look i'm not the best at mario sunshine but i never feel like i'm in full control of aiming my water it's one of the few times in a mario game where the control is honestly a little mediocre 57. boss brolder a giant boulder with a face and arms what could possibly go wrong he can't run towards you but instead rolls with his younger and smaller bolder buddies simply chuck the smaller boulders at the boss and he'll go down in a few hits after each hit he spins like a maniac and is completely invincible and it's a little scary avoiding him in this phase 56 chief chile this is the normal bully fights done right the big papa chief is actually fairly aggressive his lunges can actually stun you and simple jumps aren't gonna push him back anymore and every time you get him in the icy water he goes around the stage shrinking it making the fight harder this is a great evolution to the crappy bully fights from the original mario 64. 55 pee wee piranha mario galaxy 2 tried to recreate the magic of dino piranha from the first game and this one didn't quite land peewee's still a decent boss you have to smack its egg until it reveals its bottom and then you smack that to land a hit i mean it's a good starter boss and all but there's very little strategy or timing involved 54 stuart this bunny can't manage to keep his lunch down he's so bad that he hurls purple goo all over the ground and we have to use our hat to push it out of the way which now that i think about it more deeply that's really gross it's a clever boss fight with all things said it's just a little simple 53 harriet probably the most intricate bunny fight harriet chuck spikes at you with her ponytail and you have to fling back the spikes with your hat once you hit her head she starts screaming and drops spikes all over the stage but you could stop her tracks by just launching a spike back at her i like the mechanic because it requires decent coordination to get down 52. cook a teal not quite the spiciest of stews but coca teal has a fine enough taste as a fireball you swim around the pot avoiding the spikes that are being dropped in when kokoteel starts barfing a pink slimy substance you climb up and have to smack the birdie's head and here's the thing with most mario odyssey fights they'd be much better if you weren't given hearts to heal it takes up most of the challenge 51. goombas he is all about bossing us around this giant goomba with a fancy mustache will try to stomp you to little bits with yoshi you need to get behind him and eat his smaller goomba army and then hurl and egg at his backside for a hit it gets really crazy in the final phase when he's sprinting at you it's a solid battle 50. top maniac this is mario's version of beyblades you start by stepping on his big red button to remove his spikes and follow that with a couple smacks into the electric gate there's a couple variations of this fight usually the end has additional spiky topmans to up the challenge it's a little short-lived but also reasonably fun 49. dino piranha one of the more memorable galaxy boss fights you have to sneak your way around to his tail and smack the end so it stretches and hits the plant in the head i don't know what it is but it's very gratifying figuring out the best time to get behind him to attack 48. wamp king from galaxy 2. when you first climb the tower you think the womb king fight will be as simple as in the original but you're sorely debated when you take out the womp only to find the middle of the stage open up then when you drop down you find a much larger whomp and the real fight begins he spawns baby womps he can shake the ground stunning you and he's just a much larger opponent he's still not super difficult but it's a lot more invigorating that's for sure 47. histocrat by far one of the jazziest music pieces histocrat is a snake that can be taken out most easily with the cat suit you'll do so by climbing up the smaller serpents and diving into histocrat's skull there's a fun charm to this one 46. king boo from sunshine i imagine some people would find the king buu fight to be worse than i've placed it and for good reason the entire thing is luck based you need to hope the slot machine rolls three pineapples because doing so will spawn a pepper which you throw into the booth's mouth and from there you can finally hit him with a fruit king boom may also spawn enemies or coins but like i said all of this is random and you have no idea how long this will take but i find the pepper mechanic to be really clever and i love that we have to ground pound parts of the stage to stop the tracks from rotating 45. mecha wiggler after taking control of the tank you have to narrowly avoid the wiggler's energy balls as well as rampages at the bottom it's really easy to avoid these since a giant yellow line indicates which part of the crown to stay clear from the whole idea is to shoot each fragment of the body so you can stun it from moving and it's all done through the tank 44. king caliente this is one octopus that doesn't squirm around the king of squids is out to shoot fireballs and coconuts at you the coconuts you'll smash back at him and it almost becomes this weird game of tennis when you have to keep hitting the coconut back and forth it's really refreshing to fight a boss like this instead of just stepping on the head three times 43. sorbetti i never see this boss talked about or mentioned but it has a really interesting attack pattern you could only hit the red nose as it rolls around the stage but what makes it unpredictable is the stubs on the snowball and in the ground it forces you to react quickly to which direction he'll turn but for some reason he's just really unmemorable 42. dig a leg it's pretty neat to have a boss that is based entirely on the spin drill dig a leg waddles around this circle of dirt and we have to dig through and attack the star from underneath him the star is only on the bottom at certain times so you have to be very careful of when to dig or you might get stomped on or hurt 41. gooper blooper one of the more interesting starter bosses you need to splash gooper's face and pull on his lips and i mean really pull on them because they'll snap back and make him flop through the air normally you're supposed to also tear off his arms but you actually don't need to do that if you spray and grab his mouth at the right time i mean come to think of it it's really vile that we're literally tearing his arms off while he's alive poor guy 40. rollo dillo roll roll roll your rocks harshly down the spear using rock mario you'll hit rocco dillo's backside when he isn't looking or stunned in place if you're confident enough with control on rock mario this fight isn't much of a problem 39. baron burr a giant ice cube is out for revenge and it's up to you to shake the iciness off them and then kick him in the face stupid ice cube he even spawns in little burrs but they don't really get in the way there is a chance that this energy shock wave may knock you off the platform if you're really bad at this game but it's not that hard of a fight 38. bowser from mario 64. it's the classic bowser fight run behind him grab his tail and throw him across the stage into a bomb there's three variations all of them with slightly different stage hazards and difficulty the final version where it takes three hits and the stage crumbles is by far the best plus bowser is rainbow the timing is key as your window for hitting a bomb is pretty small when he's spinning at max speed 37. mecca bowser in a way this vitalizes a childhood dream i've always had taking a water gun and squirting it on a roller coaster just to see what would happen we have to fight a robo bowser via conveniently placed missiles and the game gives you what's basically a hard and easy mode it's easy to hit him up close with missiles but you're also given the option to snipe him from really far away 36. tail slash dry bowser from 3d land half the challenge isn't fighting bowser but simply navigating the level bowser does breathe fireballs and jumps around the stage but you mostly have to figure out how to get around him it's pretty easy if you have a tanooki leaf and not so much if you don't 35. glam dozer she tends to flip out so we have to flip her by ground pounding these gritted tiles this fight can get tricky considering she'll also spew lava that covers up the gridded locations and in general she's just very fast this makes for a solid fight 34. bowser from sunshine this is just the weirdest fight ever bowser is taking a bath in nasty sewer water and you have to ruin his family vacation by launching yourself into the air and hitting these pads which destroy his tub bowser sends out bullet bills and breathes fire but it's fairly underwhelming for what's supposed to be the final boss fight don't get me wrong it's loads of fun and it's an interesting idea yes it's just so weird 33. king boo from mario 64 ds by far the best version of a king boo fight you start by going up to a mirror to find luigi and king boo behind him then you have to hit the back of king buu from either your side or the mirror side and this ghost is booking it so it's not as easy as it usually is it really is a creative way to have a ghost fight 32 bowser from 3d world okay why does bowser have a pimpin car i don't understand that at all but my god it actually fits them so bowser throws bombs at you and you have to swipe or hit them to attack later versions of this fight have lava to avoid and bowser also breathes fire occasionally but honestly i just can't get over that bowser is rocking such a massive car 31. motley boss blob this big hunk goes around jumping towards you and eventually forms into a million different metal orbs later versions are a lot harder when there's energy waves from his stomps and you have to avoid them or you'll get hit it's generally a quick battle but it really keeps you on your toes since you can't always tell which way you need to go 30. torque drift are we fighting a chandelier i mean yeah i know it's a saucer but seriously it looks like a chandelier you basically have to attack the glass part while also avoiding several energy shock waves that bounce all over the room this is another quick fight where you need to be instinctive 29. prince picante the infamous octopus has upgraded from giant magma hole to cannon car but he still has the same tricks he's still spitting fireballs and coconuts at you but this time it's much harder to hit the coconuts back since his fire patterns are much more rampant that combined with the icy ground which forces you to skate makes for a surprisingly solid flowing battle 28. bowser jr from mario galaxy that's right there is no robot or other monster being summoned by bowser jr we fight the koopaling himself with him it's a small airship that shoots cannonballs and bullet bills we just have to use koopa shells and chuck them at the ship near the end we can only hit the front which gives us less room for air while it's a very forgettable fight it's a fun enough encounter 27. king lekatu despite the title this leica 2 looks like some spoiled rotten brat like most like it too he hurls spineys your way and you have to catch them with yoshi and spit them back out it's pretty sweet revenge after all these years of dealing with lekka 2. he's finally getting a taste of his own medicine the dude even sends in thunderstorms to try to stop you he can get crazy 26. bugaboom back in the prehistoric day when bugs were like 50 feet large bugaboom flies around while you have to butt stomp his back it's fairly simple until the last phase when he speeds up and starts rotating but if you time it right it's not too bad it utilizes beam mario well but it's a bit on the easy side 25 molos lonsier i hope you enjoyed my french impression this guy has a pretty big cranium and you have to slosh his lava hair with water eventually mollusk becomes so big brain that his head explodes yeah too much iq will do it to the best of us it's a really cool fight though all jokes aside 24. wiggler from sunshine i don't know what kind of morning wiggler had but it couldn't have been very pleasant this wiggler is charging around gelato beach and all you can do to stop them is squirt water at a stem so some sand rises and hopes that you flip them over but really i just love how intricate this fight can be 23. taryn talks this might possibly be the most disgusting mario boss of all time tarantox is a massive spider that shoots green slime from his sides and you have to fling yourself to pop his zits or his back end it just looks so gross and i feel like i'm violating him but the boss fight has really fun mechanics since it revolves flinging yourself around his own web 22. camella it's ya fella kamik but with a wizard like robe and green lipstick camello waves a magic wand to spawn in fireballs and green shells pick up the shells and hurl them back at camella there's harder versions of this fight where you have less room to move around in and magikoop is spawning at the end for more challenge it's a really fun way of reinventing this character for a new boss 21. squizzard i don't know what a squizzard is even supposed to be he kinda looks like a cactus that's had a really bad sunburn you'll have spikes and bombs thrown at you and you basically have to throw several fireballs into his mouth what i like about this boss is you need to very carefully aim your shot usually you need to get up close to his mouth but then you run the risk of getting sucked into the sand it's got this really good risk and reward system 20. under grunt gunner fantastic name choice aside the gunner finds himself in a bubble gun and rapidly shoots bubbles at you if you have b mario you can easily just fly up and hit him but if you don't then you need to hit a button to race platforms and actually avoiding bubbles is a problem some versions of this boss can also be pretty intense 19. knucklotech or what i prefer to call him iroc 2 or maybe i rock with a face the idea is to capture knucklotech's hand and send it back to him for a sweet knuckle sandwich along the way he'll launch his fists at you and release hordes of cinchos from the ground this fight is so much fun and really quite riveting 18. major burrows you're saving a bunny from being attacked by what i can only describe as pain the creature major burrows can only be attacked if he's out of the ground which you'll do by ground pounding close to him in later phases he gets a lot faster and you have to time your ground pound really well i just love how pissed he gets it adds a lot of excitement to the fight 17. boulder geist everybody loves boulder geist and how could you not he's this massive rock ghost thing that rolls rocks and bomboos at you he can only attack by grabbing the boos and smacking him with them in later phases he grows hands and can create giant spikes on the spot he has this really intimidating yet inviting vibe to him there's a lot of joy to getting good timing with your booth rose 16. ruin dragon dark souls slipped one of its dragons into mario odyssey and my god what a fun fight this is the lord of lightning blasts jolts of electricity waves and rings and you can only hit him when he's drained all of his power you'll pull out these stakes in his helmet then crack his head with your botox it's not quite as intricate as i'd hope a dragon fight would be but it's still such a blast overall 15. gobblegut here's another dragon boss that i find to be slightly better now obviously it doesn't look quite as cool but the gameplay is a lot more intriguing you have to hit these pink blobs around the dragon's body while also avoiding his snapping attacks there's more substance to the gameplay and there's more strategies to defeating gobblegut than just one with the ruined dragon 14. petey piranha i know the two piranha fights are fairly different but i decided to combine them anyway into one because the strategy to defeat them is basically the same before pd barfs out goo you stuff his stomach full of water and ground pound his belly my god that is morbid and why do so many mario enemies barf slime overthinking aside this fight is incredibly satisfying just watching the water protrude from his mouth after smashing his stomach really makes you feel like he did some damage 13. mega leg i've said this before and i'll say it again you just can't go wrong with massive bosses that you literally have to climb up shadow of the colossus style you start by going up the leg and avoiding some bullet bills then at the top you'll find more bullet bills that home in on you and you have to navigate them towards the gate with enough finessing you'll be able to nab the grand star even to this day it's one of mario's most exotic boss fights 12. mega hammer bowser jr goes full dr eggman and puts himself in a giant robot suit the hands of the robots are hammers and he shoots out bullet bills as well the goal is to attack the blue orbs in the front and back of the robot and it has to be the best yoshi based boss fight the challenge comes in when learning when to time your bullet bill attacks as well as avoiding all the energy waves at the ending phase 11. boomsday machine there really is no other way to describe this boss it does look like a boomsday so much is happening in this fight you have fire bars swinging at the bottom electric balls being fired and eventually the machine turns into a tank loaded with spikes you have to use cloud mario and the turbines to get yourself up top and crack bowser junior's glass i just love how enthralling this fight is and anything involving cloud mario is a huge plus 10. fiery dino piranha i almost combined this with the normal dino piranha but the patterns are so different that i thought it made sense to separate them fiery dino's tail will literally be on fire meaning you can't touch it without taking damage so for this fight you have to pay really close attention to when you can whack his tail this one change makes the whole fight so much harder and so much more exciting 9. fiery gobblegum this is the same idea as fiery dino piranha you can't touch gobblegut's body at all and you can only hit the pink blobs there's also lava bubbles all over the stage which again makes this a more stellar and engaging fight compared to the original 8. robo brood the 4 bunnies were a bit lame but combine them together and you get one of the best boss fights in the game robobrood is a wooden and metal robot that spits out bombs in these hula hoop rings and you need to use pokio's beak to shoot the bombs back and break off the middle pieces to climb up the music is just perfect for this fight and there's a good amount of struggle too 7. phantom manta i feel like a lot of people hate this boss but i think it is simply incredible first off the scope of the phantom manta is enormous it really looks like it's engulfing the entire level and spraying it down can be done in so many different ways you can stay in the middle and risk getting zapped or play it safe and run around the edges and it's a nice touch that the tiny phantom mantas will chase after you so you don't have to scurry around for them in the end 6. bowser from mario odyssey i'm combining the normal fights in the final boss for this one since that makes the most sense bowser starts by pounding the ground creating energy waves and throwing giant boulders at you but since we can take his hat we just punch him down until he can't shield anymore this is okay and all but the second half really steals the show you turn into bowser himself and save the princess while capturing bowser the fact that nintendo got this meta with a boss fight still blows my mind it was such a great way to end mario odyssey 5. king finn the only reason kingfin is so high is because nintendo did the unthinkable they made a water level fun yup this is by far one of the best water levels i've played because we mostly use the koopa shell to swim around the objective is to hit king finn with koopa shells while also avoiding his skeletal fish guards i just love wrapping mario around the planet and lining up my koopa throws this is so much better than it deserves to be 4. bowser from galaxy 2. a lot of people say galaxy 1's final boss is better and i have to agree with them but that doesn't mean galaxy 2's isn't phenomenal as well the gimmick to hitting bowser is to use the meteorite's gravity and ground pound into it to smack bowser through the air while this is happening bowser is spewing fire with loads of energy waves to avoid the ending is extremely cinematic because it's just you and bowser going through some sort of void or black hole you just have to hit him with more meteorites and while this looks hella dope it's also a bit anticlimactic due to how easy it is 3. bowser from 3d land i can't believe i'm putting this final boss so high up either but it honestly deserves it instead of fighting bowser head on the game turns into this insane james bond movie where you're running around all sorts of buildings trying to avoid all the fire being launched at you the camera is panning all over the place and you never know what's coming next the fact that this is running on a 3ds is even crazier this looks and feels like something you would play on a console and also i love the donkey kong reference with bowser throwing barrels is such a nice touch i'm still just so impressed with how fun and different this boss fight is 2. meowser the creation of meowster is something you never consider until actually seeing him you know why didn't bowser ever use the game's power-ups to his advantage he does so for this fight and it is simply fantastic meowser climbs up buildings trying to swipe you away but all you have in your power is to run away and try to avoid him in the second half meowzer gets a hold of the double cherry and you end up avoiding multiple meowzers at once and at the end you get to mash the pow block and take out all five meows at the same time it is on par with the greatness of the 3d land boss and one bowser from mario galaxy let's be real this one kind of wins by a landslide every single bowser fight from before has now been morphed into one and it is really cool just going through all the phases most of the time you're just smacking them over and over often tossing them around the planetoids it's not the hardest fight ever but it is by far the most interesting and has the best music as well the opera really sets the tone that bowser ain't playing around and once you've hit him multiple times you literally send bowser into the fabric of space i don't know how you could possibly defeat anything worse than that don't think you could so before going in case anyone was wondering i decided to not include shadow mario because he doesn't really count as a boss he more or less behaves like a recurring enemy but yeah i still can't believe we've seen over 70 different mario themed bosses which ones are your favorites let me know down below because i found it really tricky trying to figure out what was the best of the best and with all that said i hope you enjoyed today's video and thank you so much for watching stay safe out there and have a great day i'll see you all next time [Music]

Channel: Nathaniel Bandy

Views: 1,630,900

Rating: 4.8968315 out of 5

Keywords: mario all bosses, ranking mario bosses, ranking 3d mario games, super mario 64, super mario sunshine, super mario odyssey, super mario 64 ds, super mario galaxy, super mario galaxy 2, super mario 3d land, super mario 3d world, super mario, mario, nathaniel bandy

Id: VIJLYV1x3uM

Length: 27min 17sec (1637 seconds)

Published: Thu Jul 30 2020