Boss fights represent the climax of each vignette throughoutSouth of Midnight. The entire game is magical, presenting a twisted version of the American Deep South, but the bosses are the most overtly so, labeled as Mythical Creatures in-game. Most of the bosses share similar mechanics outside the run-of-the-mill combat encountered during the rest ofSouth of Midnight, but they still provide varying levels of difficulty.
South of Midnight’s Southern Gothic taleputs you up against massive, terrifying creatures, but it won’t test your mettle in the same way traditionally difficult games will. If you are looking for a challenge, try changing yourSouth of Midnightdifficulty settings, but the bosses aren’t liable to require any more technical skill, even if they’re set to do more damage.South of Midnightonly has five bossesin its relatively short runtime, and they cover a pretty wide spectrum when considering each one’s difficulty.
5Benjy Isn’t Much Of A Boss Fight
Chapter 3
Benjy mainly qualifies as a boss through a technicality: he’s one of the five Mythical Creatures that specifically gets spotlighted by the game with a banner at the top of the screen. That said, there’s no actual combat involved in his appearance. Hazel learns how Benjy was essentially jailed in a tree by his brother, Rhubarb, who led Benjy into a hollow then boarded it up. Benjy’s sadness over being abandoned in the bayou saw him merge with the tree, growing into a giant wooden statue of sorts.
There’s nothing particularly difficult about the Benjy “boss fight;” all you have to do is climb up to his head. There’s no resistance on the way up, just ledges to climb and platforms to jump on. In many ways,Benjy is an introduction to the gameplay loop that will crop up repeatedlythroughoutSouth of Midnight’s 14 chapters: Hazel learns of a particular tragedy, unraveling the surrounding Stigma so she can reach the festering Knot that has afflicted the local Mythical Creature.
4Two-Toed Tom Is Imposing, But You’ll Figure Out His Weakness Easily
Chapter 5
Two-Toed Tom was once a normal alligator, starved and abused by the man who kept the wild animal as a pet.He turned on his owner through Jolene’s trickery, who unwittingly unleashed the troubled creature on the local wildlife. Two-Toed Tom grew to an immense size, and at first appears inSouth of Midnightas a moving island, before he surfaces and reveals himself.
The encounter with Two-Toed Tom is more of a straightforward boss fight than that with Benjy. Two-Toed Tom bites at Hazel, who gets cornered on a small island among the floodplains, butthe giant alligator telegraphs his moves pretty clearly. You may get hit a couple of times learning the pattern of the fight, but the key to defeating Two-Toed Tom is given away by plenty of on-screen prompts. The whole fight is just a matter of dodging attacks and waiting for the right moment to strike the bell, which will leave him stunned for a pummeling.
3Kooshma Isn’t Very Difficult For A Final Boss
Chapter 13
Kooshma, the King of Dreams and Nightmares, is the final boss you’ll face before the credits roll onSouth of Midnight. The most difficult thing about Kooshma is the fight’s length –it’s actually a string of encounters against Haints, the enemies you’ve fought throughout the game, interspersed with sections where you dodge attacks from Kooshma himself. Kooshma appears as a swirling miasma of Stigma, and Hazel gives her mother, Lacey, her magic bottle to absorb the excised pain during the lengthy battle.
Only one Health Coil is available during Kooshma’s entire fight, which can make things tricky, but it will regenerate if you switch to the Story or Easy difficulty modes.
Staying alive for so long feels like a tall order, butat this point in the game, you’ve fought so many Haints and likely acquired plenty of upgrades, so the actual combat isn’t terribly difficult. Likewise, the short sections where you dodge Kooshma’s attacks are fairly easy to deal with. Just like every previous fight, the boss' attacks are telegraphed by glowing red effects on the arena floor, so all you have to do is dodge out of the area in time.
2Rougarou Has Some Tricky Moves You’ll Have To Deal With
Chapter 7
Rougarou is the bird-like creature that Laurent transforms into, an affliction he developed as a response to violence and abuse in his childhood. He’s consequently lived an abnormally long life, but he has a lingering fear of hurting people he cares about if he happens to grow angry and transform.Laurent becomes the Rougarou when Hazel comes to ask about Huggin' Molly; he doesn’t want to help her find the supposedly dangerous monster, and they get into a spat about Laurent’s relationship with Lacey.
The Rougarou fight has more depth than Two-Toed Tom’s, and the boss itself is the primary danger, unlike Kooshma.The Rougarou moves quickly around its arena, strikes fast, and has a variety of movesthat have to be learned. It has a similar cadence to the intermissions where Kooshma’s attacks have to be dodged – a swirling cloud limits your movement and vision occasionally, and the Rougarou attacks from the haze, requiring good timing on your part to not take considerable damage.
1Huggin' Molly Is South Of Midnight’s Hardest Boss
Chapter 9
Huggin' Molly is the toughest boss fight inSouth of Midnightlargely becauseit’s the most technically demanding. Huggin' Molly has a wide variety of attacks, some of which make large patches of the arena difficult or painful to traverse. The encounter has three stages, with each subsequent stage taking place on smaller arena platforms thanks to holes Molly has created. You have to dodge a continuous barrage of attacks while seeking out explosive barrels to lob at her, which appear randomly around the arena and can be destroyed by Molly’s attacks.
Huggin' Molly and the other Mythical Creatures are all based on folklore and legends from the southern United States.
While each stage has a break in between, where you do some mild platforming to return to the arena, the fight itself requires almost continual dodging and jumping. It’s very easy to get trapped between a gap and a cloud of toxic fumes Molly blows across the platforms, or get stuck in a yarn web on the ground and be unable to dodge a vicious punch. Molly telegraphs her attacks, just like all the otherSouth of Midnightbosses, but the skill required to deal with them is greater than that needed for previous fights.
South of Midnight
In “South of Midnight,” players follow Hazel, a young woman navigating a surreal, Southern Gothic landscape in search of her mother after a devastating hurricane. As a newly awakened “Weaver,” Hazel confronts creatures from Southern folklore, such as Two-Toed Tom and Huggin’ Molly, using her magical abilities to mend spiritual wounds.
