My brain just processes the whole thing as an unwelcome interruption of my attempt to beat the challenge in front of me. It doesn’t matter how fun I normally find the core gameplay loop, in that context it feels like having to fill out and submit paperwork to get the approval to retry the challenge I just failed.

It’s pretty funny that you say this actually, because I’m exactly the same but with a different variation on it. I tend not to like bosses in general. They often feel like they ruin the flow of a game for me and just become this bottleneck that if I am not able to overcome it relatively quickly, just becomes a chore I have to get through in order to continue on doing what I want to do by exploring the world. Pretty much exactly as you describe above, where it’s a skill check that if I can’t pass, I am denied the approval of the game to continue playing and progressing. I understand why bosses are there, and there are some that I’ve come to enjoy fighting again after I’ve beaten them and they are no longer a barrier to me being able to able to play, but in most cases I just wish they weren’t there, or rather that they are optional instead of mandatory (as is sometimes the case). It’s not a pleasurable experience to butt your head against a wall repeatedly and told you aren’t allowed to go further because you weren’t good enough to beat this one specific thing. But I realize I’m in the minority there, that most people enjoy boss fights a lot more and even find them be the highlights of the game. So needless to say, I hear you on just plain not liking that death mechanic. I think it does just come down a lot to personal preference though, some things just click with some people and not others.

I know this was a typo, but I’m going to pretend it was a pun about how Silksong constantly makes you spend ingame money to do routine tasks.

lol, uh yeah… I uh meant to say it that way as a subtle criticism of Silksong’s highly flawed economy… really, it was intentional (*winkwink*)