What separatesThe Binding of Isaac: Rebirthfrom other roguelikes in the modern era is the wide diversity in bosses. While there are a handful of frustrating late game bosses, there really aren’t many bosses that should give you trouble.
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The ending bosses — those that can directly lead to one version of the game’s many endings — are all similarly difficult in that they throw tons of projectiles at you and some are either overly long fights or have huge health pools. This ranking is concerned with the regular bosses that are fought in the early to mid-stages of the game that become regular enemies later on.
10The Haunt
The Haunt is one of the few vanilla Rebirth bosses that can cause problems. He starts with three lil’ haunts that aren’t too tough to get rid of but bounce around quite a bit and circle the user. Once they are dealt with, Haunt himself sticks to the back of the room and quickly bounces back and forth from left to right.
If the player gets too close, he will charge them, and at distance, he fires both brimstone and five blood shots at a wide range since he moves so quickly. The trouble comes from having to lead your shots given his speed, which usually means being right within his range at all times.
Bumbino is more of a frustrating boss than a challenging one. He usually spawns in a cluttered room, which means less room to move around and avoid his attacks. He charges very fast at the player, albeit not at great distances. He can also drop both butt bombs and attacks that hit the ceiling, causing rocks to fall.
These rock projectiles hit a large amount of the spaces on the floor, limiting your movement — unlike many other pre-final bosses can cause. His combination of close range and area denial damage make running into him unprepared a nightmare.
It Lives is possibly the hardest vanilla boss in Rebirth. It Lives starts by spawning eye enemies that can attack you from distance. Once these are dealt with, It Lives begins a bullet hell sequence that covers a majority of the room.
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Throughout this period, it spawns more enemies to deal with. Unfamiliar players will struggle just to find the safe spots in its pattern, and the aggro enemies will force players to constantly be on the move, further causing trouble attempting to find a pattern.
Wormwood is similar to Larry Jr. but turned up to 11. Wormwood is very difficult to track, often going underground and relocating. Because of its incredibly aggressive movement, having lower movement speed or even shot speed can make it impossible to avoid taking physical hits. Wormwood also fires projectiles in random directions before submerging itself back underground.
you’re able to drop bombs and have Wormwood run into them and take damage much like the Chub boss, but its more erratic movement makes this a risky strategy. His final stage sees him create multiple pits that force the player to move around them.
6Colostomia
Colostomia starts by bouncing around in an erratic fashion, both firing projectiles and covering the room in gas. Afterward, she starts firing butt bombs that create bigger explosions on the area covered in gas.
These areas are easy enough to avoid, but the more frustrating part comes in the second half of her fight, where she can create up to two puddles that deal AoE damage, while she’s also firing around herself. Her area denial with puddles and her fast movement, along with these projectiles, make it tough to get through without taking hits.
Brownie is another difficult to avoid boss due to his fast spawning rate and projectile firing. Every time Brownie is hit, he spawns a brownie corn. This actively punishes any build that can’t deal high damage or relies on fast firing speed. Even if enough damage is output, he will just spawn a group of them instead.
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He will also fart and knock back both the player and the brownie corn, making it likely that at least one of them bumps into you. Builds utilizing mom’s knife or brimstone — ones that can deal with multiple of the brownie corn at once — can make this far easier, but this may be impossible if you run into him earlier in a run.
4The Bloat
The Bloat is both one of the most unpredictable bosses and the most frustrating. Bloat spawns eye roamers that bounce around the room and off of walls. This itself isn’t too bad, but they also bounce off of each other. While trying to navigate around them and The Bloat, he will fire both projectiles and brimstone at you in whatever direction you are trying to hit him from.
Getting through The Bloat unscathed involves constantly moving and avoiding both his eyes, brimstone attacks, and projectiles. This is entirely possible but requires much more careful play than almost any other pre-final boss.
Singe is a fast charging enemy that focuses on staying aggressive and forcing the player to pay around his area denial. He spawns with four different spiked rock balls that damage the player when bumped into.
If they are hit by his explosive gas, they will go flying around the room. Like Wormwood, Singe’s high speed and aggressive nature make it impossible to avoid for lower speed builds. Flight is a decent counter for these attacks, except for his latter stages where he starts shooting fire.
The Pile combines many of The Binding of Isaac: Rebirth’s most frustrating mechanics. The Pile shoots bones, which are one of the fastest enemy projectiles in the game. It’s not too tough staying out of his range and avoiding them altogether, except that he also spawns bony enemies, which shoot their own bone projectiles as well.
The Pile then creates spike traps to prevent the player from moving freely. He can also burrow underground and charge at the player. Neither of these are as frustrating as either Wormwood or Singe, but combined with his other attacks, they’ll will keep you on your toes.
1Great Gideon
Great Gideon is so overly designed I still have no idea how he isn’t a final boss. Gideon always spawns in a long, vertical room that is structured like the greed mode boss. He sends different sequenced waves of enemies after the player. Gideon himself does not need to be damaged, but the enemies he spawns do.
This doesn’t stop Gideon from pulling in both you and his spawned enemies, firing projectiles and even changing the surrounding terrain. The only saving grace is that the extra length of the room means you don’t have to get overly close to Gideon unless absolutely necessary.
