Games that have good side missions

Seems like the art of the side mission is hard to master in video games. Which games do you think do side missions right, SW? I think Skyrim had great side missions, but the main mission wasn’t that great. Are there any games that do both great?

My favorite ones are from the Witcher and the Yakuza series. Everything about the Witcher's side quests are fleshed out, so you want to see them all the way through, and Yakuza's substories can be ridiculously funny, super emotional, or sometimes both. In Yakuza's case, some substories have connections to previous games, like for example, the pocket circuit fighter from Y0 and Kiwami returns in Y6. Then on top of that, there are the big substory missions like the cabaret club, taxi driving, hunting, clan battles, managing a baseball team, becoming a pop idol, and so on, which can take as much precedence as the main story.

Another game's side stories that I really like are Gravity Rush's. They're not as good as the Witcher's or Yakuza's, but I still find them very charming, as they provide good insight on Kat's everyday life. Despite ordering her around with mundane tasks, along with providing a lot of sass, you get the feeling that the people really appreciate Kat.

Flowers for a Lady from RDR - best side quest ever.

I thought the side missions in The Witcher 3 were great, that is the first game that comes to mind when I think of good side mission designs. There was a lot of variety overall and many of the side missions had a story arc themselves, lot of dialogue, new cutscenes, etc. Skyrim had some good ones too, I want to replay that game one day as a Werewolf or Vampire.

Skyrim had the worst side missions, and they tried making up for it with cookie cutter auto-generated quests. It's so bad it makes Oblivion look like a classic.

Witcher 3 side quests were better than anything the abysmal main story had to offer, really not sure what happened there. I'm including contracts in this, not just typical side missions. Some of the contracts were amazing.

Whenever 'best side quest' conversations come up Witcher 3 will always be my first answer. It did a lot of things wrong but side quests wasn't one of them.

I also thought the Hearts of Stone and Blood and Wine main quests were better than the main quest of the story, but, this kind of makes sense, since this seems to be how CD Projekt operates. They probably created the main quest first, and then created all side quests after that; and when it comes to CD Project Red, they seem to just improve on stuff quick after doing it a bit. This goes for cutscene animation, also. If you notice, the cutscene animations are ten times better in the expansions vs the main game, also.

Skyrim actually has some very good side missions, better than Witcher 3's.

Witcher 3.

Yakuza the thread

@getyeryayasout: Same here. Doing all the substories is very fun, plus you get to fight Amon by doing so.

Witcher 3 is obvious one. I want to say Bloodborne with its tragic sinister characters and there stories but all of it feels like just part of the main story I guess. Honestly you need a guide sometimes to get the full story quest or whatever they are. I don't know if its good or bad the game does not easily feed you the story. The shit in there always has more then what they appear and can get really tragic. Like Father Gascoine quests. Very very creepy I love it. Somebody said Yakuza yeah that one as well.

Fallout 3 and Witcher 3.

There's a good idea for a game in this. A game where this only side-missions and you can only play as a side-kick.

Yakuza has the best ones for sure. Witcher is not bad either.

Probably the minority on this one here, but I thought Skyrim had some awesome ones too.

Majora’s Mask is still unbeaten in terms of side missions.

Yeah, Yakuza's are fun.

I loved the random encounters in GTA IV. I don't think GTA V even had those, at least not as extensively.

@SolidGame_basic:

Kind of a trick question but I think the majority of side missions suck. They're mainly just filler.

Kingdom Come comes to mind. I wouldn't say the main mission or the side missions are the best we've ever seen but they're both above average.

BOTW had great side missions but I could see you say that the main mission wasn't good.

I don't remember much from my playtime with Elder Scrolls Online but it may have very good side quests. I wonder if someone else here can chime in on ESO because very few people seem to have ever tried it and I remember it being an excellent Elder Scrolls game with the big caveat that you lose the ability to mod. That's the big drawback and for half its fans that would probably be a deal-breaker but if you can get past that it's actually a very good Bethesda game. (Or that's how I remember it anyway.)

@Sgt_Crow: Oh of course! That is the perfect example of a game that does both well. Bethesda could learn so much from MM and BotW, Dragon's Dogma and Kingdome Come (and Dark Messiah).

Their combat could be so much more physical with actual feedback (including the magic). The citizens could feel so much more alive and respond to what you are, what you're wearing, what you're known for. And the interaction in combat with the environment could be so much more fun. But I suppose Bethesda games are just too tough to make to improve a whole lot.

If they would learn a little from all games above I would totally pay them twice as much for their next Elder Scrolls. I would love for them to go all out on their next one. A-la Monster Hunter World. Suddenly improving many aspects that you kinda start to accept as being stuck the way they have been for a while now.

It could be so good. I wish Bethesda would invite me to their studio and I could pepper them with new ways to approach some of their systems.

Do the Shangri-La missions in Far Cry 4 count? I kinda liked them even though the weapons weren't guns.

The missions with the stoners were okay as a break. ;)

Hahaha, yea that was a pretty good one. I really enjoyed those random Stranger encounters, too.

GTA5 had some good ones with the Strangers & Freaks, and the random encounters.

I think everyone here is a Pulitzer winner and multiple GOTY winning dev. They know the answers.

Of course.