By Jeremy Azevedo

Everybody remembers the final bosses of all the classic NES game: Bowser, Red Falcon, Gannon, Mother Brain, Dr. Wiley. But what about the lesser bosses… the assistant managers of evil in the department store of adventure? What about them, huh?

In honor of the middle management monsters of gaming’s past, we’ve compiled a list of the top 10 most compelling minibosses of the NES era.


Former baddies at the law offices of Hippo, Birdo, Woodman and Sachs.

Birdo (Super Mario Bros. 2)


Quite possibly the most disturbing example of cosplay ever conceived.

Just what the hell is a “Birdo” anyway? A transgender reptile/bird/mammal thing that spits eggs out of it’s gaping snout as an act of aggression? Eggs that never hatch? What sort of creature would do something like that? How do they reproduce, by getting mustached plumbers to re-fertilize them by chucking the eggs back at them or something? Whatever the hell it is, Birdo shares the important distinctions of being both the first openly bi-curious video game character and the first miniboss to ever have a “nerdcore” metal song written about it:

Dodongo (The Legend of Zelda)


Wait, what? I don't remember the old bearded dude saying that...

The Zelda series has always had great minibosses, but my personal favorite has always been the Dodongo. Sure, unicorn/dragon things and one-eyed crabs are all fine and good, but nothing beats the self-congratulatory feeling of shoving a live bomb up the hungry snout of a triceratops that “dislikes smoke”. Despite the fact that the Dodongo encourages kids to experiment with feeding explosives to living creatures, thus creating many future serial killers, it still ranks as one of the most memorable minibosses of the NES era.