You Deserve Better Side Quests - Extra Credits Gaming
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- Опубліковано 30 вер 2024
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You deserve better side quests than having to bring 10 rat butts to the local tavern owner, in EVERY game EVER! That's right! Because creating meaningful relationships between characters and quests can make your world more insightful and interesting for the player. Keeping them invested in what's happening and ready to explore every corner of your world.
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The "skip forward" button in question:
I love how the "get rid of the vermin" quest was approached in Icewind Dale.
_First of all:_ The game starts directly with a conversation, which you can steer towards learning about the local bar. Nothing about the vermin at that point, only that there is a bar and that the person who talked to you wants you to meet him there because he might have work for you to do. (And no, he's not the bar keeper. He just wants you to join his expedition.)
_Secondly:_ The bar keeper isn't speaking about the vermin in the cellar if not pressed. You can ask for a drink, at which point the bar keeper is telling you that she can go and make you something great to eat in the kitchen, but that unfortunately all her beer barrels up here are emptied out. If you press for what "up here" means, she will say that there is a cellar and that there are more barrels, and will then laugh it off when you ask her to bring one up then. If you then press further, she will finally admitt that there is a bug infestation in her cellar and that she is just too scared to go down there to bring a new barrel up.
_And that brings us to point 3:_ The bar keeper isn't wrong about being scared of the bugs! When you encounter them at 1st level with almost no gear to speak of and only some sticks to your name, then killing those agressive pests might well be your doom depending on your group composition and positioning. I remember the shock I was in when I first encountered this quest and my Rogue died within a single combat round by 2 bugs getting the drop on him. And I got in there with 6 characters. Even if the bar keep was a female halforc, there's no way she'd have lived to tell the tale of her heroically bringing a barrel of beer up the stairs.
This encounter is basically telling you everything about the game right away: Death is cheap. Combat is dangerous. And things you think you know might be way different here.
"Potato Flowers in Full Bloom" also does a good job with quests
@@Hauntaku never heard of it, but a bit of google-fu brought up some interesting footage. Thanks for that.
I *love* games that require you to dig a little to get at the quests. Much better than the ones that clog your quest log with all the things you don't actually care to do (yet, or at all). One key mod for *Skyrim* that I intend to install just blocks the automatic quest acquisition, requiring you to accept a quest in order to get it into your log -- it's such a key aspect of autonomy!
The breath of the wild village you help build is a good example of this. It's sometimes stuff like getting a bunch of wood, but you don't mind because each time you get to see new houses and such. And other times you go around talking to people to find new villagers to move in.
A settlement needs your help.
A settlement needs your help
A settlement needs your help
A settlement needs your help
The most memorable side quest in any zelda game imo is the one where the end reward is the Big Goron Sword. Not Because the macanics are cool it is literally just a number of fetch quests. But because the quests are chained together and we get to learn a bit about each character.
I need to play through the Terry Town quest in my next playthrough. Missed it the first time.
The other thing I think you can do with side quests that you didn't touch on: World building. Rather than having no story at all in a town, or having an NPC just flat out explain it to you, you can have the player explore the problems of a specific location through quests that all revolve around the central conflict of an area. If you're going to have a town that's being occupied by an evil empire, you can help a citizen sneak out of town, deliver supplies to a resistance holdout and help an evil border guard pick up a can off of the ground. Little bits of non-story that help reinforce the kind of place the player is in without overtly saying it.
fallout new Vegas is the king of quests that do world building.
Guild wars 2 is not terrible at doing this. Many renowned hearts (local zone quests) revolve around doing several tasks to help an npc. But they are flavoured. Wurms keep injuring ranchers, help recover and care for some cows, fend off wurms, do some ranch tasks. You can choose which tasks to do as all progress the heart, all the tasks are related, and it is part of the overall narrative goal of helping the people/armies/factions. Once you complete a bunch and level up the next story bit happens because the zone is "secure" enough from the players actions to allow the story bit to happen. And every zone has it's own unique factions, characters, and hearts to do.
Obviously not perfect, but the tasks are far less grindy, you sometimes do hearts by accident because some event was happening that looked interesting and you joined organically. And they tend to chain events to cross various heart locations, so you escort an npc to area (get heart for killing bandits), npc passes cargo to a soldier unit that need to be protected while they set up (complete another heart killing monsters), if successful device goes off which allows the npc's to trigger a big boss fight (also in another heart zone).
Overall, a HUGE improvement over the classic WOW quest model.
Like Jak II
Final Fantasy XIV
Xenoblade 3 does this with its quests for each colony, from what I've observed thus far
One of my favorite "rat butt" quests is in Elder Scrolls IV: Oblivion. The first quest you get when you join the fighter's guild is about rats in some lady's basement. But surprise surprise, it isn't a rat infestation, it's her pet rats, and they're being killed by mountain lions. And it's not as simple as killing the mountain lions and telling her there's a hole in the wall. No. First you go find some other NPC, a hunter, to kill some more mountain lions near the city walls to help prevent this again. But still, this isn't it. She thinks someone is plotting to kill her rats. So, you do a stake out at night where you discover an NPC creeping. But you can't just confront her. You gotta catch her in the act. Once you do then you can confront her. Where you're left with a choice. Report to the Rat lady and you'll gain a level in speechcraft. Or don't and the culprit will give you a level in acrobatics instead.
I was going to post about this one as well. It's my favorite rat quest. The culprit also wasn't trying to bring in mountain lions, but rather trying to lure the rats out so the guards would kill them as pests. In fact the culprit is horrified that her actions were bringing mountain lions into the city.
@@bulshock1221 been awhile but that sounds right
Another game that did this really well was Kingdom Come Deliverance. Most of the sides quest were actually meaningful and multi-part. The "fetch quest" style of quests (gather meat, win fist fights, etc) were specifically labeled as activities so the player knows these are less important.
You also get to know the people involved in those quests quite well and many of them are featured or mentioned in multiple quests. Finally, many of the quests serve as learning opportunity for the player by providing a window into particular aspects of late medieval life and ways of thinking.
Honestly, I became quest fatigued when playing that game. Even with these stories I felt like I was a glorified errand boy.
You missed a perfect example in the Witcher quest where you do exterminate a bunch of rats from a warehouse. The actual quest is trivial, and it's meaningful because of the character interactions. You have a long conversation with Trish during it, and you are betrayed near the end as they want to turn you into the witch hunters for extra money. The character writing turns this bog standard quest into a pretty meaningful story
I wish that a games story would start with an innkeeper telling you “go to my basement and kill all the rats down there.” And then the ENTIRE MULTI-HOUR DRAMEDY THAT FUNDAMENTALLY CHANGES THE WORLD THE GAMES SET IN is started because of this ONE quest.
He traps you down there talking about how easy it is to capture new adventurers and gasses you. You wake up without any gear on moving carriage through a wooded area. There are others bound up, looking fairly somber. One man turns to you with a stoic expression.
“Hey, you! You’re finally awake.”
It starts with normal rats, but there is a sub-basement. Where a rat king waits directing the horde, with a dozen tails and bodies and your first taste of enemy magic, or maybe magic at all. When you defeat or run from the rat king it becomes clear that there are rats in most of the basements, all being directed like the ones in the inn. That everywhere is being overrun with rats. That the many rats forming the hordes are acting as one.
From there you find out that a demon of pestilence or perhaps something else associated with rats is the what is actually bringing them about as the precursor to the all out invasion of the world by the demons.
One thing that always bothered me was MMO quests that are along the line of “Hello adventurer, I have a problem and only you can fix it” even if the MMO starts with something like “you are one of many individuals who just arrived to these lands”.
It would be cool, if the start of an MMO talks about you being one in a group of people, that the quests given are more team themed
I.E. “Please complete this test that is available for anyone to complete once” or “as a merchant I’m looking for this stock, you’ll only need to bring me a handful with how many have already helped” or “only brave adventures enter that dungeon and survive, so I dare you to go in and survive” or “can you help the other warriors protect the village from the never ending goblin hoard? Only for a short while” or “if every person kills 10 forest flies, then that should help eradicate the species. What are you waiting for? Kill 10 forest flies and do your part for the community”
Yeah, I really don't get why we so often write multiplayer games like they're single player games. It's not only wasted potential but an active disservice to both the game and the community.
Final Fantasy XIV
The ending of base Destiny had that problem. “Oh no! Only you can stop the big threat!” Well, no. We passed like 4 guys that were clearly late game and higher level than me. I’m sure they can handle it (again).
Destiny is chronically afflicted with only-you-can-itis. Am I a part of a large and well-organized military force with a commander and hundreds of comrade Guardians pitching in against the Darkness, or am I a lone warrior killing all the big bad guys and saving Earth singlehandedly? Make up your damn mind, game!
Not a single mention of Runescape? I'm kind of surprised by that. Even the very earliest and most basic quests in the game - Cook's Assistant (go fetch ingredients for a cake) and Sheep Shearer (go get a set of shears and click on a bunch of sheep) - have little tidbits of fun writing and are well-integrated into the lore of the game. Respectively:
Cook's Assistant gets referenced a bunch, since the cook pulls the same exact trick on literally everyone he can... including an NPC you show around town in a much later quest. The actual problem - that the cook is frankly incompetent to the point where he can't even bake a cake despite trying literally thousands of times - is the whole reason the 100th quest (Recipe for Disaster) gets kicked off.
Sheep Shearer introduces new players to The Thing, which later gets expanded upon until you're infiltrating a compound of Soviet penguins hidden in a glacier. Clockwork disguises are involved.
Both quests also serve important roles as introductory content, getting players used to navigating around the Lumbridge area in particular but also more broadly interacting with world objects and their inventories to complete tasks.
I like how all the far-flung quests of the world give their own little pieces of lore but also tie into the overarching narrative. You can't get the whole story of the God Wars without helping a cult kill a family dog, fighting in an elvish civil war, reprogramming a malfunctioning golem, joining a secret order of knights, saving a tribe of subterranean goblins, and picking sides in a vampire family feud.
I came to watch this video expecting a discussion of Runescape's far above par quest design, smh...
Which is funny, because spacebarring through quests is a meme in the community. Wish jagex had data on how many people actually skip through lore, then again it would probably be inaccurate due to alts of people who already completed quests and bots.
@@runelt99 Yeah, I expect >90% of non-bot quest completions are probably from people doing a quest again. In OSRS, anyway, especially since the backup didn't allow players to bring their own characters back with them. Even beyond that there's more recent things like the Leagues (I've done a number of quests a couple of extra times now just from those...) and similar temporary modes.
Heck, The whole 'Slayer' skill is based around 'these side-quests are so predictable and dull, i could make a script to auto-generate them forever!'. hence Slayer Assignments all being 'Greetings, Adventurer! I need you to kill number of monster!'
I like how Horizon: Forbidden West handles quests, while also doing away with the annoying task of tracking down that one last quest. I especially liked how there were several quests that seemed like one-off quests, which then unlock further quests down the road that build on the characters that you interact with. Not to mention that even in the resource collection quests, there's an aspect of character building that makes you interested in even the one-off quests.
This video makes me absolutely want to play a game where you lead generations of rats battling to reclaim their ancestral home from a corrupt innkeeper
To add to that, maybe the corrupt innkeeper's the unworthy successor to the prior innkeeper...who made a cooperative agreement with the rats ancestors generations (from the rat's perspective) ago.
Oh! And maybe, (after the hero takes down the corrupt innkeeper) the hero themselves becomes the new innkeeper, who restores that prior arrangement with the rats. And it's "happily ever after"...at least 'till the first game's protagonist dies. In which case...sequel?
This is a good look at the problem narratively, but making the quests mechanically engaging is also important. I'm going to enjoy killing those 10 rats a lot more in Dark Souls, where the combat is difficult and rewards playing thoughtfully, than in Skyrim, where the rats and I just swing at each other until someone dies. I had a hard time enjoying most Witcher 3 content because I didn't find the combat or other gameplay mechanics engaging, and while the narrative helped it didn't fully distract me from how little enjoyment I got out of the actual fighting. It's a balance to be sure, and sometimes you can get away with just one thing being strong, but getting both right is the real recipe for success.
I would suggest you try playing Witcher 3 Enhanced Edition mod. Overhauls almost every gameplay mechanic, but most importantly it improves combat drastically.
So it’s not just me who thought fights in Skyrim are annoying? Thank you!
@@bleistift2775 I don't hate Skyrim combat, but is is fairly basic. This is why I usually end up playing stealth daggers/archery instead of a straight melee build.
This feels like the base of an NPC character for D&D. funny we don't apply it more to electronic gaming!
Especially in a RPG.
@@SirDavid290 FINAL FANTASY
Vampire: The Masquerade Bloodlines did this really well, too. They put a few side quests in the same location along with a bunch of others in the area. Some of them required stealth, others were a decent amount of investigation. You needed to look up names in a bail bondsman’s computer! And then you had to read the info and figure out where to go and what to look for next. It was so neat!
For all it's other issues, Cyberpunk 2077 had some fairly good side quests. Even the simple fixer gigs often have more depth to them than a surface look would reveal. And even the NCPD jobs will have links to other gigs or side stories. Course to see that it often means reading the notes you come across.
That makes sense with Witcher 3 being his best example.
I personally think a good example of this is what happens if you take Cait as a companion for long enough in Fallout 4, when she confesses to you that she’s still hooked on all those narcotics and asks you to help her find the vault that will cure her, its the first time she ever asks you for anything, and her gratitude is immense if you complete the quest, so you really feel happy when you are done with the mission
I realized I've killed more rats in more game quests than I can count. Little rats, monster rats, diseased rats and yes even the rat quest for the tavern keeper, but he made no bones about serving them to customers. So another good idea is letting the player set up an extermination service! Gold for rat butts! It's something that was memed more times than I can count too.
Do you think you've killed more Rats or more Slimes overall?
NieR automata is one of the only open world games I've gone out of my way to 100%, and that's mostly because a massive chunk of the side quests felt like good episodes of a TV show with their stories, whether or not the quest itself was actually interesting to play or not.
A tip from my time playing TTRPGS: tying the quest back to the main story of the game. I remember a D&D campaign where the main goal was to kill a dragon king - a simple, overarching goal. Every detour on our journey there had something helpful to assist in that goal, whether that was information about said dragon king or artifacts to battle with. It really gave us this feeling of agency and richness in the world, where every potential decision had something to be gained from it.
This is exactly how Runescape's quest design works. Back in the early 2000's, this sort of quest design was common in MMOs, with the obvious offender in World of Warcraft. Runescape never really did this sort of thing - even back that far back, while Runescape's quests were still dominated by one-shots that were designed really simply, most quests weren't really like this, with only the absolute noobiest quests being anywhere near the 20 rat ass quests and only Imp Catcher being much of a pain in that regard because it required 4 different relatively rare drops from an annoying mob. And then, in 2005, Runescape released the Slayer skill. With Slayer, you ask dedicated characters called Slayer Masters for a task. The Slayer Master then generates a Rat Ass quest for you by rolling from a table some number of some mob that you need to kill. "Go kill..." _rolls dice_ "...118 greater demons." Killed 'em all? Great. "Now go kill..." _rolls dice_ "...79 blue dragons." In this one skill, Jagex made it _abundantly clear_ how formulaic this plot structure is. There's nothing to Rat Ass quests but "Go kill rats," and Runescape's Slayer skill proves this beyond doubt by offloading this structure 100% to RNG.
Yakuza is great at doing this, some of my favorite moments are the side quests, and it is all canon to the story of the game, meaning Kiryu actually did all these quests, he actually got super into a children's card game, he actually helped an illegal immigrant deal with her pimp by delivering her a pizza, and he actually worked at a real estate company with the help of his pet chicken Nugget. These even go across games, with later games continuing the quest chains and bringing back characters from side quests.
Yakuza also gets real creative and hilarious with its quests sometimes, and each of them have a satisfying start, middle, and end. I don't usually go out of my way for side quests but whenever I play a Yakuza game, I will literally go out of my way if it means doing another substory.
Some of the best side quests I’ve played were in Kingdom Come Deliverance They really add to the immersion/narrative
That game was great for immersion. I especially like the potion crafting system.
@@thawhiteazn Potion crafting is really something, it seems like a tedious chore until you actually give it a try, then next thing you realise you just brew potions for 30mn and you haven't noticed the time flying by.
@@Biouke yeah I spent way too much of the game like “ain’t nobody got time for learning to read” but I ended up being forced into it just to make potions.
Two words:
Souls games
I know it's a worn out thing to bring up but they are a master class in quest chains developing character and world narrative. You don't need the difficulty and obscurity that those games use for other reasons to do exactly what they are doing from a narrative perspective.
I think "Collect 10 rats" quests are great. Because they made me give up on world of warcraft at level 15 and I never looked back while half my friend circle turned into total WOW crackheads, back in my university days.
Really wish Destiny 2 would do this more often. Most story quests end up being "go here and shoot bad guys and at the end you'll get some dialogue if you don't immediately leave"
With destiny's amazing cast it makes me sad we don't get to go on very big narrative arks with them. This has gotten somewhat better recently (see the season of the haunteds therapy sessions) but it could definitely be better
Imagine if Dark Souls NPCs just wanted rat butts. Solaire just needs 5 rat butts to find his sun. Siegmeyer just wants the gates open to Senns Fortress and then he just leaves.
every time i play any RPG game, one of my thought is "What crazy side quest that i gonna get to out of this game" because for me, a good side quest can make the player feel good to do to level up, exploring the map better and the NPC have more character that even player want to just sit down and have a chat before back a new quest
whenever good quest design comes up my brain automatically bring up that bloody baron from the Witcher 3.
that quest had me going through every single emotion a human can have, i was sure i'd murder this monsterous man but by the end i felt pity and helpd him move on peacefully and be a better person.
I'll remember that quest till the day i die.
Yeah, one of the weird effects of that is the quest line is so good, the rest of the game doesn't quite measure up to it, even when the stakes are higher. Even though it's been years since I played it, I remember almost everything about the Bloody Baron quests, but only recall bits of other quests that happen.
Tip: if the dialogue associated with a sidequest takes longer to get through that collecting those ratbutts, you're doing it wrong. :)
✍🏽 Give ✍🏽 rat butts ✍🏽 a 1% ✍🏽 drop rate ✍🏽
Got it!
So yeah, turns out I'd love to play a game where the innkeeper hires me to deal with the rat problem in his cellar. Gotta get a druid to speak with animals, get local government involved, apply for grants from the king, ensure both sides have good legal representation, negotiate land rights and usage rights, hammer out and register written agreements... Maybe I'll get the blacksmith & bandits expansion.
I like the Kingdom of Loathing version of this where it turns out the rats are in the inn’s basement because someone left the rat faucet on
then in later special ascension path you go back and there aren't enough rats.
3:00 this reminds me of the quest Neko is a Cat in Genshin Impact. it tells a story about a cat asking us to repair her shrine in hopes that human returns to the shrine and maybe her friends too, not knowing that her friend is dead long time ago.
Bounties in pillars of eternity and deadfire take the place of the ratbutt quests so I think there is a place for them so long as they are characterized correctly
This is the really big difference between Guild Wars 2 and any other MMO like WoW. I remember trying WoW and there were so many fetch quests while leveling. But in GW2, you do an event in an area like, collecting a bunch of grapes for a farmer. But then all the grapes attract an attack by centaurs because they want grapes! And after the attack, you got to attack the centaur camp to keep them from attacking again! Chains, peeps.
FF 14 does a good job with side quests. You start off with simple fetch/kill quests, because you're a nobody. But you gradually start getting more important and complex quests as your character becomes more important and famous. Of course, that also reflects the game's development; the devs were initially under a lot of pressure to fix the original (bad) release of the game, and they had more time to make better quests as the game went on.
Personally I think Final Fantasy XIV did a good job with a lot of its one shot side quests, as most usually give you a decent context as to why they want you to go out and complete the various tasks. Be it slaying a creature or gathering some seemingly random trinket, there is usually always something there added to expand your understanding of the world and its characters. But this is likely an uncommon example of there being actual time taken to write a very short story behind each side quest to help with immersing the player in the world if they choose the time to read what is being said by the NPC's giving the quests, as well as the hand in items often have descriptions attached to them. So yeah I agree we need to work harder on side quests in games, as a good side quest will help with world building and immersion, while a bad generic one can just annoy a player and break the immersion.
I'm playing Final Fantasy XIV (a MMORPG) as I watch this. One of the other issues with sidequests are quest hubs. FFXIV does put effort into its side quests, and it has side quest chains where you'll follow an NPC, and a lot of the sidequests are helping to fill out environmental lore. However, I arrive at a new town and there's 12 sidequests. I'll go to each NPC, read all the dialogue, and move on to the next one. By the time I get to the quest location, I don't remember why I'm doing or for whom, and the conversation when handing in also has little context since I don't remember what I did for the quest. The number of times I've gone into a dungeon not remembering why I'm there because I had other quests at the same time is almost 100%. I do agree with you that I think a smaller number of more focused and better written quests would be more enjoyable. Most MMOs, I'll read the main quest stuff and skip all the side quest dialogue.
One thing they do right is limiting the amount of effort their quests need. A lot of quests don't require any killing. When there's drops needed, it's usually at 100% so it's little more than an alternate way of counting kills, and when needing to kill, it's usually a small number. The regional quests where players might need to work together, a single player might only need 12 kills to complete the quest. Stuff that depends on rare drops or rare spawns do exist, but they're rarely tied to quests.
I missed out on the whole MMORPG thing, so I got into FF14 as my very first one. I barely left the first city but I've been surprised how many quests chain into another quest and then another quest - although the really early ones haven't been going anywhere lmao.
One of my favorite games that does side quests well is the Mass Effect trilogy where the quests go on to effect future games in both a big way and small ways showing you are making actual change to the world
And then they ruined it at the end.
Chrono Trigger had beautiful side quests, because each one had to do with your own party and bettered the world in some way, instead of just doing little things here and there.
Robo in Fiona's Forest and his resistance against Mother Brain
Marle's Trial of the Rainbow Shell
Lucca and her mother's injury
Reviving a fallen party member
And more.
I love the concept. There is a balancing act here though. I know we want a story that doesnt (understandably) always make us mindless murdering psychopaths, but there is a reverse to this. Too much story can make it feel more like you are playing an interactive movie/novel instead of a game.
Personally, while FFXIV's MSQ is an interesting story, it features seemingly little game play and can drag as a result.
Perhaps a good example, is in Assassin's Creed of all games, when you are first given missions to sneak in somewhere to find some evidence and are encouraged to not kill someone. It's not used a ton but its nice when it is.
In Shadowbringers and Endwalker, each zone tends to have multiple threads of sidequest that then feed into a final zone thread. The thing is that there's almost never any reason to do side quests in FFXIV. The only rewards are those narrative rewards of watching things develop.
Edit: The best example of this is probably Lakeland's quests. They're actually a bunch of little stories that all feed into each other, turning a zone that is fairly boring overall into an interesting place. It's just that, especially now that Endwalker is out, there's little incentive to spend more time than you need to for the MSQ in each zone.
I really feel like Ghosts of Tsushima had some memorable side quests with a narrative that motivated me to see them through
Ishikawa chain ❤
I loved the writing in that game, but I was a bit disappointed when nearly all of the quest activities boiled down to "go to place, kill mongols." And that same action would repeat in every link on the quest chains.
mongol bad, samurai gud, shinobi cool. easy and simple.
As someone who plays any game that allows it as a “mercenary” who does everything for pay and remains as neutral as possible I see nothing wrong with motivation for a quest being as a simple as “have job, will pay”
It's not necessarily about the _player_ having other motivations, but the other _characters_ should have motivations and at least a little bit of depth so they're distinguishable from a flat piece of scenery from a grade school play on a tight budget.
Even if I'm playing a mercenary with purely financial motivations, I want to be able to suspend disbelief for the rest of the world too, have varied quest design, and have the quests I'm sent on feel like the kind of quests a mercenary would be sent to deal with.
There's still a narrative framework there and a fiction to support to help someone feel like they're actually playing that mercenary.
I do find the idea amusing, that the NPCs are having very serious problems and story arcs, and then you come in solving them stoically like a janitor with a mop.
"Ah yes a dragon cursed your house, happens all the time"
I mean, you can have it both ways. The monster contracts in Witcher are designed around this idea. Geralt is a professional who will take the job, haggle about the price and then do it. But the contracts quest still have some of the best writing in the game.
Hmm, I might use this design theory in my TTRPGs games
Do ittttttt!
I feel like this advice will be useful for DMs too. I've always struggled with the "side quest" part of running a campaign but hopefully the advice in the video will make it more interesting for my players
I do think that part of the problem is just the sheer number of quests we as players have to do in most side-quest related content, particularly in MMOs, coupled with the lack of any real value most quests bring outside of just "progress to the fun part of the game". If I walk into a town and see 6 side-quests, I'm probably not going to have the patience to read 6 opening halves to a story that doesn't really have any relevance to the plot, but you bet I'm going to take all 6 at the same time because it's more time-efficient than doing quests one at a time.
I did often enjoy the quest chains in WOW, the ones that had an actual storyline in Vanilla were quite enjoyable.
I feel Final Fantasy XIV handles side quests fairly well. Many early ones do feel a bit chore like but even early on they incorporate some fun writing and world building in them and their multi-part quests always create interesting narrative arcs and often lead to unlocking cool extra content. There's still SO MANY of them that people will often skip through the dialog, even I'm guilty of doing that a lot, but it definitely rewards you for stopping and taking the time to read through the quests and I try to do it more often when I have the energy to do so.
Fetch Quests are just the gig economy of the fantasy universe.
Art imitates life, and it's fitting punishment for majoring as a murder hobo instead of getting a real job in the vendor market.
If you start your game off with generic quests, you're going to make people think all quests are generic. Start off your STARTING quests on the right foot: daring, important, not clichéd, interesting, even funny, and you'll be telling your players "pay attention to these quests" and they'll be less likely to skip them. Heck, show that quests have CONSEQUENCES early on in the game and players won't skip them.
This is exactly what's wrong with Warner Bros. game of Hogwarts Mystery.
Player _BRIEFLY_ spends time orienting to the school. While earning gold thru going to school for HOURS ON END and spending it on fashions and pets you unlock, have few fun parts like a tiny duel that is a play on Rock, Paper, Scissors. Ultimately _boring!_
Then about 2 tortuous levels of classes later, the detective comes in and insults your intelligence while stating her creds and spilling one bean about the mystery.
The player spends about 5 minutes going through the allowed part of one clue and then goes through tortuous hours of classes learning the exact same spells and potions. (They couldn't be bothered to make a side quest in the Room of Requirement?)
There's a friend or 2 and a Malfoy - like character who ends up relenting and helping but keeping distance. We don't get her back story or any of the others'. Nor the detective's
No conversations leading to interest or hidden clues. Hardly any interaction with Hagrid, our magic pets, or even the Headmaster. No moving staircases, no Clue/Cluedo movements or postulations about whodunit or why. No secret passages. No rescuing friends from a rabbit-hole of a side quest that uncovers another piece of the puzzle.
No history/mystery like in the Chamber of Secrets. No history whatsoever. You'd think that going to History class would reveal a clue. Maybe you'd have to parse it out from Professor. Binns' boring, ghostly lectures.
And no poltergeist Peeves to torment the kids and hit you with more clues in a sideways fashion.
I could write a better story than that,even if using only still pictures and tableaus.
And I don't code (yet).
I guess you're talking about the quest from "Wakfu"? Yeah, it's a terrible quest. You go down there, slay some rats, and the guy's a jerk who asks you to do the same thing again and again without any increase in difficulty or additional lore. A waste of time really. This video was helpful for me because I'm working on a farming RPG with platforming elements! There'll be quests (I think) and I want players to enjoy the characters.
Having intriguing side quests ultimately depends on having good communication between the writers and the programmers. Not only should the task be enjoyable to play, it should have a noticeable effect on the world around you, what you do should matter in the game world.
Cyberpunk 2077 failed this when they killed off the character we loved the most, though it does have a fair share of story quests; the main quest is lackluster (With a little depth) and death ending. That's just a sad ending, with no enjoying the status you have earned. Everything is over shadowed by the multitude of "go here, KILL!" Quests.
I can't believe you never gave the punchline. I was waiting for "you couldn't give a rat's butt about the quest" all day at work knowing this was in my queue.
With the quest text, though, they aren't wrong. Too many side quests fall into "tell not show" and are VERY verbose about it. Like the owl that exposits for 3 years every time you go somewhere in Ocarina of Time.
When it comes to sidequests in FF14, I'd say the Tribal Quests have it right, especially since they're repeatable.
Typically, these quests form minor errands that are simple "there and back" style quests. They also randomly select three quests each day, so there's variety there. Storywise, these are literally just minor errands a lot of the time. You build up trust with that tribal faction, then after a few days to a week, you get a mainline quest for the faction that advances their story and adds more quests to the pool.
Let's use the Vath as an example. Their goal is simple. Set up an adventurer's guild in their territory. Your daily quests are basically supply runs or "our guys have run into some trouble, go check on them" for the most part.
The main quests for that faction though are focused around both building up the guild and your Vath friend trying to fully assert his individuality from the hive mind that the Gnath (the wider faction that the Vath broke off from) are subject to.
@@ShinyGG At this point, the only HW tribe I haven't completed is Moogle.
Each rat has an 11% chance of having a butt, but no other rat parts will be accepted as proof.
Yeah, that's the reason I stopped playing WoW after trying it out. Just a bunch of busywork design to fill time.
This reminds me of something Max0r said about the side quests in Cyberpunk 2077
“This game is like reading 6 dirty copies of war and peace, and every 20 pages you have to stare at cardboard.”
This issue is common in dungeon crawlers and mmorpg games usually.
Normal RPG games tend to get creative, because they tend to appeal to readers.
Planescape took the "clear the rats" really far, because such type of games *MUST* make everything into whole narratives and world building pieces, it's their life and blood.
99% of mmorpgs tend to just be chore games with some boring writing to their side quests, because indeed, they usually aren't aiming at those wanting a deep world, but rather, do optimal builds and shoot to endgame level.
The phenomena is always specific to games that don't care much about the narrative, and mostly put filler content to "lvl up with".
Mechanical RPG's.
This reminded me of the aftermath of a couple quests in genshin impact. One of the characters asks about a sword, and after you go clear the area out you return and they give you a reward. They then ask you if you found the sword, and then give you the quest reward. It's a massive missed opportunity that there is never actually a sword to find, because think about how cool it would be if your random daily quest just happened to have an optional part to it. It wouldn't even be difficult to implement a sword sometimes appearing in the fighting area, but because they didn't it just drops so much depth that could have been there
I loved this in BOTW when there was a city building quest with many character arches. Even though it is still guilty of this problem.
Guild Wars 2 actually is a good example of good side quest and story quest design. Sure, you could fight the creatures, but some quests give you completion by solving riddles, talking to ghosts, etc.
I feel like Kingdom Come Deliverance is another game that did this type of side quest pretty well, at least for the most part.
I suggest Gothic 1, 2 and Myrtana. If you, as a player ,don’t pay attention to the dialogue you don’t know what to do and revisit the quest log. It engages you in the game! Cheers and keep the good work!
6:25 - "Now for side quests this can't be some piece of vital information, especially if they can be missed."
*From Software has entered the chat*
Souls games have always been good at this, solaire of Astora, Siegward of Catarina, and Blaidd wouldn't be nearly as memorable if not for that
Of course, they all end in tragedy, because Fromsoft.
The Yakuza games also have a knack to make side quests engaging as side plots. I'll never forget Miracle Johnson 🕺
Majora's Mask and The Witcher 3 have the best side quests. I still love the "Guild" quests in Skyrim.
I usually do most quests regardless but I like the sound of narrative quests. If done well and not overly long they would be really fun.
Well written side quests is a big part of the reason I keep paying Final Fantasy XIV subscription. Take a note other big companies!
In FFXIV most side quests don't lead anywhere, but there are a few that have long quest chains with a special reward at the end for players that go out of their way to do them
still going to simp for the witcher 3 side quests, some of the best written quests i have ever seen in any RPG ever have been SIDE quests in tw3
edit: commented before i actually watched the entire video, you nailed it.
I definitely spam mindlessly through quest dialog, because they are always useless garbage. 🤔
I was just waiting to say Witcher 3 was the best example of a game that got side quests right, lol. So true.
I am a solo designer working on an RPG, and I agree. I think one reason so many of these quests exist, is frankly just that they are easy to make. You just make a variable to count the 10 things they need to get, which are already items in your game world, and then a "switch" or boolean to determine if they've done it or not. Then they go back to the NPC and he spews out some fun little lines of dialogue about the quest, and you're done. It doesn't really make for good content though.
The guiding principle I've used while creating my game is just constantly asking "Why?" Why are they doing this, why does he need that, why is this item in the game world, why does the quest giver live here, why is his village here, what do they do, etc. and on and on. If you do this, your content will fit into your game world coherently, and the quests and personalities of the quest-givers will also be integrated into the game world. This ends up netting you "World Building" points just by you continuing to design your game.
I find quests can even be boring, hum-drum, or run-of-the-mill gameplay wise, but if you remember that you are creating a Role. Playing. Game. which needs to take place in an interesting Fantasy. World. the quests will create engagement for the player. We don't even need the high-level triple-A studio mechanics everyone dreams of some day creating themselves- "living breathing world," day night cycle, radiant AI for the NPCs, etc. You can create the illusion of a living, breathing world using very deterministic mechanics with only basic programming, and the player will buy into it and be engaged if you've done the above.
Good video.
I think the big reasons for filler quests are a) lack of imagination, and b) pressure from studios to create as much content as possible for monetary or advertising purposes.
there is the rat killing quest in Morrowind's fighters guild, where it's meant to be an introduction to the kind of menial work that the fighters guild does on a normal day, while also having some fun because the person who gave the quest is obsessed with pillows for some reason.
FFXIV does side quests *really* well. What side quests arent chains and stories in and of themselves are always touched on by other quests. Main side quests like Hildibrand touch on side quest content. ANd story quests touch on both. The chained quests always feel like youre building and learning about the world as you go through the story. And its messy. some quests end sadly or with you realizing the consequences of your actions. but it all feels continuous, like it all belongs in the world.
One really interesting "quest" doesn't even involve an actual quest until the very end. During your adventures, you happen to run across another adventuring party, who eventually break up due to incompetence by one of their party. Later, you can do an actual quest involving that failed party member going mad and trying to resurrect the person she failed to save.
Ubisoft should take notes. I feel this is one of the things Valhalla did well with some of their side quests
I must be a boring questgiver in some cat RPG, because my cat leaves me rat butts all the time.
As with many aspects of RPGs I like to compare them to Gothic 2 (2003 game). Almost every side quest is well thought through and leads to interesting finds.
"Rat's ancestral home"
Idris Elba: You...keep talking
We need a side quest where the rats hire an adventurer to stop the mad murderer that lairs in the beer dungeon.
Sounds like something from The Amazing Maurice and His Educated Rodents.
I feel like Final Fantasy XIV did this pretty well. Of course the player can skip through the quest dialog if they want, but if they actually pay attention, there is a story in there. They also indicate if a quest is a one-off or a multi-quest arc but they’re subtle about it.
All I can think about throughout this video is "Poor rats..."
I swear to god Cyberpunk must be made by CDPR’s chaotic evil split personality
Nicely said!
Quests design feels like something that's more about the type of game that is being played. For example, world of warcraft is all about reaching max level so no one cares about the quests itself. Skyrim is all about the world so more focus is on the quests.
Elden Ring (and to a similar extent all the other SoulsBorne games) does quests really nicely I feel
while, yes, you do have some npcs asking you to do something for them when first meeting them, their quests are often quite long and require you to meet them several times, leading you to naturally develop a relationship with them.
Millicent's quest in particular stands out to me, as an example
the fact that some of the quests in these games have entire sections that can be skipped or missed, or even have failure states somewhere along the path makes it all the more interesting
Everything in a Fromsoft game (except Sekiro) is designed to emphasize that your character isn't important in the world. Miss a quest step or unknowingly fail a quest? Tough luck, the world moves on without you.
@@stevejakab274 yes, and it's amazing
anyone here gets tired of drifting/crashing things endlessly for score-based objectives in Forza horizon too?
I've always wanted to play a game that starts off with many one-off rat butt quests that evolve into a main quest and it's up to the player to piece together the clues/coincidences/connections to get into the game's main purpose.
Check out fallout 2 you'll love it for that very reason.
@@erithanis Can't believe I forgot Fallout 2. Was going through a massive burnout at the time, but I really liked that game.
@Paul Lenuou yea. I remember more side quests from that game than anything else I've played. And the details, like finding a body with a name on the bracelet and having to choose whether to tell the loved one the person isn't out travelling anymore or let them pine waiting for their return.
I hate slow NPCs
Zoey is the best character
*pest
2:00 leave it to Extra Credits to get me invested in the "Inn keeper was the real villain" plot line
Yakuza takes the crown. imo better than the Witcher
One game series that’s consistently done side quests well is the Kiseki/Trails series as they often have world building story to them, some connect to later side quests and you’re rewarded in both narrative and gameplay for doing them as characters will acknowledge the reputation gain and you get access to better gear for your characters.
one of the big reasons i love borderlands2 are the absolute best side quests in the series
Including the greatest questgiver of all time: Face McShooty.
Isn't the "Kill 10 rats" quest usually the combat tutorial?
Yes, but there's the possibility of making it more than that, with just a little imagination.
How did you miss out on the "bear asses" joke?
oh man, I wish we had ratbutts in prisson.
This all makes sense and I'm all for good stories......but am I the only one who truly just enjoys the simple "bring me rat butts" type quest? I live for the grind and progression. Rat butts are rare drops you say? All the more excuse to spend time fighting rats. Idk maybe I am a masochist, but I love the classic grindy video game loop.
Even good writing isn't gonna save you if side quests are over-abundant and repetitive. As much as they might teach you about the world and the NPCs that give them, clearing a map in FFXIV of its "yellow quests" is nothing short of torture.