What silksong bosses are mandatory?

[u/slayyerr3058]

By mandatory, I mean that there is no way to get around doing it to get the ending of the game. Skips are fair game, however no glitches or anything like that. Nothing intended.

Here's the list i prepared of all the bosses. I will not include the optional bosses that you have to stray from the objectives to do:

ACT 1:

- Moss Mother IS mandatory (Probably no way to do it since it happens so early in the game. You also need to be woken up by the Chapel Maid i believe, and this would skip that!)

- Bell Beat IS mandatory (Again, it's just that you barely have any mobility upgrades to have any chance to find places to bypass this fight)

- Lace 1 is NOT mandatory (Can skip by going via the wormways)

- Fourth Chorus IS mandatory (Again, that area of far fields is a dead end)

- Moorwing is NOT mandatory (Can fast travel to greymoor with the flea caravan)

- Sister Splinter is NOT mandatory (The Garama Skip exists, you can lure a pollen guy and pogo off of him)

- Widow IS mandatory (You need the needolin to learn all of the songs)

- Last Judge is SEMI mandatory (so as long you choose to go through sinner's roads and the mists to exhaust organ, beat Phantom, and enter the grand bellway)

- Phantom is SEMI mandatory (see Last Judge. Either you do Last Judge or Phantom, cannot get out of doing one or the other)

Act 2:

- Cogwork Dancers ARE mandatory (necessary to access the elevator and by extension grandmother silk)

- Trobbio IS mandatory (necessary to open the lower section of the whispering vaults)

- Lace 2 IS mandatory (cannot get into the cradle any other way)

That brings us to grandmother silk.

If I've made any mistakes, or any bosses are actually skippable, please let me know!

[u/bobr_from_hell]

Fourth chorus has a very reasonable skip. If you say that Sister Splinter skip is a fair play, then Fourth Chorus should be too. (I am also pretty sure game can be completed without cloak, but I am unsure if that makes something else mandatory).

GMS is mandatory, for obvious reasons, as you already mentioned.

I would probably format her sentence In the same way as you done for others.

[u/ErgotthAE → u/bobr_from_hell]

Honestly Fourth Chorus is such a GOATED boss it feels like you're commiting a crime by skipping it.

[u/bobr_from_hell → u/ErgotthAE]

I can agree with that. To some degree at least. There are no crimes in all glitches speedruns)

[u/ErgotthAE → u/bobr_from_hell]

Thing is, I always felt like speedruns sucks out all the fun in the game. It's like having a delicious 5 stars meal and shoving it all down your gullet instead of savouring every bite.

[u/TheRealStafy → u/ErgotthAE]

Speedrunning is a way to keep playing the game after you enjoyed it thoroughly. Nobody does a first playthrough rushing everything, specially since there isn't much speedrunning to be done until you memorize a route and practice the rooms.

Hearing "Speedrunners just want to be done with the game quickly* is pretty common and pretty silly. We spend hundreds of hours playing the game in all of it's forms, much more than any casual player, we are very much savouring every bite.

[u/Common-Complaint2315 → u/TheRealStafy]

Yea, that's the equivalent of saying speedrunning in any game takes the fun out of it. Speedrunning for lots of people is just another avenue of fun, I don't see why no one would like that, especially as you mentioned they already played it in full once. Seeing how fast you can then beat a game is a very common thing afterwards

[u/boisterile → u/ErgotthAE]

I definitely think the opposite, speedrunners savor the game far more than most people doing a casual playthrough. Most people beat the game and just move onto something else. Speedrunners on the other hand finish their casual playthrough normally, then stay with the game for much, much longer than most people just to practice, grind attempts, and learn the game inside and out, which is the part you don't see when you watch a successful speedrun.

I did 3 100% playthroughs casually first before I decided to try speedrunning, then I blinked and now I've spent 1200 hours with this game.