would smooch to defeat

the "SMAAAASH!!" hit text but with smooch instead

The hand hold, the ultimate finishing move

Shouldn't have taken off those outer plates

how come I don't get a rolling HP bar, huh?!

My knowledge of Earthbound is vastly limited but surely any meta convenience for the boss is simply too unfair for the player, right?

Pretty much; in terms of gameplay it wouldn’t be interesting to deal with if it were set up that way. Some fights largely hinge on the player’s use of it, though, especially in Mother 3. There’s a couple bosses that do extremely strong attacks and then waste turns afterward to give you time to recover before the rolling HP zeroes out, and an important story segment is nothing but survival.

If the enemy could waste YOUR time by making successive turns pointless when THEIR health is counting down, then you could be stuck sitting around, spending redundant turns holding hands or resting peacefully until they fall asleep!! And that’d be terrible.

PRIMED FOR A GRAB AND A KISSY

if he doesn't get you first!!