The 15 Best Side Quests In Video Game History (And 15 That Were Embarrassing)
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The good are good for a wide variety of reasons, including excellent writing, interesting goals, laugh-out-loud moments, and more. The bad? Well, they
You Are Reading :The 15 Best Side Quests In Video Game History (And 15 That Were Embarrassing)
Ah, the side quest. Mainstay of the RPG and action genres, it’s safe to say that they add a whole lot of value to our games. In some series, like The Elder Scrolls or The Witcher, they can add hundreds of hours to our in-game experiences, as well as providing us with crucial memories that shape our feelings about the games; however, all is not rosy in the world of side quests. Sometimes, you play one and just end up wondering what on Earth its purpose was. Why did the game just make me spend an hour of my life gathering snark skins? MMOs are particularly guilty of this (I’m looking at you, World of Warcraft).
In this article, we’ve pulled together 15 of the very best side quests, and 15 of the very worst, from across the whole scope of gaming. The good are good for a wide variety of reasons, including excellent writing, interesting goals, laugh-out-loud moments, and more. The bad? Well, they’re bad for reasons just as myriad. Whether they sent you out on repetitive, dull tasks, or simply had a writing quality that felt like that of a sixth grader, you’ll find them on this list. From Fallout 3 to GTA: San Andreas, Final Fantasy’s seventh and fifteenth installments, they’re here. Do you think we left anything out? Any particularly amazing or egregious side quests that stick in your mind or your craw? Let us know in the comments!
30 Best: The Replicated Man – Fallout 3
Hey you! Yes, you! Do you like Blade Runner? If you do, then I’ve got some good news for you: The Replicated Man is the side quest you’ve been looking for. Based on the hunt for an android who’s escaped from Rivet City, the quest casts a blinding light on what it means to be human in the world of Fallout. Throughout it, you get wrapped up in a heartrending world of human and robotic rights, culminating in a decision that shouldn’t be hard if you have any level of soul. Like tears in the rain…
29 Worst: Mages Guild Suspension – Oblivion
Now, it should be very obvious that I’m somebody who loves Oblivion to pieces. Do you know something I don’t love? Fetch quests. Those irritating missions that require you to head off to remote locations and gather banal items. Should you find yourself cast out of the Mages Guild for any reason, the task you have to do to get back in will make you question whether you really want to become Arch-Mage. For theft, you need 40 flowers! Twenty each, of two different types. Oh, and the game doesn’t tell you what they look like. Have fun!
28 Best: Sit In Judgement – Dragon Age: Inquisition
No one expects the player’s Inquisition! Like a pint-sized version of the CRPG Tyranny, this quest lets you judge a variety of prisoners who’ve all committed various misdeeds. Their punishment is entirely up to you. You can have them dealt with in the most final way possible, have them locked up, given to other factions, exiled, and more, depending on the prisoner. It’s a really cool little side quest that makes your moral choices have more weight than simply punching people.
27 Worst: The Treasure Of The Shen’dralar – World Of Warcraft
I’m not a big MMO guy, and quests like this don’t go a long way towards changing that. This quest basically requires you to double back on yourself and go all the way back through a dungeon you just worked your way through. That’s not cool! That’s not cool at all! I know that a lot of MMOs need subscriptions to keep the lights (and indeed, servers) on, but making us waste our life like this is frankly, just insulting.
26 Best: Legion’s Loyalty Mission – Mass Effect 2
I was wondering whether to include the loyalty missions in this list, as they add so much to the game. They are optional, however, so I feel they belong. This one is particularly interesting for a number of reasons. Legion is, as I’m sure you remember, a Geth, that race that we thought were the big bads in the first Mass Effect. Without going into a huge amount of detail, the mission sheds light on just who they really are. Its aftermath also gives you a very interesting interaction between Legion and Tali; It’s well worth doing.
25 Worst: Street Races – GTA 5
I say this is in GTA 5. It could, however, apply to pretty much any open-world game of the past 20 years. What is it that makes an open-world game suddenly attempt to try its hand at racing? It never ends well! I know that GTA 5 gives you Franklin’s ability that does indeed, make it slightly less unpleasant, but that doesn’t help. If I wanted to race, I would play a racing game. I’m playing GTA/Saints Row/Sleeping Dogs because I want to cause havoc. I do not want to be the Ayrton Senna of the streets!
24 Best: A Behemoth Undertaking – Final Fantasy XV
FFXV got a bad rap for its side quests, and believe me, we’ll get onto that later, but they weren’t all terrible. A Behemoth Undertaking was actually really, really cool. The mission requires you to hunt down a monstrous beast, Deadeye. To do this, you need to track him through thick fog and then follow him stealthily to his lair. Once there, you’ll fight him in a truly epic battle. Once the quest is completed, you’ll also unlock Chocobo rentals!
23 Worst: Supply Lines – GTA: San Andreas
Oh my God. This mission made me want to throw my keyboard out the god damn window when I first played it. The mission requires you to fly an RC plane and drop bombs on various targets. That sounds fine, doesn’t it? It would be, if you had a controller and the precision that analogue sticks bring. If you don’t, and you’re left trying to maneuver a plane through three dimensions of space with a keyboard? It’s an exercise in extreme frustration.
22 Best: The Game – Fable 3
If there’s one single quest that encapsulates Fable’s distinctive humor, it’s this one: Three Magi require the hero to rescue a princess, and to do this, they need to transfer him to another plane. Once you’ve been transferred, it’s revealed that the Magi are just three ordinary guys, and you’ve been shrunk down to a miniature size for a far more hilarious reason. You’re a figure in their game of Hollows and Hobbes, which is effectively DnD. To complete the quest, you need to fight a wave of demonic chickens and rescue the princess. Yes, really.
21 Worst: Caught Red Handed – Skyrim
Skyrim’s side quests are usually pretty good, but this one? I don’t know, it makes me feel a bit grim whenever I do it. The quest requires you to basically shame a woman for having the temerity to do you-know-what with whomever she likes. You’re also required to beat up innocent strangers who dare to be involved with this woman. It’s just a bit icky really, and feels like it was written by someone with an axe to grind. It’s not even worth completing for the reward, which is some paltry armor or a weapon.
20 Best: Bith Scientist Quest On Nar-Shaddaa – Knights Of The Old Republic 2
I love KOTOR 2. If you want an immersive, well-written RPG, this is one of the best. On Nar-Shaddaa, you encounter this scientist, who is being driven crazy by a radio signal. No one knows where these signals are coming from, except for one certain character. When the signal sources were discovered, nothing is left of him but his arm, clutching a datapad. On the pad, you find out that he had discovered the source before being attacked by his droid.
19 Worst: Breeding A Gold Chocobo – FFVII
Look, I’m not here to rag on FFVII. It’s a popular game for a reason, but do you know something? Breeding Chocobos isn’t the most intuitive process. If you want to get a golden Chocobo, and you do, then it’s exceptionally obtuse, and the Sage is not helpful at all. Sure, you’ve got guides online these days that make it a lot easier, but the vast majority of players didn’t have that when the game released. It’s not the most well-designed game.
18 Best: I Know You – Red Dead Redemption
This is by far the best Strangers and Freaks mission in Red Dead Redemption. This strange guy appears at various symbolic locations, and seems to know an awful lot about you. When you shoot him, he doesn’t react, instead, he simply walks away. When John Marston curses “damn you,” he replies simply “yes, many have.” His actual identity is kept secret, but it’s implied he could be either God, the devil, or death himself. It’s very weird, well-written, extremely interesting stuff.
17 Worst: The Bards’ College – Skyrim
Bards are underrated in the world of DnD. They’re capable of doing pretty much everything if leveled correctly, while also being charmingly badass. In Skyrim? Apparently they’re basically just warriors with pretensions. Joining the Bards College should be the start of a series of interesting, varied, charisma-focused quests. It’s not though. If you haven’t played this faction before, you basically end up doing the Fighters Guild 2: Electric Bardaloo. You have to trawl through dungeons for different artifacts in what amounts to dull-fetched quests.
16 Best: Saving Solaire – Dark Souls
Everyone knows Solaire, don’t they? He’s mine and yours’ favorite sun-obsessed weirdo. In Dark Souls’ later stages, his fate is essentially in your hands. And, like many things in Dark Souls, what you have to do to save him from going insane is pretty damn unclear. You need to enter Lost Izalith via its shortcut, take care of the red-eyed Chaos Bug, and pick up the Sunlight Maggot. If you don’t do these things, well, let’s just say Solaire’s brain and that maggot are going to get to know each other very well, much to your detriment.
15 Worst: Getting The Master Sword – Legend Of Zelda: Twilight Princess
Look, I’m just going to be honest here. I don’t like Twilight Princess. I think it’s a boring and poorly-designed game. The process of getting the Master Sword exemplifies what’s wrong with it. Getting to the sword’s resting place takes an absolute age. It’s also a deeply frustrating experience. You have to follow Skull Kid down interminable paths, then solve a puzzle that involves moving statues into the correct position. These statues mirror your movement. It is an irksome experience.
14 Best: Hung Over – The Witcher 2
Ah, The Witcher. It’s a game that is not afraid to embrace adult life in its most adult sense. If you’re old enough to drink, you’ve probably had a morning like Geralt’s, where you wake up and can’t remember what happened to you the night before. The titular Witcher has woken up with a strange tattoo on his neck and needs to figure out exactly how he got here. It’s a hilarious, well-written quest, which is maybe the epitome of The Witcher’s world.
13 Worst: Monkey Madness – Runescape
One of my housemates loves Runescape. When I asked him about this quest, he lost all color in his face and collapsed to the floor. Okay, that part isn’t true, but I wouldn’t be surprised. What is it that makes Monkey Madness so maddening?
It’s exceptionally long, requires a few hard-to-get items, and then there are the monkeys. These aren’t your Ape Escape simians. These guys will tear you limb-from-limb. It’s a ridiculously tough and awkward quest, which can be failed all too easily.
12 Best: The Sewer Fairy – Silent Hill 3
While Silent Hill 3 is far from the best Silent Hill, it does have its moments. This little moment encapsulates the series’ writing chops. You can find the fairy in the underpass while playing as Heather Mason. Upon examining the water in the sewer and throwing the steel pipe into it, the fairy will appear with a gold and a silver pipe asking if one of these was yours. You can say yes and get either, but if you say no, you’ll be rewarded with your honesty, getting both and your original back. This sequence is a reference to Aesop’s The Honest Woodcutter.
11 Worst: Still In The Dark – Fallout: New Vegas
I absolutely love New Vegas. It does have some horrendously shoddy moments, though. This quest is exceptionally frustrating for one simple reason: the virus isolation sequence. You have to isolate a virus that’s on three computers spread across Level 2 of the Hidden Valley Bunker. It’s got a strict time limit of 60 seconds, and if you don’t isolate this thing in that time, well, you’ve got to start all over again. Never again will I do this quest, New Vegas, never.
Solomon is a UK-based writer with a passion for gaming and pop culture. When not working, he enjoys stylized ultraviolence, a life of petty crime, and surrealistic and psychedelic experiences. Coincidentally, his favorite games are Hotline Miami and GTA V.
Link Source : https://www.thegamer.com/video-game-side-quests-best-ever-least-history/