Introduction

Forget about that deadly meteor that's coming to kill us all — it's time to raise some farm animals! Inspired by God of War Ragnarok's plethora of optional content, this week the Triple Click gang talks side quests. What makes a good side quest? What are our favorites? And have we really come up with another taxonomy? Yes, yes we have.

One More Thing: 

Kirk: Reservation Dogs S2

Maddy: New TV (LG OLED C1 Series 48” 4k Smart TV)

Jason: Tactics Ogre Reborn

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Some Sidequest Types:

• The Arena - A combat area that remixes enemy types from the broader game
• The Racetrack - A racing arena where you race. Cars, horses, ATVs, footrace, etc.
• The Tournament - A tournament for the in-game game. Gwent, Pazaak, etc.
• The Loyalty Mission - Basically a story mission focused on one of your party members/NPCs. Can have an impact on the story or the ending. 
• The Collect-A-Thon - A sidequest you get early in a game that has you collecting a certain number of things. Collection can also mean destruction. Lots of subvarieties of this
• Boss-a-Thon - A series of optional boss fights culminating in one very hard fight or maybe a rush against all of them
• The Secret Sidequest - A quest that you didn’t even realize you were doing, but that eventually unlocks actual story material or alternate endings
• Harder Puzzles, Please - Optional puzzles set right near the ones you had to do for the story, which are much more complicated
• Treasure Map - Find this location, with this clue.
• Animal Farm - Basically chocobo breeding but I know there are other games that do this
• Merchandise Spotlight - Master the ins and outs of a store or trading network with rotating items so that you can get all the items
• It’s A Mystery - Solve a mystery of varying complexity, either by gathering clues or talking with witnesses. It is often possible to solve the mystery incorrectly 
• The Ancient Dungeon - a big optional dungeon, often with 100 randomly generated floors, that exists just to let you spend more hours playing
• The Fetch Quest - bring object A to person B, rinse, repeat. Can be a one-off or can gradually expand