King Mook

Can you guess which one's the boss?^note Obviously, the small one in the center, because it's in front.

"I just hope they don't resort to enlarging the characters on the levels and calling them bosses this time; that giant beaver was a pretty cheap trick!"

— Cranky Kong, Donkey Kong 64 instruction manual

This is where a boss enemy resembles an enlarged or Palette Swapped version of a regular enemy, possibly with a crown or some other identifying feature. They may even be a mutant version, and will probably have an unimaginative name based on the enemy type they resemble.

However! Their attacks may be vastly different from those of the enemies they are based upon, or they may be identical but stronger. This mook is usually one of the varieties that can turn red, causing the player extra pain.

King Mooks tend to be such by virtue of being Large and in Charge. They may be the result of a Mook Promotion, or they may always have been tougher than your average enemy character. The King Mook has a high chance of being a Flunky Boss, having several of its weaker forms fight alongside it. It could be a Mechanical Monster if the original Mecha-Mooks it's based on are weird looking enough. A King Mook version of The Goomba is a common choice for a game's Warmup Boss.

Compare Giant Mook. See also Elite Mooks and Superpowered Mooks. Contrast Monster Lord, when this is due to biology. Not to be confused with Flunky Boss, which is about a boss that relies on his army to do the fighting for him.

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Video Game Examples:

Action Adventure

• A Bug's Life: Thumper and Molt share the same movement patterns as the grasshopper enemies (patrolling a small area and charging at Flik if he enters that area) while having much larger health bars. Hopper averts this by being the only grasshopper that can fly and throw water projectiles.
• A Hat in Time: Most of the bosses are this. Specifically, the Mafia Boss to the Mafia of Chefs, The Conductor to the Express Owls, DJ Grooves to the Moon Penguins and The Snatcher to his Minions. There is also the Giant Crow in the Birdhouse to the Mad Crows and Shoctopus to the Shock Squids, though they are never fought.
• Isle of Rebirth: Crabalt, Moldorm Prime, Mothula, and the Golden Beasts fall under this trope. Venser is a subversion — he's the leader of the Wizzrobes, and summons them during his first two fights. However, he's actually an Eldritch Abomination.
• Ittle Dew: Jenny Deer and the Lichious Turnip, who in fact used to rule their species a long time ago. Then, there's Ultra Fishbunjin 3000. As the card puts it: "Fishbuns usually don't exercise nor enjoy a balanced diet. Unfortunately for you, this one did."
• The Legend of Spyro:
  • The Legend of Spyro: A New Beginning: The Stone Sentinel is essentially a giant Rubble Brute fought as a boss instead of as a common enemy.
  • The Legend of Spyro: The Eternal Night: Arborick, a giant Treant, acts as a boss-level version of the smaller walking trees fought throughout the level leading up to him,
• The Legend of Zelda:
  • Zelda II: The Adventure of Link has an Iron Knuckle riding a horse, Rebonack, as one boss. He returns as a miniboss down the line. There's also Carock, which looks and attacks like a Wizzrobe but is bigger and faster in terms of teleport frequency, and much harder to hit (that last being something Wizzrobes are good enough at already). Yet another example is Thunderbird, a giant-flying variation of the Fokkeru birds that drop fireballs in the Great Palace.
  • The Legend of Zelda: A Link to the Past features the Armos Knights, the Moldorm King, and the Helmasaur King, smaller versions of which inhabit their dungeons or the area around them. Additionally, Moblins have been redesigned from their bulldog-like appearance in previous games to resembling pigs, carry mini tridents, and have an implied backstory of being former people. This makes them a mini version of Ganon, a monstrous trident-wielding humanoid boar who started as a person.
  • The Legend of Zelda: Link's Awakening: Several examples. Mini bosses King Moblin and Master Stalfos are this to Bulldog Moblins^note separate from the piglike Moblins which are called Pig Warriors here and Stalfos respectively. The dungeon boss Moldorm is a larger and more powerful version of the Mini Moldorm enemies.
  • The Legend of Zelda: Ocarina of Time: The bosses of the first three dungeons: Queen Gohma, King Dodongo, and Barinade. You fight Gohma's hatchlings, Dodongo larva and normal Dodongos, and smaller jellyfish parasites before fighting the big ones. There's also the minibosses Big Octo (to Octoroks) and the White Wolfos (to the gray Wolfos).
  • The Legend of Zelda: Majora's Mask has Garo Master (leader of the Garos who challenge Link when he's wearing the Garo Mask) and Captain Keeta (a giant Stalchild).
  • The Legend of Zelda: Oracle Games: Two minibosses in Ages, Armos knight and Blue Stalfos, are souped-up versions of the Armos and Shrouded Stalfos enemies. In Seasons, the miniboss pair of Goriyas are a more powerful version of bulldog moblins who they closely resemble. Both games also feature Great Moblin, the king of the Pig Moblins and a recurring Goldfish Poop Gang. Being Laughably Evil, Great Moblin survives, unlike the other examples.
  • The Legend of Zelda: The Wind Waker features Gohma (who resembles a Magtail), Jalhalla (the king of the Poes), Helmaroc King (a giant version of a Kargaroc), Kalle Demos (whose head resembles a Boko Baba's with eyes) and Gohdan (who is a giant Armos statue). Even Molgera is one, as he's a giant version of the Moldorms he releases.
  • The Legend of Zelda: The Minish Cap: A special case. Two bosses (Big Green ChuChu and Big Octorok) are simply regular enemies, but as Link has shrunk to flea size they're gigantic from his perspective.
  • The Legend of Zelda: Twilight Princess: King Bulblin, along with his steed, Lord Bulbo. Other examples include that giant version of the Twilight Kargaroks with trumpet bells for heads that you have to fly up Zora's River on, Diababa (a giant Deku Baba), Twilit Bloat the Shadow Insect Queen, Armogohma (a Giant Spider in a spider filled area), Stallord (biggest Stalfos in any game, and the player only sees him from the waist up) and Argorok (once again Kargarok). Even a boss who came from a corrupted good character, Blizzeta, takes the form of an enemy (Freezard). And then there's Ganon, whose One-Winged Angel form resembles a Bulbo.
  • The Legend of Zelda: Skyward Sword: Moldarach is a thousand-year-old Aracha who grew to monstrous size.
  • The Legend of Zelda: A Link Between Worlds features series veteran Moldorm, Gigabari (a Mini-Boss that splits into numerous Bari when it takes enough damage), and Knucklemaster (a large, armored Wallmaster).
  • The Legend of Zelda: Breath of the Wild:
    • Taluses are just enormous Pebblits, having the same body type as them. This also applies to Frost Talus and Igneo Talus (them being respectively the alphas of the Frost and Igneo Pebblits).
    • Being the leader of the Yiga Clan, Master Kohga serves as a boss version of the Yiga mooks Link finds over the course of his adventure. He can also use some of the abilities stored in the Sheikah Slate, thus also doubling as a Mirror Boss.
  • The Legend of Zelda: Tears of the Kingdom:
    • Boss Bokoblins are giant versions of the common Bokoblins. They are found as leaders of larger Bokoblin tribes and encampments, leading them in patrols or lunging around in camp. When fighting, they prefer to stand behind a line of minions, using blasts of their horns to command their grunts into various formations.
    • Froxes are gigantic, fully-developed specimens of the Little Froxes that roam in the Depths. Unlike their child variants, these are so durable that Link cannot defeat them by hitting their bodies per se, but instead the ore chunks located in their backs.
    • Queen Gibdo, the boss of the Lightning Temple, is the progenitor of the Gibdos that have overrun Gerudo Town. The boss shares the same traits at them, but also the same weaknesses.
    • Mucktorok is a small, yet highly skilled alpha species of the Octoroks capable of vomiting mud, both to attack its enemies and to swim between the puddles to dodge attacks. It can also take the form of a (literal) landshark to swim beneath the floor with agility.
    • The Seized Construct is the largest, most powerful version of the Soldier Constructs fought in the game, and serves as the boss of Spirit Temple (and indirectly also the Construct Factory). It can use the same abilities as those you use when piloting Mineru's Construct body, as well as certain tricks from the Soldier Constructs (such as fusing materials to attack with stronger weapons in the second phase). A similar unit of the boss is also used by Master Kohga during his final rematch.
  • Hyrule Warriors has several examples:
    • Volga is a combination of the Lizalfos, Dinolfos and Aerolfos — enemies that are Elite Mooks at best and Red Shirts at worst — only scaled up to the power level of the playable characters.
    • Wizzro is an even better example, as he even looks like a Big Poe, the Elite Mook he's based on.
    • Captain Keeta and King Bulblin, who are larger and more powerful versions of Stalchildren and bulblins respectively and are treated as characters.
  • Cadence of Hyrule: Wizzroboe is a large, more powerful version of the Wizzrobes, and was entrusted the Oboe instrument by Big Bad Octavo. It can summon snowflake-shaped shrapnels that freeze the floor, make icicles fall below Link, and case rows of purple fire.
• In Magic and Mayhem, any creature, after dealing enough damage, can level up to a Captain, and ultimately, King. The King status is unique in that there can only be one King creature of a certain kind at a time, and it has a high chance to convert any creature of the same kind that comes close (as they "recognize them as a king of their kind" and join their side).
• Nightshade (1992): The crime bosses only differ from their underlings through additional health and a special move or two.
• Ninja: Shadow of Darkness: The Spider Queen is a Queen Mook who birthed the numerous Giant Spider mooks you consistently encounter throughout the underground level.
• Nobody Saves the World: Bosses are an even bigger and stronger version of Elite Mooks, having several health bars and an additional gimmick in some cases.
• Over the Hedge: Three bosses are a King Rat, a King Bunny, and a King Gopher.
• The old PC game, Piranha Panic, have your piranha character travelling across various lakes infested by hostile marine life, in order, jellyfishes, barracudas, crabs, marlins and great whites, and the boss of each level being a giant version of the level's theme enemy. And then there's the final level, which is a Boss Rush where you fight the king jellyfish, barracuda, crab, marlin and great white, all at once.
• Psychonauts: Justified with the Mega Censor where, while in one character's mind, the player destroys all nodes where censors (basically, mental antibodies that normally combat small bits of insanity) would usually come out. Unfortunately, this effective repression leads to a massive buildup of censor energy, which eventually overloads, releasing the Mega Censor.
• Ratchet & Clank:
  • The Alien Queen from Ratchet & Clank (the game's first boss); it's even in her name!
  • The final boss itself, the Mutant Protopet of Ratchet & Clank: Going Commando.
  • And from Ratchet & Clank: Up Your Arsenal, the Big Momma Tyhrranoid.
• In SpongeBob SquarePants: Battle for Bikini Bottom, the first boss you will fight against is King Jellyfish, who's a King Mook to the jellyfish enemies you will encounter throughout the game. King Jellyfish himself made his debut in "I'm Your Biggest Fanatic", once again as the ruler of the smaller Jellyfish species.
• Umbral Cloud: A good number of (mini)bosses.
  • Vire: Keese.
  • Ice/Lightning witches: Ice/Lightning Wizzrobes.
  • Giant Zol: Zols and Gels, obviously.
  • Frogger X is this to the frog minibosses, which in turn are this to the frog mooks.
  • Hauntrock: Li'l Haunts, more or less.
• In StarTropics, about half of the bosses are upscaled versions of mooks from their respective dungeons, e.g. C-Serpent(Looper), Octo the Huge(Octot), Magma the Fierce(Mad Muddy), Maxie(Minie), Giant Turboss(Armet), Hoodoo Doll(Rocky), and Jetpack Jumper(Space Trooper).

Action RPG

• Bastion: Several appear as bosses in certain areas. They also show up in the Who Knows Where. These are Gershel, a giant Scumbag, Queen Anne, a giant Anklegator, and Sir Lunky, a giant Lunkhead.
• Bioshock 1: Other than the final boss and the Big Daddies, all the bosses are simply normal Splicers with much more health and better resistance against elemental Plasmids. Which sort of makes sense, in-universe, since pretty much everyone started off as normal people, who just abused the ever loving shit out of Plasmids. You could just look at it as that Steinmann (Being a plastic surgeon who had easy access to lots of cosmetic Plasmids) and Cohen (Being that he was close to Ryan, and probably had easy access to ADAM and such) just got shitloads more than most. Rose inverts this for being encountered before the normal Spider Splicers. There's also a mid boss called The Beast Master is basically a mage 3, with heavy armor, more HP and magic immunity.
• Borderlands:
  • Bandit: Bone Head
  • Lance Rocketeer: Ajax
  • Rakk: Mothrakk
  • Sycthid: Bleeder is a special Scythid who flies only. He is called Bleeder for constantly emitting a red liquid.
  • Skag: Skagzilla, also the Wereskag enemies and bosses like bigfoot
• Borderlands 2: Nearly every boss qualifies here in some way, save a few examples.
  • 010011110100110101000111010101110101010001001000 has the appearance of a constructor and a Hyperion Loader mixed together
  • Anchorman: The Big Sleep is a bodyguard for Sandman, but is visually just an average Anchorman with a special skin.
  • Borok: Woundspike the genetic experiment.
  • Bullymongs: Donkey Mong, King Mong, Warmong, Grendel, Jackenstein, and Knuckledragger are all Bullymong's and clearly use the same style model with differing appearances, sizes, and names, but all fight entirely different. Jackenstein for examples has incredible health, shields, can summon loaders, and fires electrical blasts from his chest, things no other Bullymong does. The Bulwark is another Bullymong with the odd ability to curl up into an invincible ball when the player is too close.
  • Crystalisk: Blue and Rouge
  • Dragons: The Handsome Dragon is essentially just a giant boss version of a red dragon with special AI behaviors. Additionally, the Ancient Dragons of Destruction, Brood the Invincible, Boost the Invincible, Incinerator the Incinvible, and Helianth the invincible, are all special dragon boss enemies.
  • Drifter: Arizona is just a fire version of a regular Drifter. Dexiduous the Invincible is a colossal Raid Boss drifter.
  • Goliath: Midge is a Midget Goliath riding a Bullymong. Although he doesn't resemble them, and he uses Electrical Cannons, Piston's running animation and melee attacks are clearly the exact same ones used by Goliath's and the Goliath Inspired enemies, Enforcers. There's also Smash-Head, who like both of the above doesn't really fight like most Goliaths (he has a shield, a rocket launcher, and a bunch of midget cronies)
  • Golem: The Gold Golem piloted by Greedtooth is essentially a colossal Iron Golem, which in turn is just a stronger version of a regular golem. There's also the Unmotivated Golem which must be fought repeatedly.
  • Hyperion Engineer: Pyro Pete and Hyperius the Invincible are both modified Hyperion Engineers.
  • Knight: Sir Boil, Sir Mash, and Sir Stew
  • Loader: Saturn, Innuendobot, Bone Head 2.0 (a reference to Bone Head from the first game), and H 3 RL-E. Saturn is easily the greatest difference, at a hulking 30 feet and equipped with cannons, but it is still visibly and obviously a giant Loader.
  • Marauder: Assassin Wot is a stronger version of a Marauder
  • Midget: Sandman is just a powerful midget obviously. Bagman is as well.
  • Nomad: Big Maw and Deputy Winger are both special Nomad boss enemies, as is Captain Flynt, Doc Mercy, Mad Mike, and Assassin Oney.
  • Orc: Arguk the Butcher is a regular Orc with swords for hands, but otherwise looks and attacks like any other Orc. There's also Warlord Grug and Warlord Turge.
  • Pirate: No-Beard. Master Gee the Invincible is a standard pirate enemy that is giant, but also one of the most unique fights given the AI behavior and the environmental situation.
  • Psycho: Assassin Reeth and Incinerator Clayton
  • Rakk: Rakkanoth, and the hidden boss fight with Son of Mothrakk.
  • Rat: Assassin Rouf is a big version of a Rat. There's also Dan, Lee, Mick, Ralph, and Flinter. Also Laney White, cousing of Scooter.
  • Sand Worm: The Leviathan is a colossal Sand Worm of unbelievable size. Due to its size, it doesn't fight like a normal Sand Worm whatsoever, but it is obviously one just by looking at it.
  • Savage: When you face off against Voraciduous, you will also face Chief Ngwatu, a special Savage with an incredibly powerful shield and lightning bolt attacks. He's also 10 feet tall.
  • Scalyion: Thermitage the giant Scalyion.
  • Skag: Dukino's Mom is a gigantic Armored Skag who cannot run and fires laser beams.
  • Skeleton Knight: The Four Skeleton Kings fight just like Badass Skeleton Knights, and all use the same models and attack patterns.
  • Snowman: Sir Tinder Snowflake is a giant snowman. In the same DLC he's fought in, killer snowmen are common enemies.
  • Sorcerer: The Handsome Sorcerer loosely borrows his movement animations and attacks from the regular Sorcerers the player fights.
  • Spiderant: The Black Queen is a mini-boss Spiderant that looks nothing different from an average spiderant. There's also Scorch, the giant Fire Spiderant. There's also the Spycho and Sully the Blacksmith, giant Spiderant-Human hybrids with the torso and head of a human, and the lower body of a Spiderant.
  • Spiders: Although she has a human head, she essentially fights like an Arachne with special attacks and shields. She's also a lot bigger.
  • Stalkers: A great many fights with Stalkers such as Henry, Tinkles, and the raid boss Voraciduous the Invincible.
  • Thresher: Old Slappy, Moby, and nearly any other thresher is essentially a giant dangerous version of a regular thresher. This doesn't stop Terramorphous the Invincible from being one of the most unique boss enemies in the game (and easily one of the hardest).
  • Varkid: Madame Von Bartlesby (Tina came up with the name) is a special colored giant Varkid. Vermivorous is a raid boss version.
  • Vehicle: The Monster Truck that Torgue sends you to fight is clearly just a giant car based on the Bandit Technical. Motor Mama uses a special Motorcyle with the same design as the others, but two turrets instead of a rider.
  • Clark the Combustible Cryptkeeper is apparently a modified Incinerator Clayton that is re-skinned to look undead.
  • Motor Momma uses Ellie's appearance.
  • Wilhelm is Half Loader, half Hyperion Engineer.
  • The Invincible Son of Crawmerax the Invincible is a funny example of a giant boss version of a boss from the previous game.
• CrossCode features Sir Blobus Starnikus, a humongous Jelleric fought at the end of So'Najiz Temple.
• Diablo may pick several from a selection of Palette Swapped versions of the normal mooks as incidental encounters in the randomly generated dungeons. The sequel has several fixed king mooks acting as bosses and fixed encounters, as well as randomly generated ones that spawn at random locations every time you load the game.
• Fallout 3 has unique "boss" versions of many mook types, such as Rocksalt, Torcher, and Roach King (Raider), Commander Jabsco and Lag-Bolt (Talon Company), the Drifter (Wastelander), the Ant Queens in Grayditch, Shalebridge, and the Corvega Factory, General Jingwei (Chinese Officer, Operation Anchorage), Defender Sibley (Brotherhood Outcast, Operation: Anchorage), the Alien Drone Commander and Captain (Mothership Zeta), the Presidential Metro Sentinel Unit (Sentry Bot, Broken Steel), and Enclave Squad Sigma and their leader (Enclave Soldiers, Broken Steel). All of these have significantly higher stats than their mook counterparts, except for the Alien Captain.
• Fallout: New Vegas
  • In the vanilla game there is the Legendary Deathclaw, Legendary Fire Gecko, Legendary Nightstalker, and Legendary Cazador.
  • Radscorpion Queen
  • Lakelurk King
  • Vault 34 Overseer (Feral Ghoul Reaver)
  • The Nightkin Jailer, as well as Davison and Tabitha if you decide to fight them.
  • Joe Cobb (Powder Gangers)
  • Escaped Convict Leader
  • Motor-Runner, Cook-Cook, Violet, and Driver Nephi (Fiends)
  • Caesar's Legion:
    • Vulpes Inculta (Vexillarius)
    • Severus, Dead Sea, and Alexus (Decanus)
    • Aurelius of Phoenix (Centurion)
    • Canyon Runner (Explorer)
    • Lucius (Praetorian Guard)
  • Ghost of She (a giant flaming Yao Guai) from Honest Hearts.
  • Tons in Old World Blues, featuring the Boss versions of common monsters and robots you see:
    • Test Subject 1 (Lobotomite)
    • Super Ego (Robobrain)
    • Construction Drone Foreman and The Custodian (Protectron)
    • Patient Zero (Spore Carrier)
    • 010011110110111001100101 (Securitron)
    • Dionaea Muscipula (Spore Plant)
    • Sparks (Mister Handy)
    • Ironbelly (Mister Gutsy)
    • Doctor Orderly MD PHD DDS (Mr Orderly)
    • RY-589 Ultimo Bot (Sentry Bot)
    • Legendary Bloatfly (duh)
    • Specimen 73 (Cazador)
    • Shadis (Nightstalker)
    • Y-17 Master Trauma Harness (Y-17 Trauma Override Harness)
    • Gabe (Cyberdog)
    • Stripe (Deathclaw, with Wild Wasteland only).
    • X-42 Giant Robo-scorpion (self-explanatory)
  • The Tunneler Queen, Rawr (Deathclaw, even stronger than the Legendary one), Blister (Hunter), Beast (Marauder), Bonesaw (Ravager), Blade (Scout), Colonel Royez (Irradiated Heavy Trooper), and Gaius Magnus (Irradiated Centurion) from Lonesome Road.
• Fallout 4 includes:
  • Wayne Gorski (Feral Ghoul)
  • Atom's Wrath (Assaultron)
  • Sarge and AHAB (Sentry Bot)
  • Lieutenant Clint, Captain Wes, Sgt. Baker, Tessa, and Captain Bridget (Gunner)
  • Skinny Malone, Dino, and Eager Ernie (Triggerman)
  • Gristle, Jared, Chancer, Bosco, Wire, Ack-Ack, Sinjin, etc. (Raider)
  • Slag (Forged)
  • Dead Eye, Big Mack, Fist, and Hammer (Super Mutant)
  • Swan and Grun (Behemoth)
  • Z2-47 (Institute Courser)
  • Ivey (Rust Devil)
  • Shipbreaker (Fog Crawler)
• I of the Dragon:
  • The first two bosses, Tokolosh and Quingor, are larger versions of their ordinary species. Said species is only encountered much later in the game, however.
  • The human king is a normal-sized Sinisterwing... wearing a crown.
• The Organization XIII members of Kingdom Hearts II act as this to most of the Nobody enemies. In particular, Axel to the Assassins, Demyx to the Dancers, Xaldin to the Dragoons, Roxas to the Samurais, Xigbar to the Snipers, Luxord to the Gamblers, Saïx to the Berserkers, Xemnas to the Sorcerers, Marluxia to the Reapers and Larxene to the Ninjas.
• Luminous Plume: Lore-wise, Berserkers are common brutes that somehow evolved or transformed to the point where they can rival Brutalisks. When revisiting old areas, it's possible to find optional Berserker bosses. These include Dread Hunter, Rarefin, Ancient Rider, and Lost Skelreaper.
• In MapleStory, nearly every single boss is one of these. Most notably King Slime and Mushmom.
• Several monsters fought in the Monster Hunter series are alpha, fully-evolved versions of regular creatures. Where used, italics determine the names of the mooks:
  • First generation (Monster Hunter (2004) and its G expansion and Freedom port): Velocidrome (to Velociprey), Gendrome (to Genprey), Iodrome (to Ioprey), Cephadrome (to Cephalos)
  • Second generation (Monster Hunter 2 (dos), Monster Hunter Freedom 2 and the latter's Unite expansion): Bulldrome (to Bullfango), Giadrome (to Giaprey), Congalala (to Conga), Blangonga (to Blango), Daimyo Hermitaur, Shogun Ceanataur, Vespoid Queen, King Shakalaka
  • Third generation (Monster Hunter 3 (Tri), Monster Hunter Portable 3rd and the former's Ultimate expansion): Great Jaggi (also representing the female Jaggia), Great Wroggi, Great Baggi, Royal Ludroth, Gigginox (to Giggi), Agnaktor (to Uroktor)
  • Fourth Generation (Monster Hunter 4, Monster Hunter Generations and their respective Ultimate expansions): Seltas Queen (this one is unique in that the smaller Seltas is still classified as a large monster to begin with), Desert Seltas Queen (this one stands out for being the first subspecies in the franchise to invoke this trope), Great Maccao, Zamtrios (to Zamite)
  • Fifth Generation (Monster Hunter: World, Monster Hunter: Rise and their respective expansions): Great Jagras, Great Girros, Great Izuchi, Rakna-Kadaki (to Rachnoid), Pyre Rakna-Kadaki (to Pyrantula; this makes Pyre the second subspecies in the franchise to invoke this trope)
• The Three Wise Men in Odin Sphere are really just Palette Swaps of the wizards fought in Titania, but with upgraded spells and requiring the player to hit projectiles back at them to injure them instead of it just being the most effective strategy; and since wizards were already Demonic Spiders on they're own, fights with the Wise Men very easily reach That One Boss status.
• Nearly all the major bosses in Spiral Knights. The Royal Jelly is simply an enlarged version of the standard pink Jellies wearing a crown. The Twins are basically giant Rocket Puppies, Snarbolax is like a huge Wolver, and even Lord Vanaduke basically has the same AI as Trojans.
• Terraria:
  • The game has the Eye of Cthulhu (a giant Demon Eye), Skeletron (A humongous skull), Plantera (A giant man eater) the King and Queen Slime (giant slimes), and the Eater of Worlds (an extra-large version of the Devourers). The latter three also are Asteroids Monsters.
  • The Eye of Cthulhu, Eater of Worlds, and Skeletron all appear later as even more powerful versions known as the Twins, The Destroyer [of Worlds], and Skeletron Prime, respectively. This makes them King King Mooks.
• Some of the enemies in the dungeons of Torchlight act as Minibosses, known as "Champions". They are essentially a larger, much stronger version of a regular enemy (which usually appears in a group with them). They also tend to have names like "[Body Part]-[verb]er The [Adjective]."
• In The Witcher, the special monsters whose heads can be traded for a bounty are scaled-up, uniquely-named versions of regular enemies.
• The World Ends with You has four Optional Bosses and three regular bosses that work like this. Noticeably, the regular bosses act fairly different from their smaller counterparts.
• All of the minibosses in Ys VI: The Ark of Napishtim are oversized versions of normal enemies. Gaposdhala/Gaposasura is a giant Man-Eating Plant, Piana-Pius/Pullus is a giant bee, and Noodollon/Deadollon is a giant version of the cave slimes.

Beat 'em Up

• In the arcade version of Double Dragon, the Mission 1 boss is Abobo^note Famitsu Weekly's 1987 article on the game calls this version Jick (Jikku), but the green Mission 3 version Abobo, a head/Palette Swap of the Giant Mook Bolo^note Who is referred to as "Abobo" in the NES version. with a Mr. T-like mohawk and beard and at least one new attack. The same enemy appears as the Mission 3 boss with a green color scheme.
• Dusty Revenge has a couple. The first boss, Reddo, is an upgraded version of the recurring bull enemies (even using an Arm Cannon, though Reddo's can fire rockets besides bullets) and later in Ogdro Jungle Dusty fights Amelia Swift, a jaguar who's a boss version of the ordinary feline mooks.
• Mega-Midget, the boss of level 4 in Executioners is basically a Midget-Man buffed up and the size of an Elite Mook.
• Oriental Legend have those weak, horned demon mooks as a recurring enemy in the first stage, with the boss - the Silver and Golden Horn brothers - being boss versions of the demon enemies. You can also encounter their father, a giant version of the regular horned demons.
• The Gatekeepers from Slashout, fought at the end of each stage before the stage's actual boss, are upgraded, champion versions of the level's recurring mooks. You'll fight the king versions of the Porco, Osso, Lucer, Forbici, and Gatto enemies before the boss of each stage.
• The first boss of the Space Ghost Flash game Headkicker II: The Final Kick is red-tinted Cloneborg, with appropriate upgrades from previous two models.
• Justice League Heroes: The Flash has Gorilla Grodd as the King Mook to his gorilla thugs scattered throughout the game.
• Spyborgs has a recurring robotic Giant Crab enemy, the Quad Hunter, and near the game's ending you'll fight a boss version, piloted by Lieutenant Colt. It's larger than regular Quad Hunters and covered in flaming spikes for good measure.
• Troublemaker has the Absurdly Powerful Student Council's enforcers, Elite Mooks in black jackets, and they're led by Ricco who fights like a boss version of their regular members. They appropriately shows up en masse in stages featuring Ricco.

First-Person Shooter

• The Ceph Guardians fought at the end of Crysis 2. They're as fast and agile as the basic Ceph Stalkers, have as much if not more health than a Ceph Heavy, and can cloak. And you have to fight 4 of them at once.
• Most of the bosses in the Vendetta co-op mode of The Darkness are versions of regular enemies with lots more health.
• You regularly encounter giant octopuses in Death in the Water, and then you met the titular Death: a huge, black octopus monster who's the last boss.
• Deep Rock Galactic: Glyphid Bulk Detonators are, both lore-wise and gameplay-wise, superpowered and supermassive versions of the more common Glyphid Exploders. And a boss-tier Action Bomb is a terrible thing to face; not only does it stomp massive craters into the earth without taking damage from it, its final explosion is in the kiloton range and will leave a crater over 30 feet wide.
• Doom:
  • Doom II: Inverted with Arachnotrons, which are the minion version of the Spider Mastermind who first appeared in Doom. Also inverted with Hell Knights, which are weaker versions of Barons of Hell.
  • Doom³: Vagary, the Trite Queen, serves as a Queen Mook for the knee-tall spiders that creep from viaducts and other small tunnels to ambush the main character.
• Dread Templar has the Spider Queen, a sized-up version of the Giant Spider enemies. Besides being large enough to take up the whole cavern you fight her, she can also lay extra eggs to summon extra spider enemies.
• Almost all of the bosses in Dreamkiller are just giant versions of the main normal enemy type encountered in that level. The final boss and at least one of the end-stage bosses are unique creatures, though.
• Duke Nukem: Zero Hour has Boss Hog, a giant Pig Cop with tank treads in place of a lower body. In Duke Nukem 3D, there's the Overlord, which is a giant Enforcer with rocket launchers, and the Alien Queen. Except for a helicopter, a 50-foot coachroach queen, and the final boss, all the bosses in Duke Nukem: Manhattan Project are just tougher versions of regular enemies (although most at least have a unique character model and a couple extra attacks).
• Halo does this a lot:
  • Halo 2: The Heretic Leader is just an Elite Ranger with more health, an Elite Heretic skin, and the ability to make holographic clones of himself. The Dragon Tartarus is a white-gray Brute with a one-hit-kill hammer, an energy shield impervious to everything except beam rifle shots, and insane health.
  • The Brute Chieftain encounters in Halo 3 are often set up like mini-boss fights; one Chieftain will even tell his followers to back off so he can deal with you himself.
  • The Elite Field Marshal in Halo: Reach, while the Elite Zealots border between this and Boss in Mook Clothing.
  • Halo 5: Guardians: Warzone mode has an insane amount of boss enemies, most of whom are just pallet-swapped regular enemies with a lot more health, immunity to one-hit-kill attacks, and the occasional exotic REQ variant weapon.
• illWill (2023) have all the bosses being enlarged versions of regular enemies (who even have a Cool Crown on their heads!), complete with "King" in their onscreen monikers. King Painhead, King Slaughterer, King Behemoth, etc.
• Jurassic Park: Trespasser: You spend the vast majority of the game facing off against three different colours of Velociraptor, and the Final Boss of the game, interestingly enough, is just a very large Velociraptor. It's also much weaker than the Albertosaurus and Tyrannosaurus enemies, and just as stupid as all of them, making it rather easy to defeat. The developers intended the boss to be a new dinosaur, but time and budget constraints led to it just being another Velociraptor.
• Marathon:
  • The "Mother of All Hunters" and "Mother of All Cyborgs" in Marathon 2 and beyond, as well as the oversized grey Pfhor in the penultimate level of Infinity.
  • In EVIL, you encounter a gray boss Hunter named Karth Pakor'h that can only be damaged with plasma grenades, a Giant Devlin, a Super Assimilated BOB (who is really your Brainwashed and Crazy commander), and two Super Mystics on the final level.
  • Marathon: RED has the Champion Metalloids in the level "Can We Get a Squeegee Over Here?", which is an homage to "You Think You're Big Time?", as well as boss versions of some of the Organic monsters.
• In the Metro 2033 series, the Nosalises have two examples: the Plated Nosalis in 2033, and the Rhino/Big Momma in Last Light. Both are are exceptionally durable compared to their fellow mutants, and are fought in arenas specifically tailored to the encounters. To Artyom's fortune, both have weaknesses: the Plated Nosalises only live in total darkness and are easily Blinded by the Light of the headlamp at full charge, and the Rhino can be tricked into charging into supports and walls and take damage from them; if you get her to hit all the supports, her health will drop so low that any attack of yours, even a Quick Melee with the knife, kills her in one shot.
• The Super Tank (a giant Tank with a literal tank for a lower body) and the Hornet (a Giant Flyer) in Quake II, which first appear as boss battles, but become recurring enemies later.
• The Big Bad of Red Faction II is equipped with a souped-up version of the Battle Armor you previously fought and piloted.
• The Large Mutant and Kraken mini-bosses appear in a couple of levels in Rage (2011).
• Rise of the Triad: Three of the bosses are stronger, elite members of the enemies you face across the episodes: General John Darian (to the human soldiers, and boss of Episode 1), NME (to the robotic sentries, and boss of Episode 3) and El Oscuro (leader of the Triad's monks, boss of Episode 4 and also Final Boss). The outlier is Sebastian Kryst (Episode 2), who is a human boss but fights very differently to any soldier (he moves and attacks with a well-armed wheelchair).
• Serious Sam games will often have feature the Aludran Reptiloid Highlanders and/or the Uber Lava Golem.
• Star Wars: Shadows of the Empire has a giant Dianoga for the boss of the Sewers, and the Gladiator Droid, which is an oversized upgrade of the Mecha-Mooks you've encountered throughout the game.
• Turok 2: Seeds of Evil has the Mantid Queen and Flesh Mother.
• The large, psychotic Skaarj with glowing "pseudoinvisibility" effects fought near the end of Unreal, and a fourth (orange) one that escapes from the Mothership Lab, though you don't actually have to fight that one. They were all part of an experiment to mutate Skaarj with tarydium so they would have natural energy shields. Unfortunately it had the side effect of sending them into a constant Unstoppable Rage, so they were locked up. Of course, once the Player Character destroys the generator powering the forcefields...
• In Warframe, almost every single boss was essentially a palette-swap of an existing enemy with boosted stats when they were first released. However, this has gradually become less and less the case, the devs redesigning boss characters one at a time to have unique looks and mechanics. As of three years after the start of open beta, there are only a handful of King Mooks left. While a few retain the visual aesthetic - being bigger, badder versions of normal enemies - they have been retooled to be more along the lines of being a Puzzle Boss, with one exception. The Sergeant, originally "Sergeant Nef Anyo" until Nef was split off into his own character, is just a larger, recolored Corpus mook whose only real distinction is that he can temporarily turn invisible... which only barely slows down his murder by superpowered space ninjas.
• Wolfenstein 3-D:
  • The Episode 1 boss, Hans Grosse, acts like a bigger and tougher SS Soldier, with a similar color scheme on their clothing, similar blue eyes and golden hair, and considerably more firepower.
  • The Episode 4 boss, Otto Giftmacher, acts like a bigger and tougher Officer, with a similar color scheme on their clothing, similar eyes and hair color, and bigger Hand Cannon that shoots rockets. Oddly, his projectile weapon can make him less threatening than regular Hitscan officers and bosses.
  • The game's sequel, Spear of Destiny, has the Ubermutant, a giant four-armed Mutant with a Gatling gun in its chest.
• Wolfenstein II: The New Colossus has a final Dual Boss fight against a pair of towering Zerstörer robots, which are like bigger Ubersoldat dual-wielding the BFG-9000 from Doom (2016).

Hack and Slash

• Inverted in Bayonetta, where almost all bosses or large enemies appear early in the game, with the smaller versions coming later. The Beloved shows up in Chapter One, but it's really just a larger version of the Braves, that don't show up until Chapter Eight. There's also the main bosses, the Auditio^note Fortitudo, Temperantia, Iustitia and Sapientia who, once killed, show up in at least one more stage later in the game as a smaller, weaker version^note simply named Courage, Temperance, Justice and Prudence. For a more straightforward example, the Applauds can be seen as this in relation to the Affinities.
• Bloody Spell has a heavily armored, dangerous Elite Mook enemy who uses dual swords, and the Caretaker who's a boss version of said enemy type (expectedly, he's flanked by several of his mook counterparts). Then there's the priestess legion near the end of the game, which you defeat until you reach their leader, the High Priestess who's a red-clad, far more powerful version of the common priestess enemies.
• The Phantom Guard General in Darksiders is simply the stronger version of the regular Phantom Guard Soldiers, though he at least gets to summon his troops during the fight.
• Devil May Cry 3: Dante's Awakening has Hell Vanguard, which is a bigger (and way tougher) version of the Hell Pride. The first time you encounter it is in a true boss battle, just after defeating other Hells. Subsequent encounters with them feature them spawning alongside other Hells and even other Vanguards as if they were simple mooks, but while still keeping their firepower and durability, which in higher difficulties turns them into Bosses in mooks's clothing.
• Eastern Exorcist contains boss version of mooks in both campaigns, many of them which uses sprites from their mook counterparts, but sized up. There's the Hair Feeder, Giant Spider, Treants whose boss counterparts takes up an entire screen, and the Skeltal Arhat being a boss version of skeletons far taller and more durable than the mooks.
• A number of bosses in Jiu Xiao are sized-up versions of regular enemies, including the first wolfman leader (a boss version of the Wolf Man), the giant bird-woman, and the massive taotie.
• Eternity: The Last Unicorn has two literal examples, the Spider Queen who's a Queen mook version of the game's Giant Spider enemies and a Goblin King who's larger and stronger than regular goblins.
• The "boss" enemies of Mars: War Logs (Sean, Generosity, and the Praetorians) have a couple more advanced spells but otherwise fight just like regular Technomancer enemies, just with somewhat more health. Tenacity, who you fight at the end of Act II, also fights just like a regular enemy; he has significantly higher-than-normal health, but surrenders once you deplete it by about half.
• In Ninja Gaiden (the Xbox reboot), Masakado, the second boss, is this for the horse-riding samurai minions you fought just prior.
• The second boss, the Shadow Dancer from The Revenge of Shinobi is merely a Head Swap of the basic mook enemy. His main advantage over the regular mooks? He uses the power of disco as you fight him.
• In Star Wars The Force Unleashed, an entire The Salvation level is spent fighting off hordes of tiny Terror Droids. By the end of it, the mysterious creature tearing through the ship turns out to be the Terror Walker, a Terror Droid the size of a house that's armed to the teeth and spawns hordes of its kin.
• In The Wonderful 101, the Gah-Goojin can be seen as the next logical progression from the Dough-Goo, Chew Dough-Goo, and Diedough-Goo enemies. The Gah-Goojin itself later gets a bigger version; the Wallgah-Goojin. Then, the Wallgah-Goojin is itself outdone by the Giga-Goojin! The Giga-Goojin will even throw replicas of the other two during its boss fight just to show how big it is! The big enemies often come first with the smaller ones coming later. Dahkarts is a large scorpion that shows up as the miniboss of Operation 001-A, but it's not until 004 that we're introduced to their smaller, larval stages. Lastly, the Vaikki is this for the Dahkarts, especially as the harder difficulties will swap out Dahkarts with Vaikki in certain Kahkoo-regahs.

Party Game

• Mario Party 10: The majority of the boss characters are Mega versions of regular enemies from the Mario platform games, including Mega Goomba, Mega Sledge Bro., Mega Cheep Chomp, Mega Blooper, Mega Monty Mole, and Mega Mechakoopa
• In Nintendo Land:
  • Pig moblins appear alongside Pig Ganon, making them this to him like in A Link to the Past.
  • The Pikmin attraction has even more. The Bulblord (bulborbs again), the Large-Mouthed Wollywog (wollywogs), and the Bladed Beeb (beebs, introduced in this game).
• Super Catboy has an Abandoned Mine stage where you face literal moles as Mole Monster enemies, that periodically leaps in and out from underground to ambush you with explosives. The stage's boss is a giant mole that attacks just like the regular mole mooks, except it's ten times the size and far more durable.

Pinball Game

• The boss at the end of the Knight level of Pinball Quest is a giant Knight.

Platform Game

• Banjo-Kazooie:
  • Boss Boom Box from the first game is, as the name suggests, a big Boom Box. Nipper is one among the Snippets, and by extension the Mutie-Snippets (these being a Wolfpack Boss to begin with).
  • Banjo-Tooie: For the Minjos, there's Mingy Jongo. Where Minjos impersonate minor collectibles (Jinjos), Mingy Jongo impersonates a major character (Mumbo Jumbo).
• Battletoads has Big Blag, chief of the Rat Pack.
• Each boss (save for the last) of Blinx is a stronger version of an enemy introduced in the world it's in charge of. This changes about halfway into the game when the bosses are improved versions of those bosses.
  • Dust Keeper & Dust King (Dust Herder)
  • Kerogon & Kerogon II (Keropper)
  • Molesaur & Hydrosaur (Molegon)
  • Juggernaut & Juggernaut II (Golem)
• Castlevania:
  • Castlevania: Harmony of Dissonance: A number of the bosses in this game are large versions of smaller enemies. Giant Merman, Peeping Big, Max Slimer...
  • The series has many of these, including the recurring Phantom Bat, the Queen Medusa, the Bone Dragon King, and the giant skeleton in Castlevania 64.
• The Heavy Press in Cave Story. It returns in the Fan Sequel Jenka's Nightmare. There's also Great White Critter.
• King Gears from the second Clockwork Knight. He's a castle that transforms into a robot that resembles the common enemy Katchin', and even releases them from his chest in battle.
• In Conker's Bad Fur Day, Haybot, Buga the Knut and The Experiment are respectively the biggest haystack mook, the biggest Uga Buga, and the biggest Tediz.
• In the Endless Mode of Copy Kitty the boss of Cyberspace world is Jumbo Exchikke. As its name suggests, it's just your typical Exchikke, only scaled up much bigger, and is even less of a threat than Magna Exchikke.
• Almost every non-boss enemy type in Crescent Pale Mist has one super-powered golden mook.
• Cuphead has those blue slime enemies encountered early in the game during the forest levels, before ending with the boss fight against Goopy le Grande, a giant blue slime.
• In Densetsu no Stafy 3, the Pengod boss at the end of Kachiwari Iceberg resembles a larger version of the Pingoon enemies found in the area.
• Most of the bosses of Diamond Hollow II fall into this.
• This is something of a habit in the Donkey Kong Country series:
  • The bosses in Donkey Kong Country -Very Gnawty and Really Gnawty, the Master Neckys and Queen B.- are just bigger, badder renditions of common enemies you see in the game, except Dumb Drum, which is just a bigger, badder rendition of an enemy-spawning oil can.
  • Donkey Kong Country 2: Diddy's Kong Quest has King Zing, Krow and Kreepy Krow, giant versions of Zingers and Mini-Neckies.
  • Donkey Kong Country 3: Dixie Kong's Double Trouble! has Barbos, the boss of Razor Ridge. She's a giant version of the smaller Lurchin (urchin) enemies.
  • Donkey Kong 64 has Puftoss (to the pufferfish-like Puftups) and Army Dillo (to the Army, despite the enemy not appearing in the game).
  • K. Rool himself counts, what with him being the Kremlings' king. And the Kremlings have repeatedly been featured as mooks throughout the series.
  • Mole Miner Max, Colonel Pluck and Tiki Tong in Donkey Kong Country Returns, respectively based on the Mole Miners, the robotic chicken mooks (BuckBombs) and the Tikis.
  • Skowl represents the owl family of mooks in Donkey Kong Country: Tropical Freeze. Lord Fredrik, the Snowmad chief, is one among the walrus mooks.
• Nephilim in El Shaddai: Ascension of the Metatron are typically gentle to the player, but will eat each other, and grow bigger as a result. The largest ones become Fire Nephilim, which are this.
• Many of the minibosses and bosses in Elsword are merely stronger/bigger variants of normal mooks, such as Chloe (of Dark Elf Sentinel) or Magmanta (Mantares and Mantaray).
• Exorcist Fairy have more than one of the bosses being upgraded versions of mooks. Notably, sprites for the Shielded Cube-heads are resized into the False Knight, an extra-large version of the Cube-heads, the blade-handed humanoid mooks have the Traitor Lord as their boss counterpart, and the Queen Grub being one to the lesser grub enemies.
• Grey Area (2023)'s second boss, the Clockwork Borbo, is a giant version of the Borbos that act as obstacles in other levels, and some of its attacks involve its smaller relatives.
• The Reaper Drone and Grand Mother in Hero Core are this.
• In Hollow Knight, the Soul Master is this to the Soul Twisters and Soul Warriors. It has the teleportation power and the arcane bolts of both, the Twisters' orbiting magic shield and the Warriors' melee skills, including a teleport + downward attack combo. Other examples include the Gruz Mother (Gruzzer), Vengefly King, Massive Moss Charger, Shrumal Ogre (Shrumal Warrior), Mantis Lords, Traitor Lord (Mantis Traitor), Brooding Mawlek, Flukemarm (Flukemon), Crystal Guardian (Husk Miner and Crystallized Husk), Nosk (Corpse Creeper), Hive Knight (Hiveling), Uumuu (Uoma and Ooma), and Obblobble (Obble).
• Iji has a variant in the Hacker King Yukabacera, who's been leaving logs all over the place explaining how to hack various weapons - thus benefitting the player far more than the relatively orderly opposition. He looks like a mook with a coat of paint. He hits like a space station. (This is appropriate: He's obviously not been publishing all the alterations he's made to his own Nanofield...)
• The anticlimactic final boss of Journey to Silius is an upgrade of the recurring slow-moving robot mooks. Earlier, Stage 4 has a miniboss version of the hovering Demonic Spiders from Stage 3.
• Kirby:
  • Several enemies have a larger counterpart in the form of a Mid-Boss. These include but not limited to: Poppy Bros. Sr. (Poppy Bros. Jr.), Gigant Edge (Blade and Sword Knight), Grand Wheelie (Wheelie), King Doo (Waddle Doo), Block Waddle Dee (Waddle Dees), Kibble Blade (Sir Kibble), Captain Stitch (Gordo), Water Galboros, Flame Galboros, and Miasmoros (Galbos), Jumpershoot (Drifter), Boboo (Bobos), Gao Gao (Gaw Gaws), Big Metalun (Metaluns), Moundo (Rockys), Hornhead (Beetley), etc.
  • Most of the Mini-Boss characters in Kirby 64: The Crystal Shards are giant versions of ordinary enemies; they are frequently surrounded by many of their normally-sized friends. Among them is a giant Galbo that eventually became the basis for the Flame Galboros of Kirby: Triple Deluxe.
• Magical Whip: Wizards of Phantasmal Forest has two kinds of bosses, one of which is simply a scaled up sprite of a normal enemy surrounded by its normal-sized brethren, which behaves just like its smaller pals. The other kind is a dragon.
• Mega Man
  • In Mega Man 3, you fight two Giant Met minibosses in the remixed version of Needle Man's stage.
  • Metall Daddy, boss of Wily Stage 1 of Mega Man 4.
  • And in Mega Man Powered Up, the Warm-Up Boss is a giant version of the Boss in Mook Clothing, isn't that ironic...
  • The Nightmare Mother of Mega Man X6, which is a giant mass of Nightmare Viruses.
  • Copy-X of Mega Man Zero, literally. Pantheons come in all varieties, but they're still just weak, mass-produced clones of Mega Man X. Copy-X stands above them all, both as ruler of Neo Arcadia and a far more advanced model.
  • In Rockman 4 Minus ∞, the boss of Wily Castle Stage 1 is Proto Sniper Joe, who has the same attack patterns as Proto Man and uses the Sniper Joe 01 sprites from Mega Man 7.
• Metroid:
  • The first Metroid Prime has a giant Sheegoth guarding the Wave Beam. The difference: that is the "normal" version. More common, "baby" versions are seen long before the fight. Although adult Sheegoths you fight as regular enemies after that are much smaller, meaning either those aren't fully grown or the guardian one was really strong. There's also Omega Pirate, a King Mook of Elite Pirates, which are themselves Giant Mook Space Pirates. So it's a King Giant Mook.
  • Nearly all bosses in Metroid Prime 2: Echoes are this. There's Amorbis (a colossal Sandigger trio), Chykka (an oversized War Wasp), Quadraxis (a giant version of the Quad robots you fought in the preceding level), and the six "sub-guardians" that were ordinary monsters before being possessed by the six Ing that managed to steal Samus's upgrades (Bomb Guardian is a Sandigger that was already one of these before getting possessed; Jump and Boost Guardians are Warrior Ing; Grapple Guardian is a Grenchler; Spider Ball Guardian is a Pillbug; and Power Bomb Guardian is a Sporb). Then there's the Alpha Splinter (which gets possessed too), the optional Dark Missile Trooper, the Alpha Blogg, and Emperor Ing himself. The only bosses in this game that aren't a King Mook are the Caretaker Class Drone and Dark Samus.
  • Metroid Prime 3: Corruption has an interesting variant. The Berserker Lord is a boss version of Berserker Knights. What's interesting is that Berserker Knights are already Bosses In Mook Clothing, and that you fight the Berserker Lord before you encounter any of the weaker Knights. The Pirate Commander is also a boss version of Commando Pirates, essentially a King Elite Mook. In a similar vein, there's also the Steamlord, which is based on the Steambots, an upgraded version of the Tinbots.
  • There's also the Metroid Queen, the ultimate form of Metroid in the entire franchise. In this case, it's the ultimate evolution of a species that comes into gradually bigger and stronger species (Alpha, Gamma, Zeta, Omega and then the Queen). Among the Phazon-infested Metroids, Metroid Prime takes this role instead.
• The boss of Mute Crimson's World 3 is "King Eye", who predictably sends out standard Eye enemies to chase you down as well.
• Most "boss" enemies (if you can call them that) in Ori and the Blind Forest are upgraded versions of common mooks. Kuro herself appears to be a giant version of the bird enemies. Inverted by the fireball-shooting orb boss in the Ginso Tree, which is demoted to a mook in and around Mount Horu.
• In Ori and the Will of the Wisps, the first boss, a giant wolf named Howl, has an attack pattern very similar to the Snappers (salamander-like mooks) encountered just before him; the Horn Beetle boss of Kwolok's Hollow is a gigantic version of the armored rhinoceros beetles found in said area; the Giant Spider boss Mora is this for the spiders populating Mouldwood Depths, and occasionally summons them during the battle; and the Willowstone is a boss version of the fireball-and-laser-shooting energy orbs. The deleted Optional Boss Grol would have been this for the corrupted Gorlek Miners.
• Pizza Tower has the Vigilante, a cheeseslime in a cowboy outfit who's noticeably tougher than the ones the player encounters. For one thing, his boss fight has him using various firearms against the player and can only be damaged by Peppino shooting at him with a gun, and when he returns in the Boss Rush, throwing Gustavo at him is the only way to leave him open for damage.
• Every boss in Poacher except the Dark Lord, Gamey/Magnus, and the Judge. Even the Dark Lord may count as one to the Oil Rig blobs.
• Polyroll:
  • The Big Bad andalBoss, Kaiser Kiwi, is a more powerful version of the purple bird enemies.
  • The first boss is also a giant version of the purple birds.
  • The totem pole boss in Parcheesi Temple has the unusual distinction of being a King Mook for four different enemies:
    • The yellow head is based on the oil-lamp-like enemies that shoot flames.
    • The red head is based on the box-throwing robot enemies.
    • The purple head is based on the bird enemies.
    • The green head is based on the singing snake enemies.
• Pronty has a recurring enemy called the Chattertooth, and the first boss is a sized-up version called the Silver Chattertooth (who uses an enlarged sprite of the mook version, but with some parts recolored silver). It's expectedly tougher and stronger than it's mook counterparts. Late in the game, you'll face the Golden Chattertooth, obviously stronger than the mook and silver versions.
• King Coiley in the 2005 version of Qbert for the PC.
• Quack Shot: Pete's henchman resemble shorter versions of himself.
• The Boss Chenille in Rayman 2: The Great Escape is a large red caterpillar; one of the regular Mooks in that part of the world. She's not even that adventurous with her attacks in her Boss fight; while caterpillars are essentially a chain of smoke-balls, Chenille is little more than a chain of a chain of smoke-balls.
• Shovel Knight has the Big Creep, a giant version of the game's ghost mooks, the Invisishades, which serves as the boss of the Hall of Champions.
• Sonic the Hedgehog:
  • Sonic Triple Trouble has two examples; the Tart Turtle and Giga Thomas "Pen", the respective bosses of Great Turquoise Zone and Robotnik Winter Zone. Both are giant badniks who serve as the leader to their respective species of badnik, the Turtle Badniks and the Penguin Bombers. Sonic or Tails have to bounce on the shells of the Turtle Badniks to propel themselves up to the Tart Turtle, while Pen tries to attack them by launching Penguin Bombers at them.
  • In Sonic Adventure 2, there was King Boom Boo, a much larger (and creepier) version of the small slasher-smiling ghosts that you would sometimes encounter in certain levels.
  • Sonic Mania has several bosses like this: a giant Hotaru miniboss in Stardust Speedway Zone, a giant leaping Caterkiller miniboss in Mirage Saloon Zone, and most infamously, the Mega Octus in Oil Ocean Zone - a large submarine that resembles an octopus-based badnik.
• Space Station Silicon Valley has the King Rat and King Penguin to their respective animals, though they don't really fight like a larger version of the smaller animals; rats can lay bombs or bite, while penguins throw snowballs and can use a parachute to fall slowly. The King Rat leaves a trial of noxious gas while the King Penguin flies for a short time and both king animals share the same B attack (sounding a trumpet to make nearby rats/penguins attack).
• All the minibosses in Sundered are souped up variants of enemies you'll find in the game.
• There are lots of Super Mario Bros. examples. Unless otherwise noted, their names allude directly to the enemies they represent:
  • King Bowser himself, who debuted in the original Super Mario Bros., is nothing more than a comparatively giant spiked Koopa. Mecha Bowser (introduced in Super Mario Sunshine) is one to the Mecha-Koopas and Electrokoopas, while Dry Bowser (introduced in New Super Mario Bros.) is one to the Dry Bones. This trope was in fact a factor in his creation; Shigeru Miyamoto once envisioned him as an ox in homage to Alakazam the Great, but his final design came about as Yoichi Kotabe convinced Miyamoto to make the king of turtles a turtle himself.
  • Tryclyde (bigger, triple-headed Cobrat) and Clawgrip (Sidestepper) in Super Mario Bros. 2. The Advance remake adds Robirdo, a mechanical Queen Mook of Birdo.
  • King Totomesu to the sphynx-like Gao in Super Mario Land.
  • Big Boo in Super Mario World, Bigger Boo and Roger the Potted Ghost^note this one specifically represents the Potted Ghosts in Super Mario World 2: Yoshi's Island, Boolossus and King Boo in Luigi's Mansion and its sequels, Bouldergeist^note this one specifically represents the Bomb Boos in Super Mario Galaxy.
  • The Yoshi's Island series has mostly regular enemies growing due to Kamek's magic (or in one case, namely with Prince Froggy, he shrinks Yoshi instead).
  • Naval Piranha in Super Mario World 2: Yoshi's Island, Petey Piranha in Super Mario Sunshine, Dino Piranha and Fiery Dino Piranha Super Mario Galaxy, and Peewee Piranha in Super Mario Galaxy 2 (all based on a Piranha Plant).
  • King Bomb in Super Mario RPG, King Bob-omb in Super Mario 64.
  • Whomp King and Chief Chilly in Super Mario 64.
  • Big Bully in Super Mario 64, Prince Bully in Super Mario 3D World.
  • Goomboss in Paper Mario 64 and Super Mario 64 DS (known in the former as King Goomba) and Mega Goomba in New Super Mario Bros..
  • General Guy (based on a Shy Guy) in Paper Mario 64; Megaleg in Super Mario Galaxy and Digga-Leg in Super Mario Galaxy 2 (both based on a Snifit).
  • Huff N. Puff in Paper Mario 64, a giant Ruff Puff who serves as the game's sixth boss, with his abilities consisting of thunder and lightning attacks, a powerful breath of wind and the ability to swallow the Tuff Puffs that break off him when attacked to restore HP.
  • Kammy Koopa in Paper Mario 64, Kamella in Super Mario Galaxy and Kamek in New Super Mario Bros. Wii and the games where it's fought as a boss (he was The Unfought in his debut game, Super Mario World 2: Yoshi's Island). All of them are based on Magikoopas.
  • Gooper Blooper in Super Mario Sunshine.
  • Giant-sized Wiggler in Super Mario Sunshine, Mechawiggler in Super Mario Odyssey. Interestingly, the lone Wiggler that appears in Super Mario 64 and is no different in size and appearance from the normal specimens, serves as the boss of Tiny-Huge Island.
  • Two in Paper Mario: The Thousand-Year Door:
    • The Shadow Queen is this to Beldam, Marilyn, and Vivian, a much more powerful version of three piror minibosses.
    • Doopliss, a Duplighost who serves as the boss of Chapter 4. Played with in that regular Duplighost enemies are only present in the previous game.
  • Mummipokey (Pokeys), Cheepskipper (Cheep Cheeps) and Monty Tank (Monty Mole) in New Super Mario Bros..
  • Lakithunder in New Super Mario Bros., King Lakitu in Super Mario Galaxy 2.
  • Many King Mooks are introduced in Super Mario Galaxy, in addition to those of mooks already represented in previous games by other King Mooks: Bugaboom (Mandibug), King Kaliente (Octopi), Baron Brrr (Brr), Tarantox (Scuttebug and Spoing), Topmaniac (Topman), Major Burrows and Undergrunt Gunner (Undergrunts).
  • Prince Pikante (Octopi again), Glamdozer (based on the Pupdozer) and Squizzard (based on the Cluckbooms) in Super Mario Galaxy 2.
  • Boss Brolder (pictured up top) and King Ka-Thunk (unique among most King Mooks in that he's based on a non-living hazard, namely the Ka-Thunks) in Super Mario 3D World. Boss Brolder provides the page image.
  • Mollusque-Lanceur (Gushen, Astro-Lanceur) in Super Mario Odyssey.
• The Giant Womprat in Super Star Wars, which fights alongside its smaller brethren. Then there's the Wampa King in Super Empire Strikes Back, who's so big you can only see his head and arms.
• Theta vs Pi 7 has King Pi who is a much larger version of the game's standard enemies. He's much more anthropomorphised than standard enemies however and wears clothing, has a beard, mouth, eyes, hair and a bald spot. There are also several bosses who are physically similar in shape but, while larger than standard enemies, smaller than King Pi.
• A couple bosses in TumblePop are huge versions of regular enemies, such as the Russian Monster Clown or the double-mouthed giant venus flytrap at the end of Australia.
• Papa in 2 is just a big urchin. Just like them, he is also susceptible to the Stench.
• Wario: Master of Disguise has Stuffy the 64th, the boss version of the dolphins fought in the eighth chapter.
• Wonderboy In Monster Land has the Myconid Master, the Kraken, the Giant Kong (which in turn has the palette swap Snow Kong), and the King Demon.
• The Myconid boss from Wonder Boy in Monster World is a larger version of the mushrooms roaming around Alsedo Village and the nearby cave, just like his Monster Land counterpart.
• Many of the bosses in Wonder Boy III: Monster Lair are this, eg the giant bat, the Wasp Queen, the cactus monster, and the Giant Enemy Crab.
• I.N.E.P.T. in Yooka-Laylee is a boss version of Corplet Security enemies, or "Inepts". Unlike them, he can't shoot lasers, but can move (at least on rail tracks), place landmines and fire missiles.

Puzzle Game

• Every boss in Adventures of Lolo 3 is an enormous version of a regular enemy type.
• King Pig and Mustache Pig/Foreman Pig in Angry Birds.
• The Bubble Bobble series has many bosses based upon the Mighta and Monsta enemies, plus the Super Drunk from the very first game (a giant version of a regular Drunk) and the Hyper Drunk from Bubble Symphony.
• Boss Unira in VS. Clu Clu Land is one.
• In Lode Runner 3-D, the main enemies are known as monks, and the main antagonist is shown as the mad Emperor Monk.
• Portal 2 mentions the Animal King turret, a massive turret with cheetah spots and a crown that is mentioned as a hypothetical God-Emperor of the remnants of society After the End. While Chell never actually faces one in the game proper, It shows up as a Brick Joke in which it provides the Bass in the turret opera in the ending.
• The Mechamutt in Professor Layton and the Miracle Mask is the King Mook of the robotic enemies that roam in the stages of the Toy Robot minigame.

Rail Shooter

• Bosses of this type in the House of the Dead series include the Hermit and Lovers, giant spiders; Strength and the Empress, boss versions of the chainsaw zombies; and Temperance, a giant fat zombie. Inverted by the green ninja zombies in 3, who appear to be a smaller version of the Hierophant boss from 2.
• Moz, the first boss of Time Crisis, is a yellow-suited version of the ninjas that fight alongside him and occasionally appear as non-boss encounters. Conversely, he himself becomes a one-shot enemy in the Final Boss battle.

Real-Time Strategy

• Most of the flagships in Battle Pirates are improved variants of standard hulls, like the Frostburn Interceptor, Borbas' Goresaber, Harlock's Aegis, High-Lander's Nuclear Cruiser, etc. While you can use a flagship with any fleet, it's most common to use it with a fleet of the standard hulls it's based on. For example, a Borbas' Goresaber would typically front a fleet of normal Goresabers.
• Alpha Fenrirs in Iron Marines are these to the Fenrirs, having more damage and HP while also sporting a stealth ability.
• The Onii King in Little King's Story commands common onii in the battle against your titular monarch.
• Pikmin:
  • Pikmin (2001) has Emperor Bulblax, the final boss, which is basically a giant bulborb that happens to be immune to tactics that are effective against bulborbs. Attacking its rear won't work as it has a rocky caparace, and attacking its legs won't work because it will fall on and crush your Pikmin.
  • Pikmin 2:
    • The Empress Bulblax is a Queen Mook of bulborbs.
    • Dweevils, a common family of enemies who fight using elemental attacks, have the Titan Dweevil, an immense specimen fought as a boss who uses objects it has hoarded to attack with four different elements.
    • The Pileated Snagret are this to the Burrowing Snagrets, which are Mini Bosses to begin with.
    • The Ranging Bloyster^note No, that's not a typo, it is the ranging bloyster to the smaller Toady Bloyster.
    • The Giant Breadbug fought as a boss is this to the normal Breadbugs fought as nuisances.
  • An inter-game example: the first game has the Armored Cannon Beetle, fought as a single boss. The second has Armored Cannon Beetle Larvae, as well as Decorated Cannon Beetles, weaker and more common enemies.
  • Pikmin 3: The Scornet Maestro is this to the smaller Scornets it controls, as is the giant Bug-Eyed Crawmad to the smaller, more common Hermit Crawmads.
• Epic creatures in Spore are essentially Godzilla-sized (and correspondingly tough) versions of regular creatures. The player can even create them from normal sized monsters with a Space Stage item.
• Some packs of Tiberium Raptors in Twisted Insurrection are led by an Elder Tiberium Raptor, which is three times as large and can easily rip apart tanks.
• Warcraft III has many high level creeps that are just as powerful as heroes and are accompanied by their smaller regular versions. This also occurs to an extent for standard units - the Captain is in essence a Footman with higher statistics, while the Naga Royal Guard is superior to the similar Myrmadon.

Roguelike

• Ancient Domains of Mystery has tougher versions of many types of monsters, but most of these are Elite Mooks, and even the ones called "King" this or "Emperor" that are usually more like Giant Mooks, and that only provided they're enough of a challenge and don't come in hordes. Some, however, are unique boss monsters, often optional, such as Rehetep the Mummy Lord, or the Assassin Prince. The Final Boss for the normal ending is even one of these — "Fistanarius, the Greater Balor". Since the game has ASCII graphics, everything is technically a Palette Swap of something else, so it's hard to draw the line exactly — is the Cat Lord a King Mook because he's a super-tough feline, or not one because he doesn't specifically resemble any type of feline?
• The Binding of Isaac and Rebirth feature a few of these as bosses, such as Mega Fatty, Mega Maw, Chub, Mama Gurdy (a King Mook for another boss) and Dingle.
• Minibosses in Bonfire are reskins or Palette Swaps of regular enemies with beefed-up stats and at least one ability changed. Some, such as the Resonant Golem, change substantially from their regular counterparts, while others remain similar in tactics.
• The monster races can in Caves of Qud spawn uniques and "legendary" variants of their type, both with names and a nice pink color to give you fair warning.
• The rare boss monsters in The Drop usually take this form. The exceptions are the "mythical" creatures, which have a unique appearance.
• Dwarf Fortress has Giant versions of most of the creatures, which usually fit the trope if aggro'd. The squad leaders of the goblin raiding parties might also count as well, having much higher weapon skill and sometimes better weapons and armour.
• In Enter the Gungeon, there's The Bullet King to the Bullet Kin, Blobulord to Blobulons, and The Lich to the Revolvenants.
• King Boar in The Flame in the Flood is a boar... who is as big and as tough as a bear. On the other hand, the White Wolf and Elder Wolf are not any tougher than normal wolves, but are much more cautious and will retreat rather than die to poison or arrows.
• Gloom generally has unique end-level bosses. An exception can occur at the end of The Lightless Forest. There, one of the three potential bosses is The Albino Parasite - a tiny white creature that infects a typical nest of the flying creatures, and causes it to sprout spider legs, and generally fight with the abilities of both the Giant Spider and the original nest.
• Going Under: It has two names, but they both say "King" and they have a crown, the King Slime / King Emoozi of Winkydink.
• The boss of each section of Hades' dungeons in Hades Vanquish is typically a bigger, more gruesome version of an enemy that can be found in the floors before it. Even the Final Boss is just a bigger, black-colored succubus.
• Chamberlord and Forgotten Ringleader function like this in Monolith.
• In NetHack, most sapient non-human species (i.e. gnomes, dwarves, elves and ogres) have kings (who keep being called that even if they are female). These are the strongest members of their species, and are usually purple. Otherwise, though, they have no special advantages, and are rarely worth paying any special attention to.
  • Elven kings are highly likely to be carrying a pickaxe alongside conventional elven armor, for some reason. The other kings often do not get anything more than pieces of their species' basic equipment. It's entirely possible for a regular dwarf to be better equipped than her king.
• Nuclear Throne: The boss of the Desert area, Big Bandit is the big, well-armed and cybernetically enhanced leader of the Bandits.
• Many of the bosses in Risk of Rain are this, like Imp Overlord and Colossus.
• In Rogue Legacy, all the bosses besides the Final Boss are giant versions of regular enemies, and many of the remaining enemy types get giant versions that function as minibosses instead.
• The minibosses in Spelunky are typically the scaled-up, more durable versions of regular enemies who've got an extra trick or two up their sleeves. From the truly enormous version of normal piranhas, to the Yeti King, who can cause icicles to fall down from the ceiling.

Role-Playing Game

• All monsters in Albion have up to 3 variants, with a difference in number, size and color indicating their power relative to their peers. Skrinn 2 and Warniak 2 monsters usually accompany larger groups Skrinn 1 and Warniak 1 monsters in early stages, more or less fulfilling this role. Averted with stronger monster types that appear in the later stages: variant 3 monsters become regular enemies, while variant 1 and 2 become very rare (except for the Skrinn and Krondir that only have 2 variants). There are exactly three Animal 1 demons in the entire game and they all attack individually. Animal 2 demons usually accompany a single Animal 3, while Animal 3 always attack in large groups, and due to a trigger, can spawn infinitely.
• A few mandatory encounters against enemy soldiers in Beyond the Beyond unexpectedly feature these. Two of these guard a specific location and give no outright indication that they border on Marathon Boss status, possessing several times the HP of normal men and capable of one-shotting weaker team members with their arrows. Another one of these guys shows up later alongside regular soldiers, though this time he is noticeably taller than the others. You can be easily smashed by either encounter if you think it'll be over in a couple rounds.
• King Poop Snake and Platinum Poop Snake (both optional bosses) in Blue Dragon.
• Hey, Breath of Fire III fans: "King Goo wants his item back!"
• Some of the mini-bosses and bosses in Bug Fables are stronger versions of regular enemies. For instance, Venus' Guardian is a massive version of the Venus' Buds, Ahoneynation is a giant Abomihoney, Heavy Drone B-33 is a more advanced version of Bee-Boops, Dune Scorpion is mechanically-wise a stronger Psicorp, The Watcher is a stronger version of the Haunted Cloths, Primal Weevil is a stronger Weevil, Mother Chomper is a giant Chomper, Broodmother is a huge Midge, Seedling King is a boss Seedling, Tidal Wyrm is a giant (and more scientifically correct) Arrow Worm, Peacock Spider is a boss version of the various spider enemies, and the False Monarch is a cluster of Mothflies. Most of them are capable of summoning their regular enemy versions during their turn.
• Case 02: Paranormal Evil: The Miasma Giant and Deadly Curser are bigger and stronger versions of the Miasma Zombie and Cursers respectively. These two serve as the bosses of the first and second stratum respectively, though a standard encounter version of the giant can be summoned by Gla'aki in the Final Boss fight.
• Child of Light's boss mooks include a Giant Spider, a Giant Griffon, and a Giant Ogre, whose normal-size counterpart is a Mini-Boss.
• Many of the boss-level enemies in Dead Frontier are simply the stronger versions of mutant zombies. The Titan, Black Titan, Wraith, Giant Spider, and Devil Hound bosses are the next stage in the mutation of Bone, Black Bone, Tendril, Spider, and Hell Hound respectively.
• The long-running Dragon Quest series has, as part of the many, many variations of the Slime family, not only a King Slime monster, but also a Queen Slime monster as well. And each of these two monsters has its own variations and alternate versions, such as the Japanese-themed Shogum, the Empress Slime, etc.
• Digimon:
  • ShogunGekomon is basically a big, fat, red, crowned version of Gekomon.
  • There is also KingSukamon, who is a gigantic Sukamon with a junk crown.
  • There are several Digimon that fit this trope; KingEtemon, the various Mamemon such as BigMamemon and PrinceMamemon... Most of them are Joke Characters, though.
  • The Digimon World 4 game had some tucked in a corner Mooks that would on a rare occasion be a King Mook. But the king status is only seen as a crown icon status effect. Nevertheless, they live up to the trope on toughness.
  • There are more examples if the names don't have to be the same. A lot of the time, the grunts are like the boss but less awesome. For example, Petaldramon and his Chamelemon soldiers are a ginormous plant-lizard guy and some less ginormous non-plant lizard guys.
• The Item Worlds in the Disgaea series have these every ten floors. Most of them don't even get a palette swap. There were a few in the main story, as well. In Disgaea D2, the Krichevskoy Group, who believe Laharl is an Inadequate Inheritor, first want an order-following knight named Barbara to be Overlord, as they can control her. When Laharl defeats her, they unveil a new candidate for Overlord: a Prinny! When asked what makes this Prinny so special, they reveal that he was chosen by a very specific random number generator.
• Most of the dungeons in EarthBound (1994) use a larger, powered-up version of a minor dungeon enemy type as the boss, giving it PSI powers and beefed up attacks. Titanic Ant is an Antoid, Mondo Mole is a powered-up mole, Trillionage Sprout resembles a Mobile Sprout enemy, Shrooom! is a powered-up Ramblin' Evil Mushroom, and the Plague Rat of Doom is based on the Rowdy Mouse enemy type. (Captain Strong is based on a Dummied Out enemy called "Dirty Cop," and it's possible that Carbon/Diamond Dog is meant to be one of the overworld dog enemies from elsewhere in the game.) The trope is justified in that these bosses are implied to be normal enemies suffused with the captured power of the "Your Sanctuary" locations the hero is searching for. It's less justified with Starman Deluxe and Master Belch/Barf (a version of the slime enemies). The game lampshades the trope by introducing Degraded Boss versions of the Department Store Spook named Mook.
• In Magic and Mayhem, any monster can level up into a Captain and then King if they manage to do enough damage without dying. The King rank is also unique in that there can only be one King monster of a certain kind at a time, and if another monster of that kind gets close, they will "recognize their king" and change allegiance to their side.
• The Pork Trooper in Mother 3 is a high ranking Pigmask with a fancier uniform.
• Etrian Odyssey:
  • The first game, as well as its remake Millenium Girl, has both Fenrir (the alpha male of the Skolls), and the Queen Ant (self-explanatory). The remake also adds the Queen Bee, who commands the bee-based enemies and FOE that roam the second area of Gladsheim.
  • Etrian Odyssey II: Heroes of Lagaard and its remake Fafnir Knight feature the optional Salamander, the large parent of the Baby Salamanders.
  • Etrian Odyssey IV: Legends of the Titan has the Berserker King (to the Bloodbears in Lush Woodlands), Hollow Queen (to the family of Hollow ghosts in Misty Ravine), and the Cradle Guardian (to the robotic sentries that patrol the Echoing Library). Some sidequest-related minibosses fit as well, such as the Baboon King (Angry Baboons and other related primates) and the Chameleon King (to the elusive Chameleons).
  • Etrian Odyssey V: Beyond the Myth: Among the bosses, the game only has the Undead King (based on the skeletal enemies and F.O.E. found in the Fetid Necropolis), with the remaining examples being minibosses (such as Angry Mole Lord, Luring Phantom and Xenolord; respectively based on the Rending Moles, the Roamng Wraiths and the Xenopods); the other major bosses, including superbosses, are thematically unrelated to the enemies found in the game.
  • Etrian Odyssey Nexus, besides bringing back several King Mooks, introduces the Bugbeast (the alpha version of the Platinum Pillbug F.O.E., and the boss of the Western Shrine; by extension, it also represents the Silent Assassins which appear in the postgame Bonus Dungeon).
• Epic Battle Fantasy series:
  • Beholders and giant slimes are obviously this, relative to the regular floating eyes and slimes.
  • Epic Battle Fantasy 5 has the Cosmic Gigalith, acting as a giant endboss version of the Cosmic Monolith minibosses (and, by extention, the whole Monolith family). Destroying that reveals the Devourer immediately after, a King Mook to the earlier Beholder boss and its floating eyes.
• Final Fantasy:
  • Behemoth King is the occasional Behemoth upgrade ever since Final Fantasy II.
  • Tonberry King.
  • The Jumbo Cactuar/Gigactaur, which is a gigantic version of the Cactuar enemy, with an upgraded version of its trademark attack that deals ten times as much damage. And a MUSTACHE.
  • The Bomb King. Originally, in Final Fantasy IV, there was a boss called Mom Bomb (although an enemy named Bomb King was also present).
  • In Final Fantasy V, the fifth boss is a tougher, mind-controlled version of a regular enemy Garula.
  • In Final Fantasy VI, Flame Eater is practically a King Balloon, and Dadaluma is practically a King Iron Fist. The bosses each summon the enemies for reinforcements.
  • The Monster Arena in Final Fantasy X is pratically built on this trope. Only one of the roughly thirty Super Bosses in there has an original model.
  • About 90% of the Superbosses in Final Fantasy XI.
  • The Mimic Queen from Final Fantasy XII. The vast majority of the rare monsters and Marks in the game are also giant versions of normal enemies. This is justified, though, as the Clan Primer entries for most of them explain their origins. Most of the rare monsters are explained to be naturally occuring mutant varieties of the normal monster species. Most of the Marks were mutated by prolonged exposure to corrupting magic which also caused them to go Ax-Crazy and attack anything in their vicinity that isn't a member of their original monster species, which is why the player's group is petitioned to eliminate them before they can either disrupt the natural balance and/or pose a danger to nearby humanoid settlements. Recurring franchise Super Boss Omega is also imagined here as a giant Mimic.
  • The majority of the A-rank and S-rank 'hunt targets' in Final Fantasy XIV are versions of normal mooks with increased size, a palette swap, and sometimes just a minor distinguishing feature. For some, the only real difference is their level, the red mark next to their names and the fact that they're about ten times bigger than their fellows. This also applies to a lot of minibosses and even some dungeon bosses, and particularly a lot of Epic FATE bosses.
  • And the Marlboro King from Final Fantasy Tactics A2 (and probably more) has an awesome crown and was insanely large at Crystal Guardians: Vanguard Storm. There are other large (3x3 spaces) bosses. Most of them are unique, but the "Crushatrice" and its Palette Swap are simply bigger versions of regular enemies. One of those even turns out to be the mother of the regular ones.
  • Quite a few of the bosses in Final Fantasy Crystal Chronicles , like the Giant Marlboro in the Mushroom Forest, the Gigas Lord in the Manor, the Lizard King in Daemon's Court, the Orc King in the Mines, and the Goblin Wizard in the Goblin Wall.
• Forum Fantasy has the Forum Pest Minibosses as the scaled-up versions of Forum Pest Legions.
• Almost every boss in Guild Wars, the few exceptions mostly being very important characters like the Big Bads of each campaign.
• A few of Haven (2020)'s bosses are overlords to recurring mooks, such as Nokk (Minokk), Babulardo (Babulido), Beruberu (Fulare), and Bodigado (Toriko).
• In The Infyn Prism, Juancolupé is this for normal Cactids, and so he wears a sombrero, and smokes a cigar. Ironically, he's ultimately weaker than the normal Cactids.
• Knights of the Old Republic II: The Sith Lords: On Malachor the only enemies you fight pre-Trayus are called Storm Beasts. The last of these you take down is called... a Greater Storm Beast, which is larger, tougher, and can kill an unprepared PC in two hits.
• The Goblin King and Demon Goblin Warrior from La Tale.
• MARDEK has Happy Johnnies, those Happy Johnnies have a king, he is red, he has a crown, and he has more HP.
• Shin Megami Tensei:
  • Persona 3: The Tartarus level bosses were all like this, though color swapping mooks is a cottage industry in Shin Megami Tensei games.
  • In Persona 4, the sub-bosses encountered mid-way through each dungeon and the optional bosses that take up residence in previously completed dungeons are all King Mooks. In fact, the first one of these you will encounter appears in Yukiko's castle, and is literally a king. He's a bit of a pain.
  • Even Shin Megami Tensei III: Nocturne uses this, despite most of the enemies being drawn from a very large selection of mythological figures.
  • There's also the more literal case of the recurring King Frost, a giant version of the series Mascot Mook Jack Frost with a crown and scepter.
• Megabosses Belranga and Hauani O Whe in Pillars of Eternity II: Deadfire are a giant crystal-eater spider and a massive ooze, respectively.
• Pokémon:
  • Bosses in the Pokémon Rumble series are simply supersized versions of Pokémon with proportionately higher stats and a larger range on their attacks. They also temporarily become enraged after they sustain enough hits, which further increases their damage, halves the damage they take, and increases their movement and attack speed. They're also accompanied by indefinitely respawning mobs of their lower evolutionary form if they're an evolved Pokemon (Legendary Pokemon instead getting a species of fully evolved Pokémon that shares one of their types as minions).
  • Pokémon Sun and Moon has Totem Pokémon, which have to be fought at the end of each Trial. They're are larger than ordinary Pokémon, have boosted stats, and summon allies to their aid. Oh, by the way, you can't catch them.
  • In Pokémon Ultra Sun and Ultra Moon Professor Samson Oak will gift you Totem versions of Alolan critters if you find enough Totem Stickers scattered around Alola. Subverted in that the Totem versions YOU get don't have any particularly different stats, but if their species has two regular abilities then their ability is guaranteed to be their Hidden Ability, and they have a larger model and weight more, which influences certain mechanics.
  • The Mythical Pokémon Diancie is what happens when a Carbink (a fairly common Pokémon) undergoes a rare mutation that lets it evolve. In at least one continuity, it rules over other Carbink as royalty. In the actual game, it is impossible to make Carbink evolve into Diancie.
  • In terms of game lore, the Pokemon Vespiqueen is a Queen Mook for the Combee species. Only a female Combee (which is very rare when compared to the male counterparts) can evolve into a Vespiqueen, which is both the Hive and Hive Queen of the Combee in the area. Mechanically, this means that she gets a few signature moves that look like a swarm of combee are attacking, but do damage otherwise normally.
  • In the anime in general, evolved versions of Pokemon tend to act this way to pre-evolved members of their line. For example, in the very first episode, a Spearow that Ash ticked off evolved into a Fearow and called in a flock of Spearow to retaliate.
  • Pokémon Legends: Arceus introduces Alpha Pokémon who similar to the Totems above are larger, have way higher levels than the average for the area you're in, unique moves, Glowing Eyes of Doom, and are often surrounded by a pack of their lower evolutionary form. You can catch them, making it extremely high risk, high reward to face off against them.
• Palomides the Executioner in Radiant Historia is just a stronger version of a Granorg Knight.
• Ragnarok Online has many so called mini bosses which are nothing more than pallet swapped mooks. Angeling and Arcangeling are great examples with both being porings with wings and a halo which can be extremely troublesome if you don't know what you're doing. A dead branched Arcangeling especially with it's ability to teleport and heal can sometimes terrorize a zone for days.
• In Recettear: An Item Shop's Tale, some of the bosses are these, some even in a literal sense such as the Crowned Slime (a blue slime with a crown on its head that is basicly the King Slime from Dragon Quest) and the Eyebat King who has a "fancy hat, common wings" (again, simply a very large Eyebat with a crown, but he can fire a Wave-Motion Gun from his eye). The Gauntlet (the enemy, not the floor with mooks) is also simply a very big Knight. Like his two colleagues before, he is accompanied by swarms of normal enemies of the type.
• In Siralim, certain Duties and scenarios within certain realms will pit you against a "Nether" version of a normal monster, which has considerably better stats than normal. Also, the Pandemonium King is a souped up Mouth of Hell.
• The Giant Looper and Elcian (yet another, black Looper) from Skies of Arcadia would fall into this (although Loopers are more Metal Slimes than Mooks).
• Three out of the five boss colors in Steven Universe Attack the Light are this, with Indigo being a massive scorpion with a few extra limbs, Green a massive plant-mage-thing that can summon Ditto Fighters, and Orange a massive shielded turtle that can shoot lasers, all of which are seen in their respective levels as basic enemies. Blue and Red break this trend, however, Blue being a big-mouthed whale and Red a giant three-headed centipede, neither of which are ever seen in the game at all, let alone in their stages.
• Practically every game in the Tales Series has bosses are larger and/or recolored versions of regular enemies that may have some new tricks.
• Purple butterflies are one of the earliest enemies in Underhero, and so you'll soon encounter a giant white moth, which even wears a crown on its head!
• World of Warcraft is pretty often guilty of this (it's easier to increase size instead of using a new model), especially outside of dungeons. The Devs admitted to this, and that it usually works in reverse. Once a boss is used they often find it is just too cool of a model to waste in one dungeon.

Shoot 'em Up

• In Abadox, the miniboss of stage 4 is a larger version of the crabs you encounter throughout the level.
• Bangai-O Spirits explicitly uses double, quadruple, and even half-sized versions of every single enemy in the game, including those that were already bosses. One stage in the game even has you run through a half-sized, normal-sized, and finally a double-sized version of the Cannonboss.
• The Octy King, the final boss of the first Baraduke, is nothing more than a much bigger and uglier version of the regular one-eyed Octy mooks. The sequel has a monstrous Dark Paccet as the final boss.
• Sturmvogel in Einhänder is a huge, armored version of the "Star" ships in the second stage of the game. The third stage features the Degraded Boss version, "Panzerstar".
• The bosses in Fire Fight are scaled-up versions of the normal enemy ship types, with equally scaled-up guns.
• One boss in Gundhara is a king-sized version of the recurring drone mooks.
• Most of the bosses in the Capcom arcade game Gunsmoke.
• The boss of the fourth level in the episode two of Highway Hunter is an upscaled version of the already quite large armed F1 racers you fight in that level. Like all the ground bosses, he's big enough that he hogs the entire highway, so it's not like you could just go around him.
• Macross Ultimate Frontier has an extra mission where a Regult, a Nousjadeul-Ger, and a Monster Destroid are all scaled up to the size of the Macross and you are pitted against them. Played purely for laughs.
• One of the bosses in SkyE is the stationary turret-like Rayth, enlarged to be as tall as an entire place.
• Space Bomber has a literal version of this trope, the "King Alien" as the Final Boss. For most of the game, you're battling regular aliens, floating heads and firing projectiles at you, and then comes the final level, where the King Alien turns out to be a recycled animation of the regular aliens, but expanded at least by five times, and wearing a crown. He's predictably a lot more durable even compared to the helmeted aliens (Elite Mooks which can absorb a lot of damage on their own).
• Stargunner had two huge red manta-rays in one of the middle levels of Aquatic Combat, as well as the absurdly long serpent-like creatures in the last two stages of the same episode.
• Touhou Project: Clownpiece is a Lampad, a type of fairy that is far stronger than the rest of her kin which are relegated to the level of cannon fodder in their game appearances (with the exception Cirno, a fairy protagonist), and is noticably taller than her peers.
• Xain'd Sleena: the end boss of Cleemalt Soa is basically a version on steroids of the standard Laser Blade-carrying Mooks, except that he's able to Double Jump like you and attempts to cut you down with his weapon instead of thrusting with it as the fomer.
• In Super Contra (arcade version only) and Contra III: The Alien Wars, the Metal Alien/Vicious Slave Hawk is a larger winged version of the Xenomorph Xerox mooks fought in the same stage.
• Wildcat Gun Machine has Sluggoth, a boss version of the recurring slug-monsters large enough to take up the whole room it's fought in, and the Unthinkable Horror, an enlarged counterpart to the floating tentacled brain enemies.

Space Sim

• The Mega Hulk in the original Descent. The Fusion Hulks later in the game are somewhat of an inversion; they are a smaller Palette Swap of it. Several of the second game's bosses are also like this, eg the Water Boss is basically a giant Seeker. And in Descent 3, the Thiefbot has a boss version, the Super Thief, that can use stolen weapons against you.
• Star Fox:
  • King RedEye in Star Fox Adventures. This green-colored T. Rexpy is a giant version of the RedEyes that lurk around the pyramidal temple in Walled City.
  • Star Fox Zero has the Scrapworm and Mother Strider, which are ginormous versions of the Sand Worm and Spider Tank mooks, respectively.

Survival Horror

• ANNIE: Last Hope has animated tyres brought to life by the zombie virus as recurring enemies. And one of the bosses, a living tractor wheel far larger than regular tyres that can absorb way more hits than regular-sized tyres.
• Resident Evil:
  • In the original game, the Black Tiger spider. There's also Crimson Head Elder in the remake.
  • The Adult Albinoid and Black Widow in Resident Evil – Code: Veronica.
  • Zealot Leaders in Resident Evil 4 have red robes and goat masks, sometimes wield rocket launchers, and can take quite a bit more punishment than normal Zealots. There's also the Bella Sisters, which are chainsaw-wielding miniboss versions of the female Ganados, Super Salvador in Mercenaries mode, and the Queen Plaga, which Salazar and Verdugo merge with for the Chapter 4 boss fight.
• The Giant Birds in Rule of Rose are bigger, more durable version of the standard Bird-Imps, but what makes them a nightmare to deal with is how fast and far they strike, and knock the player down with every hit, taking a fair chunk of your hitpoints at the same time. You don't actually have to defeat any to finish the game, but if you make the mistake of entering the classroom during the night in the final chapter, as you have to do if you want to gather all secret items in the game, you'll be locked in until you kill the one inside. The only way you can even hope to win is either with luck and Brown's help, or with a revolver, if you by chance happen to have that secret weapon at this point.
• Silent Hill series:
  • Silent Hill 4: The One Truth is a giant Wall Snatcher, and the ghosts of Cynthia, Jasper, Andrew, and Richard are boss Victims.
  • In Silent Hill 3, you first encounter a large Missionary as a boss, then fight smaller versions near the end of the game.

Third-Person Shooter

• Earth Defense Force 2025: Several of the insects have King Mook variants that are just larger and more powerful palette swapped versions of normal enemies. A couple other enemies also have King Mook variants including Erginus^note Godzilla like monster and the dragon enemy boss.
• Spike Hydra bosses in Fracture carry the same rocket launchers as the regular Glass Cannon Hydras, but have boss-appropriate health bar, and also protect themselves with shields fashioned out of spikes.
• Ghost in the Shell have numerous Spider Tank enemies of various designs, and several of the bosses, including the first, are larger, upgraded, spider-tank enemies.
• All of the Quest bosses in GunZ are just like some normal enemy, but stronger.
• Done for deliberate absurdity in Metal Gear Solid 2: Substance's "Zako Survival" mode, where Raiden must fight a hundred Gurlukovich Soldiers of various types (the main Mooks in the game). Then a hundred-foot tall Kaiju-ised soldier with a fin on its head emerges, is introduced as the "Gurlugon" in its Boss Subtitles, and starts trying to paralyse you with Eye Beams... Playing as Solid Snake instead unveils a giant version of the Genome Soldiers from the last game called "Mechagenola".
• Remnant: From the Ashes: Most of the bosses in the game are enhanced versions of Elite Mooks, with some gimmick or battlefield designed to play to their strengths.
• The end of the Control timeline in Quantum Break has the player encounter Liam Burke in combat. He's basically a regular Striker with more health and a chronon dampener that disables your superpowers for the duration of the fight. He also doesn't seem to take extra damage from headshots, to prevent you from ending the "boss fight" too fast.
• Each of the King Salmonids in Splatoon 3's Salmon Run mode have souped-up features of the normal Mooks:
  • The gargantuan Cohozuna is like a scaled-up Cohock, and also has a red dorsal fin as a Non-Mammalian Hair mohawk. However, while the Cohock moves slowly and can only swing at players who get too close, the Cohozuna is more of a Lightning Bruiser, able to roll forward to flatten players and can leap high into the air to squash anyone they land on.
  • The serpentine Horrorboros has nothing in common appearance-wise with the armor-plated Steelheads, but the similarities lie instead in how they attack. They both form a bomb before throwing it at the player, with the Steelhead forming it on its head and the Horrorboros holding it in its mouth, and the bomb can be shot at while still swelling up to either blow up the Steelhead or wipe away a large chunk of the Horrorboros' health bar. The beast's behavior is also like the Steel Eels with its body shape and talent for getting in players' way and body-blocking their shots, and its weak point is at the other end of its body. Furthermore, its celery-like hair resembles that of the Stingers.
  • The colossal Megalodontia is the mother of all Maws, and attacks in much the same way: it submerges into the ink and locks on to a player, and then shoots out of the ink to swallow any players whole who don't move out of the way of the marker — and Megalodontia can even gobble up other Salmonids. Unlike a Maws, the player can't Feed It a Bomb, but it instead has a huge sore on the nape of its neck which multiplies all damage it recieves.
• The Outlaw in Starhawk. He doesn't do anything the regular Scabs don't do, excepting the strange stun effect he places on Graves whenever he needs to do some Boss Banter.
• Team Fortress 2 has 3 King Mooks in Mann Vs. Machine: Major Bomber, a giant robot Demoman wielding a Grenade Launcher and wearing Prince Tavish's Crown, Sergeant Crits, a huge robot Soldier with a Rocket Launcher and Tyrant's Helm, and Captain Punch, a gigantic Heavy wielding the Fists of Steel. Valve later added three even more powerful ones-Sir Nukesalot, an upgrade to Major Bomber who uses the Loose Cannon^note and the size of its detonations are humongous, Colonel Barrage, who wields the Rocket Launcher and consistently fires what amounts to a wall of rockets, and Major Crits, a crit-boosted version of Colonel Barrage who wears the Full Metal Drill Hat and is 1.9x larger in size than the other robots.

Top-Down Action

• Defense of the Ancients:
  • Roshan. He only gets stronger and bigger every time he revives, to the point that the now rarely seen final form is adequate challenge for a full party of level 25 loaded-for-armour heroes.
  • N'aix is another example. Looks like a larger Ghoul, but is much stronger. In previous versions, he was distinguished from the normal ghouls by an aura that could not be removed. More recently, he has also been shaded darker.
• In Full Metal Furies, every enemy type comes in four varieties: the regular one, the elite one, a couple of minibosses, and a King Mook. I.e. Sharpshooters are succeeded by Sharpershooters, then by two Sharpestshooters and then there's Sniper Simo.
• The Fire Giant and Gold Fury in Smite.

Turn-Based Strategy/Tactics

• In Battle for Wesnoth, most leaders are advanced versions of basic enemies. As the campaigns progress and the AI gets more advanced units to deploy, the leaders get replaced by the level 3 versions and unique characters instead.
• The Goblin King and Slime King monsters in Delve Deeper are this.
• In Disciples 2 we have an Orc King as a neutral monster. Subverted as he features completely different model, weapon and in terms of gameplay is completely different, featuring higher initiative, armor and incredible damage, able to wipe out lower-level parties all by himself.
• In Heroes of Might and Magic games, there are simply too many upgrades for creatures to whom "Queen", "King", "Lord"... is added to count. So, you can end with an entire army of, for example, "Monarch Wyverns".
• Some of the bosses you face in Into the Breach are leader versions of the normal Vek creatures. They still deal a ton of damage and can hit many tiles at once.
• The Dramatis Personae for each faction of Mordheim: City of the Damned is essentially a max-level Leader with a unique character model. Merga is a bit of an odd example, because despite being a Magister her model and animations are that of a Sister of Sigmar wielding a great-weapon.
• The campaign for Rise of Legends contains such bosses as the Master Fire Golem (which is like the regular fire golem, but a lot bigger) and the Queen Salamanders (apparently salamanders form hives. Who knew?).
• The bosses of Telepath Tactics are nearly always this, since they tend to rely on having larger and more elite armies under their command instead.
• XCOM: Enemy Unknown:
  • One of the biggest factors that made the final boss of the first game an Anti-Climax Boss was that it was just a souped-up "Uber Ethereal"- basically a normal Ethereal with a slightly more ornate helmet and massively inflated health.
  • XCOM 2 avoids the problem by making its final boss a Wolfpack Boss. The Alien Rulers DLC focuses on a beefed-up Viper, Berserker, and Archon which can invade your ongoing missions. The Rulers have so much health that it takes multiple encounters to slay them, with the rewards being unique suits of armor that can cause panic in the mooks they're based off.
  • XCOM: Chimera Squad has all three Arc Villain bosses and the final boss simply be enhanced versions of their faction's signature unit. Rank Scales with Asskicking is downplayed substantially here: all four only have somewhat more health than the mook they're based on, plus some extra status immunities, meaning there's several agents who can defeat them in a single turn. Depending on the faction and the order that they're fought, they may not even be the last boss of their mission.

Wide-Open Sandbox

• The Alphas in ARK: Survival Evolved are bigger, faster, and stronger than the regular dinos, and it will take considerably more effort to kill them. They can also buff nearby members of the same species.
• Dead Island:
  • The Final Boss of the first game fights in the exact same manner as the regular Infected; he just has a ton of hitpoints, does double damage, can occasionally dodge certain melee attacks.
  • In Dead Island: Riptide has special named zombies that are simply toughened versions of the normal enemy types. Thirteen of these are optional assassination targets, and several more appear as part of various quests.
  • Escape Dead Island features a hallucination that forces protagonist, Cliff, to fight a zombie version of himself and his follower Linda. These fight like the Spitter and Siren Elite Zombie types, but with heightened health bars.
• Dying Light : The Following has the named "Freaks of Nature" zombies scattered throughout the game world. These are both larger than the typical zombie types, and are often tough enough to withstand several dozen headshots from the most powerful gun in the game, which drops everything else in one headshot).
• Made Men in The Godfather 2 don't look that much different from the dime-a-dozen mooks they lead but are much better fighters and can come back for more if you don't kill them the right way.
• Many quests in Horizon Zero Dawn pit you against a unique Humongous Mecha variant of the normal machines you'd typically encounter in the wild. Can overlap with Degraded Boss if you fight them before ever encountering their smaller counterparts.
• Minecraft has the Elder Guardian mooks, which resemble grey Guardians, except they are bigger, have more health, deal more damage, and can also inflict a nasty status that makes you mine much more slowly. There's only three of these in any Ocean Monument and they do not respawn, while up to any number Guardians can respawn.
• Gary Coleman and Krotchy in Postal 2 aren't straight up bosses, but both are noticeably tougher than any other character in the regular game (not counting Apocalypse Weekend or the new Holiday updates). Krotchy fights with a rocket launcher and is also Immune to Bullets, but not scissors or explosives. Paradise Lost adds a couple unique enemies with better weapons and higher-than-normal health (the PU Games CEO and John Murray, the protagonist of the Eternal Damnation mod, who's worshipping the A/C part at the asylum), but who aren't straight up bosses.
• The King Slime in Vox.
• [PROTOTYPE] has the Leader Hunter, which is just a juiced-up variant of the normal Hunter. Although its attacks aren't really changed they do an obscene amount of damage and it has a deep health pool to match, and to top it off you have to fight it on a tiny rooftop that gives it further advantage over your Glass Cannon character. Later on they start to appear as common enemies.
  • [PROTOTYPE 2] has a couple of these. The Orion Phase 2 is identical to the Phase 1s but with much better stats, and hefights alongside a few. And a lot of the boss fights are against Evolved with more health and cooler weapons than their more common brethren.

Other Media

Anime and Manga

• In Digimon Adventure, the episode that introduced Bakemon also featured a much bigger and stronger one called Lord Bakemon, who rules over his lesser kin.
• Mobile Suit Gundam: The Commander-Type Zaku is the Mook Mobile equivalent of this trope, particularly the custom red version that Char Aznable pilots. Char goes on to pilot several custom variants of regular Zeon mobile suits, invariably colored red.

Comic Books

• Sonic the Comic has Commander Brutus, a Golden Palette Swap of a Trooper Badnik, orignally a Special Badnik Service Trooper turned by Robotnik with Megatel armour making him tougher than standard Troopers. Robotnik made him even stronger to serve as his second in command.

Fan Works

• I Woke Up As a Dungeon, Now What?: Boss monsters are simply powered-up versions of normal dungeon minions. For example, Atlas (Taylor's first-floor boss) is a promoted Lesser Beetle.

Film — Live-Action

• The Hobbit: Azog, the commander of The Necromancer's AKA Sauron's army is an oversized orc with a personal vendetta again Thorin and co. Thorin faces him off as the Final Boss in the climax of The Hobbit: The Battle of the Five Armies.
• Kong: Skull Island: The main antagonists are dinosaur-sized reptiles called Skullcrawlers. The leader of the pack is a Kong-scaled one known as Ramarak. The film also has a Giant Spider. Tie-in material names its species Mother Longlegs. In the book Skull Island: The Birth Of Kong, there is a scene where a whole swarm of them attack humans. They are lead by a giant specimen of them that towers over them. It's so big it rivals Kong himself in size.

Literature

• The Iron Teeth: Crystal Hosts are monsters that bonded with naturally occurring Power Crystals, giving them great strength and magical abilities. Slimes are formed by crystal hosting.

Live-Action TV

• Doctor Who:
  • The supreme leader of the Cybermen is a customized Cyberman known as the "Cyber Controller". The Cybermen are also often led by a Cyber-Leader, which tends to just resemble a regular Cyberman with part of its head colored black. A more literal example is the Cyber-King in the Christmas Episode "The Next Doctor", which is a Cyberman the size of a building.
  • The Supreme Dalek is a model of Dalek which leads regular Daleks, but physically resembles a regular Dalek with a Palette Swap and occasionally some other minor tweaks to its casing. There's also the Dalek Emperor, the absolute ruler of the Dalek Empire, which is essentially a Dalek in a more grandiose and over-sized casing.
• Kamen Rider:
  • Kamen Rider OOO: A Greeed who's lost enough of their Core Medals to be reduced to only their head armor reveals that the body underneath is the same as that of a Waste Yummy, something normally concealed by being decked out in fancy animal-themed armor.
  • Kamen Rider Ex-Aid: The final boss of the show, a fusion between Kamen Rider Cronus and the ultimate Bugster, is beaten when the hero realizes that the result is that they're really just one of these: they've become a bigger, scarier version of the virus/human fusions that served as the show's earliest threats, and as such they're easily beaten by the Riders just dropping themselves to Level 1, which was designed for breaking up fusions.
  • Kamen Rider Revice: The Big Bad, Giff, has many varying tiers of mook working under him, but Giff himself most strongly resembles the weakest of these: he's essentially a Giff Junior, the least powerful kind of demon there is, in a flashy gold coat.
• It's a semi-recurring occurrence in Super Sentai that Mooks would get promoted (and sometimes upgraded) to Monster of the Week.
  • Chikyuu Sentai Fiveman: It eventually turns out that the Batzler Mooks used by the Zone are led by a larger Batzler named Batzlergin, who shows up as the Monster of the Week for one episode.
  • In the second movie of Kaizoku Sentai Gokaiger, one of the challenges the heroes have to face is an army of Mooks from all over the franchise's history. Eventually, the grunts would perform a Fusion Dance into a monster called the Combined Combatant.
  • Very late into Doubutsu Sentai Zyuohger, Ginis is revealed to be the result of packing thousands of the Deathgaliens' Moeba footsoldiers together. Ginis being exceptionally vain, being reminded of this is his Berserk Button.

Mythology and Religion

• Japanese Mythology has a Yōkai known as the suiko, which is basically a larger, tougher, more aggressive version of the kappa that often leads gangs of them in tormenting humans.

Tabletop Games

• Dungeons & Dragons:
  • The fourth edition includes rules in the Dungeon Master's guide on how to do this for any and all monsters. It also includes the inverse, how to mook-ify the really tough monsters.
  • In previous editions, the King Mook chieftains of humanoid monsters such as goblins simply have an extra hit die or two to distinguish them statistically from the rank-and-file. Third Edition is the exception to this pattern, as it opens up the option of giving the monsters class levels.
  • Hive mothers are very rare, large and powerful beholders capable of magically dominating their lesser kin, and are usually found ruling over communities of beholder and beholderkin with iron wills.
  • In 5th edition, with the release of the Sidekick options, it is now possible to take a being that has a cr of 1/2 or less and give it Class options in the form of Expert (Rogue-like), Spellcaster (Mage gets wizard spell list, Healer gets cleric and druid spell lists, Prodegy gets bard and warlock spell lists), and Warrior (Champion Fighter-like, with a bit of Barbarian). This can elevate something like a regular Town Guard, up to the same level as a cr 20 creature. It also comes in handy for leveling up animal companions, like a knight's trusty warhorse. Likewise, it's a great way to make sure that a bandit the party ran into at Level 1 is still a threat, even at level 10 or higher. Likewise, the DMG has a section on how to apply class levels to monsters, the example being adding barbarian levels onto a werewolf.

Web Animation

Web Animation

• Lampshaded in a segment of Two More Eggs featuring the Eggpos. "That boss is just a glorified version of us!"

Webcomics

• The Inexplicable Adventures of Bob!: The local clan of Bigfeet has a king named Mook.

Web Original

• Gaia Online: Nearly all of the bosses in zOMG! apply. In many cases even their flunkies are stronger than the normal enemy type, since the difficulty of the battle is based on the chosen difficulty level and the level of the player(s) participating.

Western Animation

Western Animation

• Beast Machines: The Vehicon generals, larger versions of the Vehicons with additional yellow markings, as well as sparks and personalities of their own.
• Mixels has King Nixel and his second-in-command Major Nixel. They both tower over the tiny Nixel army that they command, while King Nixel also towers over Major Nixel, although in reality King Nixel is the same size as his minions.
• OK K.O.! Let's Be Heroes: "Jethro's All yours" introduces Jethro, the simplest of all the robots Boxmore makes, which can only roll forward while shouting "I am Jethro!" Near the end of the episode K.O. and Rad have to team up to take on a bigger, tougher version of Jethro called Mega Jethro.

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