The Demon Bat is an unused boss in Cuphead. The Demon Bat was a horned bat who would’ve been fought in a hell-like environment. The bat would rest in a coffin, and would open and free his bats, which you would need to dodge in order to succeed, he would also chase the player(s) around by flapping his wings.
Appearance[]
The Demon Bat was a large black bat, with red wings, and small horns atop his head. The bat didn't have any legs, only a stubby tail, he would also have pink lips, accompanied with a large pink nose. He also had gray rings around his eyes.
Gallery[]
Possible phase 1
Ditto, but from another angle
Howl attack
Coffin form
Mini Bat
Concept art
Backround battle
Demon Bat Attacking
Demon bat fight
Demon bat phase 1
Demon bat (possible phase 1)
Trivia[]
- The background for this unused boss battle seems to be based on the beginning background of the Silly Symphony cartoon Hell's Bells as well as the underworld seen in the later short, The Goddess of Spring.
- This fight was cut before a simple or expert difficulty was made.
- In one of the screenshots showing his second phase, there is a bat minion that looks very similar to Bendy from Bendy And The Ink Machine, a 2017 indie horror game that uses 1930's cartoons for its character design.
- It is unknown why the bat was unused. One possible reason is, according to an interview, some ideas for bosses were changed for other ones. This is most notably seen during his second phase being identical to Djimmi The Great's third phase, while his theme, Admission to Perdition , was used for The Devil's phase one theme instead.
- The Bat Bouncer and Lightning attack data can be found within the leftover data for the Bat's phase.
- While there are no pictures of its actual phase with 2 Pentagrams and Cross Toss attacks, the phase 3 Wolf form, or its Wolf Fire and Wolf Soul attacks, they are mentioned within the leftover behavior data for this boss phase.
- The Goblin Summon is the only attack that is shared between all the phases.
- This boss has no official name, but it can be assumed that he is a demon bat by looking at his wings and head.
- Despite being speculated as the missing "phase 2" in the the Devil's boss fight, the data for both fights are entirely separated, though the bat is coded for 3 phases itself, with the missing phase 2 actually being Angel and Demon.
- It is possible that the bat served instead as a penultimate boss, a demon fought in Hell right before facing the Devil himself. This may have been part of the reason the bat was ultimately cut: the developers may not have wanted an unimportant character to be interposed between the fights with King Dice and The Devil and thus undercut Dice's status as "the Devil's right-hand man", but could not find any other place to fit the fight.
- He was first seen in 2014, appearing in the E3 trailer, and a few screenshots as well, but never made another appearance after that.
- It has been often incorrectly assumed that the bat would have been called "M. Fang" due to old screenshots of the HUD. The name actually belongs to a cut weapon, evident by other weapon names appearing in the same location, in other screenshots from the same time frame.
- Demon Bat may be based on Count Dracula or vampires in general, since he is a bat (commonly associated with vampires), sleeps in a coffin, and may have transformed into a wolf (another animal commonly associated with vampires, and a form they were said to take).
- In an unused animation reel, Demon Bat and one of the enemies he spawns are seen.