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Classic RPGs always have a lair for the final boss, and in this guide we will teach you how to make one in your game with RPG MAKER WITH. Read on to learn how to make a boss lair complete with traps and puzzles.

Advanced Guide (Part 1)

Making the Boss' Lair!

In the Intermediate Guide, we created a dungeon where your player characters will be able to strengthen themselves and prepare for the final challenge of your game: The demon king's castle! Now the time has come for us to not only make the demon king's castle, but also to start adding enemies into our game.

Making maps and putting in features like traps is the easy part, which is why they're all here in Part 1. Part 2 of the Advanced Guide will tackle implementing enemies in the game, creating the final boss battle, and an ending.

We've already made the third island in our game: Island C, which hosts the demon king's castle. The castle itself can only be accessed via air (which makes the airship the player will gain from the dungeon necessary). Once the player's party gets there, let's give them a warm welcome by creating a sprawling boss lair full of traps and puzzles.

Using a Sample Map for the Boss' Lair

Since we've already created a dungeon of our own, we will look at a feature that comes with RPG MAKER WITH: Sample Maps. Using a Sample Map for your boss' Lair can save time and effort, especially when you are starting out.

For example, we will use the "Demon Lord’s Castle" maps for creating the Demon King's Lair. Using a Sample Map reduces the time spent on designing maps and helps you focus on setting up events instead.

You can use Sample Maps to create places other than dungeons like villages, towns, and even entire overworlds! You just need to put in the effort to populate the maps with interesting events and enemies. You can also use Sample Maps to learn how to create maps of your own, especially if you are just starting out with creating RPG MAKER games.

How to Use Sample Maps

How to Create Traps

Traps provide a level of challenge by forcing the player to strategize how to approach a dungeon. For instance, the spike traps in the demon king’s castle will force players to tread carefully while exploring this dungeon.

Aside from providing a challenge, you can use traps to influence how players explore a dungeon. For example, you can place traps around a treasure chest, forcing players to explore the dungeon and find ways to deactivate them. Thus, traps are an important part of any dungeon to add more challenge to players and change their approach to complete it.

How to Make a Boss Dungeon With Traps

How to Make a Puzzle

Aside from traps, there's another way you can keep the player's party away from the final boss - puzzles. We will make a basic puzzle in the Demon King's Lair, where the player character will have to destroy three stones in order to progress to the Lair's second floor. We will do that by means of using Variables.

How to Make a Puzzle

If you follow all the steps correctly, your player character will come upon the barrier and be unable to get through if they haven't smashed all the tablets. But once they do, the barrier should disappear.

Variables can be used in many ways. You can use them to count how many times a certain action has been done (which could fulfill a quest). You can also use them to set passwords and codes for locked doors. You can even use them to make changing weather effects and even let your players gamble gold in-game.

Variables, like Switches, allow you to make complex operations that can increase the fun of your RPG.

How to Use Variables

Advanced Playtesting

Before we continue and implement enemies in our game, let's take a quick detour and go over what we have so far: Acave with a quest-giving NPC, a village with recruitable party members, shops, inns, and another important NPC, a dungeon full of loot and monsters, and the lair of the final boss complete with traps and puzzles.

Even a small game like ours already has more than a few moving parts. So it would make sense for us to make sure all those parts are moving correctly. We've tackled basic playtesting back in the Beginner's Guide, so in the Advanced Guide, it's fitting to do something a little bit more "advanced" than that: Toggling switches.

Playtesting by Toggling Switches

Aside from turning on Switches like the one for the old man in the cave, you can also use the Switch/Variable Status feature to test Variables such as the rock puzzle we did earlier. Try to use this feature whenever you playtest to save time as you go through your game to test your Events and spot bugs.

Advanced Playtesting

Moving On: Making Enemies and the Final Boss

We're now at the final stretch of your RPG-making journey! With all the key maps and events in your game done, it's time to put in enemies for your players to fight and a final boss to face off with to end the game. Read our guide to find out how to do all of that, as well as how to make an ending cutscene.

Making the Boss' Lair! Advanced Guide (Part 1)

RPG MAKER WITH Related Guides

All Advanced Guide Articles

Core Guides
Advanced Guide Part 1	Advanced Guide Part 2

Supplementary Guides
How to Make a Boss Dungeon With Traps	How to Make a Puzzle
Advanced Playtesting	How to Make Enemies
How to Make Enemy Groups	How to Make Different Kinds of Monster Encounters
How to Make a Boss Battle	How to Make an Ending
How to Use Common Events	How to Use Variables
EXP Curve Explained	Status Effect Creation Basics
Animations Guide	How to Set an Enemy’s Action Patterns
Event Priorities Explained

Tips and Tricks
How to Switch Battle Views	How to Make a Debug Room
How to Make Your Characters Jump	Kinds of Games You Can Make With RPG MAKER WITH
Game Design Fundamentals	What to Do When You Can’t Make a Good Game