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To Side Quest, or Not to Side Quest | Windbreaker Podcast
8.3k Plays8 months ago
On this week’s episode of Windbreaker, Yahtzee, Marty and Frost discuss video game side quests, and how they personally engage with them.
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Transcript
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00:00:00
Speaker
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Host Introductions and Light-hearted Stories
00:01:16
Speaker
Hello everyone, welcome to The Windbreaker's Podcast. I'm Yahtzee Croshaw, I'm joined by Marty Sleever and Sebastian Ruiz. On the other one, yeah. Yeah, I realized I just gave thumbs up on an audio centric program. And a very soggy doggy. Oh, you got off to the f***ing there. That was nice. He just got back from the kennels because we were away for the long weekend.
00:01:45
Speaker
cruelly, the one decided to give him a bath. It just sort of muttering his little problems in my ear. Do you think he went on any adventures this weekend that were sort of like tangential or to the side of what you did this weekend?
00:02:05
Speaker
That certainly seems like it could be the thing that happened. He probably got up to all kinds of side activity in the kennel. Probably sniffed a lot of optional butts. And that brings us to this week's topic. Side quests in games. What makes us want to do them? What brings this, what brought this to mind, Vadi?
Exploring Side Quests in Games
00:02:30
Speaker
Because this, I believe this was your suggestion.
00:02:32
Speaker
Yeah, it's been a heavy first few months of the year for big old JRPGs. I've been playing a lot of Like a Dragon, Infinite Wealth, a lot of Persona 3 Reload, and a lot of Redacted. And all three of those games are just lousy with side quests. And I find myself doing them a lot, so apparently they're doing something right with their side quests.
00:02:57
Speaker
So I kind of want to just have like a more sort of a mile high view of how do we feel? How do we feel? When we're playing a game with a wealth of side quests, what do we do? Are we taking the time to smell the flowers? Are we going off the beaten path? What are we looking for in quests that we like? What do we hate in side quests? I feel like you don't like them, Yahtzee. My gut is going to be Frost's pro, Yahtzee's con.
00:03:18
Speaker
Well, I'm sort of inevitably going to be conned because, uh, my policy is to try to get through the game to story end in the course of the week that I have to play them. And usually that will mean powering through side quests or avoiding them altogether. Just to go through the stories, the main campaign stuff.
00:03:37
Speaker
So, oftentimes, my hands are tied, and I can't actually engage with side quests. Although, usually, in like the early stages of playing a game, I'll indulge a few to see if there's anything more interesting there. And in fact, when I was playing Like a Dragon Infinite Wealth, I adopted the policy of humoring side quests wherever they came up, because I'd played a lot of Yakuza games before, and the critical path and main plot for those games are all kind of the same.
00:04:07
Speaker
I mean, the main character defends innocent woman who is embroiled in conspiracy to take over Japan stroke the yakuza at all ends in a shirtless bunch up. Now which yakuza story did I just describe all most recent judgment?
00:04:26
Speaker
Infinity wealth. Yeah. Yes. Every single one of them. That was
Side Quests vs. Side Activities
00:04:31
Speaker
the point. Is there a line then? Okay. So when we say side quests, let me get into the semantics there. Sure. I'm thinking like, you know, Ubisoft where it's like here to go, go find the lookout. All right. Or go do this quick little race. What is full blown side quests and what's just like, I don't know, a chore, who knows?
00:04:51
Speaker
Yeah, I think there's like a bleeding over of those, right? Like you don't have to go to all the top of the Ubisoft tower first, but that feels like a side quest. I don't know if it's a good side quest, but it feels like one. Whereas also a quest that has like a narrative arc and it has a little three act structure to it also feels like a side quest to me.
00:05:13
Speaker
In the Ubisoft sandbox model, there is a distinction between the side quest and the side activity. So these words are good. You got your main critical part quest, which is like a line of objectives.
00:05:30
Speaker
And the side quests will be like a shorter line of objectives. Go ahead, talk to this person, do this, fight these dudes, go back to the person, etc. The side activity is something more like collect all the flags in Assassin's Creed. Do all the copy pasted punch up missions.
00:05:48
Speaker
It's something that you could basically just hack a million out of. Hidden chests, like single challenges, like the stuff in Watch Dogs where you have to do the little circuit diagram puzzle. Or the Riddler trophies in the Arkham games.
00:06:06
Speaker
Yeah,
Narrative Dissonance in Gaming
00:06:07
Speaker
SideQuest can also be like little mini games, little collecting things. I feel like the ones you spotted on a difference there where it's some feel authored and others feel like we created a thing and we just kind of omitted them all over the map and now go find those things. Yes, often in a live service game there's more side activity than Quest.
00:06:31
Speaker
Yeah, they put some narrative to it and disguise it as a side course. Yeah, that's putting that's putting the pill inside the peanut butter and giving it for a relevant comparison. If you look at something like Arkham Knight or Arkham City, every side quest line is part of a coherent
00:06:49
Speaker
you know, narrative. So going up against this particular boss, he's got like Two-Face and Penguin are robbing this bank, this bank, and this bank. You have to go to all those three banks and foil the robberies individually, and they're all like individually crafted missions. In comparison, you have something like Gotham Knights, where the game just procedurally generates missions everywhere you go. Here's some thugs trying to get in, break into this door, beat them all up, move on to the next.
00:07:16
Speaker
Yeah, and the Arkham one that you mentioned, it feels like those quests also succeed in world building and character building. And, you know, they teach you something about Gotham, they also tell you something about who these characters are and their relationship to Batman. Whereas the Gotham Knights or even the Suicide Squad ones are just
00:07:37
Speaker
I mean, busy work, I guess. And maybe all games are busy work, but it just feels like busy work or chores. I think most importantly, the sense in the Arkham Knight side quest is that each one you do gets you towards a goal. Like each side quest is like a percentage showing how far you are through that particular goal. Yeah. At the end of which you will have fixed the problem, whatever it was. And the side stuff in Gotham Knight Suicide Squad feels like busy work because there's never going to be any less of it.
00:08:07
Speaker
It will always, you will always be having to do more of it. And just from like a context narrative perspective, that's a little bit demoralizing. Because like, we're not really fixing the situation. We're just part of it, really. Yeah.
00:08:23
Speaker
Feels like the
Design and Engagement of Side Quests
00:08:24
Speaker
reason I find it harder to get into these new God of Wars, because in the older ones, even if you are going off the beaten, like, I'm going to kill Zeus, right? But I've just killed Ares, I've killed Medusa, I've killed Mercury. It's kind of like all the things in the goal, right? Where it's sort of like, okay.
00:08:40
Speaker
That's a Roman god. That is a Roman god, isn't it? Hermes? Too much smite. I'll tell you what. He's also the cooler one. It's got the better name. But it's also just like, you know, as I'm getting through there, I might as well clean house on my way there. Whereas the new Ragnarok seems to be, he has a quest that he very much wants.
00:08:56
Speaker
But it keeps on just getting sidetracked more so than- Yeah, it's very overt in those games because, like, literally there are parts in the plot where your side character will go, well, we could go on and do, like, the important thing we need to do, or we could piss about for an hour. What do you want to do?
00:09:12
Speaker
Yeah, it's always funny, not to break up the ludonarrative dissonance, but the idea of in the main quest, your character has a real sense of urgency. Whereas, and then you could just fuck around and be like, cause like, I don't know, tears of the kingdom or breath of wild Zelda is like, I have been holding this pig God at a standstill in this castle for a hundred years. You just woke up, come fix this. And you could be like, or I could find 700 Koroks.
00:09:40
Speaker
Or I could do that. This is the eternal nugget of ludonarrative dissonance that has always blighted the sandbox game, right from Grand Theft Auto onwards. What was that one? Everyone yelled about Fallout 4? It's like, I'm here to get my son, or I'm just going to put that up in my bottle caps. Yeah. Which is fine. That's just something I've gotten over, right? Like that's just...
00:10:07
Speaker
But what if the side quests are better than the main narrative? So like Witcher, I'll be playing it on the side, and I like the side questing more so than I like the main story. It reminds me more of like television, where each one is very episodic, but there is like a main through line and I'm like, well, I'll get there when it gets resolved eventually, but I like these little side quests that I'm doing.
00:10:26
Speaker
I mean, me too. I like that about the witch, especially the witch of three. And what I like about doing the side quest is that it feels like Geralt on the job, as it were. This is just what he does all day. Like he's a blue collar worker. He just rocks up to someone's house and says, I heard you got monster problems. Now my rate is 500 gold an hour, but that's negotiable depending on what expenses I accrue. You've been using your natural accent more and more, all of it.
00:10:54
Speaker
Yeah, it's funny when there's there's games I look back on and I do I remember the side quests more than I remember the main story which maybe that's just a product of like in a side quest you can cut tell like a really tight vignette like you and you can even like veer off into maybe a different tone or a different genre than the main game you could do a funny side quest or a scary side quest or a romantic side quest in a game that isn't inherently one of those.
00:11:19
Speaker
Or you could play with gameplay mechanics a bit. You could have a side quest where you've gotten used to the fighting a certain way, but then there's this one side quest that says, hey, do this without using such and such power. Or do this without getting hit a single time. Yeah. Well, we've come a long way too, back in the day, you used to always be like, hey, help me cast chickens. No matter who you were, what you were playing, help me cast five chickens. Every hero has to catch a chicken. Or catch it, yes. Or kill rats in someone's basement. Yeah. It's the very first quest. Just a classic in one way.
00:11:49
Speaker
So we want them to be a little authored. I like self-contained. I kind of am a little intimidated by side quests that do impact everything else, right? And I kind of like knowing I can go in in this self-contained space and come out and everything's still fine.
00:12:06
Speaker
What do you think of games where side-questing is semi-required? I'm thinking of something like Saints Row Get Out of Hell, where instead of a fixed path of critical missions, you can just power through. It just says,
Narrative Enhancement through Side Quests
00:12:23
Speaker
hey, side-quest until you've made this amount of experience or this amount of money, and then you can do the next story mission.
00:12:30
Speaker
Yeah, that feels like a form of gating in the same way that like, I think like a dragon, the previous like a dragon off of seven, had like a money gate, where it was like, you need a certain amount of money in order to do something. And so it's like, well, how are you gonna make the money? And it's probably like the real estate game or whatever, like whatever mini makes the most money. But that's why you're
00:12:55
Speaker
No More Heroes, the first one, had something similar. I like that. I like when an open world game does that because it mandates engagement with the open world. I like it if the game has good quests. If the game has bad quests, that's one. Well, no one sets out to have bad quests in their games. Yeah. Was it one of the Just Cause games where you had to build up chaos by doing random stuff and destroying random stuff to advance in the game?
00:13:24
Speaker
Oh, that's fun. Don't recall that. But Just Cause 2, particularly, does feel like a game where you have less of that problem where the side questing feels like taking a break from the main thing. And Just Cause 2, it feels like you're constantly destabilizing the nation with everything you do. And every little helps. Everything you do gets you towards that goal. And again, that all feeds into who the character is, right? In the same way that
00:13:50
Speaker
You know, like a dragon, if you are Ichiban, he's the kind of dude who does go out and he's kind of just like a human golden retriever and he wants to help people. He's the kind of character who would, if he walked by and saw a dude in a mascot costume who needed help, he would help him out. If he saw a weird scientist who created a giant Roomba, he'd help him out. That feeds into who that character is, as opposed to being a stoic, I need to save the world, but I guess I will also catch these chickens.
00:14:20
Speaker
Well, it made more sense than when Kazma Key you did it. Yeah, Kazma Key did the same thing, but with less justification, I suppose. Yeah, yeah. Like he had to dress up in a mascot costume and one of the yakas are six side quests, as I recall.
00:14:34
Speaker
Do you, Frost, you were saying how you like them self-contained. Does that mean what you do in it doesn't really impact the world? Or does that mean you don't like the ones that are kind of chains of quests? Because I'm thinking of like the Souls games a lot of times have chained to side quests where you have to find Alexander the pot dude in Elden Ring multiple times in the game, like Raney's quest multiple times in the game.
00:15:02
Speaker
Even like the trading quest in Zelda games the big Goron sword is is the thing that lasts the entirety of ocarina time Yeah, I feel like I'm gonna actually just eat I eat those words immediately because my favorite ones is I was gonna say are the ones that like
00:15:17
Speaker
If you don't do them, there's, oh, I guess they kind of do tie back into the gameplay, sort of like in the old Assassin's Creed. You can go and scout the perimeter or find this guy and you found like an extra passageway that'll help you in the actual assassination. Where it feels like I don't really suffer too much for not have done it, but it does lend itself to the story. And again, Dark Souls, I love those quests, but more so because they're not as imposed. And it does make me curious. My favorite is probably still,
00:15:46
Speaker
onion bro. It's his little quest line of just om di dum, what's up? And as he slowly gets depressed because you're beating, it's almost one that fulfills itself without you having actually gone on it because he's always at that next point you need to be. And because you are adventuring better than he is, he starts to get depressed.
00:16:07
Speaker
There's one bit where you have to meet him in Blightdown, like, way beyond the point that you'd ever want to go back to Blightdown, but yeah. I mean, it's funny, in Dark Souls 1, it feels like the two most iconic or recognizable characters are Siegmeyer and Solaire,
Balancing Rewards in Side Quests
00:16:22
Speaker
our ostensibly side quest characters, right? Which is... Oh, man. Because they're like the only jolly people in the entire miserable experience. Yeah, yeah. The merchant was happy. The first one you meet, thank you kindly.
00:16:38
Speaker
Um, yeah, I like, I like the ones that, uh, it kind of feels like how Yahtzee was saying the smaller, everything you're doing is a smaller piece of a larger thing, like with the, with the Arkham ones or, or even certain, uh, Spider-Man 2 followed a similar, um, a similar role in like the side quests that.
00:16:58
Speaker
I don't know, spoilers like where it's nods to carnage and everything like these are quests that you like build up and then you slowly realize like what these things are drawing back upon. But then it also has the self-contained ones like there's like a you're helping out a lady who's lost her like dementia adult father and like you sit with him by the lake and he talks about that's where he like met his wife and everything and that was a nice little like oh this was nice and feels spider-man-y because that's what spider-man does is he helps out dementia adult.
00:17:25
Speaker
elderly people. Yeah, amongst other things. Yeah. I think for me, a side quest should in some way help you get through the main campaign as well. Like, I think if you're having trouble with like a boss fight the main campaign, you should have the option of saying like, we'll put a pin in that, we'll build up some money and resources and levels doing the side stuff, and then we'll try again.
00:17:50
Speaker
And I've played a lot of games where that sort of isn't considered. I remember Diablo 4 leaps to mind because everything in that game scales up to your current level, so grinding up side quests to get better for a boss fight isn't a thing because the boss would have ground up as well by the time you get to him.
00:18:09
Speaker
And I was playing Skull and Bones this week, as lots of people are, I think. And I was having trouble with this one boss fight, kill the one big French ship. And I was thinking, okay, well, I'll just grind up some side stuff and see how we do. The problem was that I didn't know what
00:18:27
Speaker
specifically would make me stronger. All I knew in the abstract was that I could maybe build better cannons if I found the necessary resources in blueprint. But half the side quests just made you money. And it's not money I needed, it was bronze ingots. Yeah. Yeah,
Influence of Side Quests on Main Game
00:18:47
Speaker
there's an art to kind of balancing the reward of a side quest, right? You don't want something that's going to make you so overpowered that the game becomes silly, but at the same time you want
00:18:56
Speaker
You know, you want something for your time and effort. But it's not your common thing.
00:19:04
Speaker
So, and I've noticed this, it's kind of in old MMOs, and this is the problem, it's called in Bones 2, where it's like, you have to do it all together. So it's like, all right, progress the story a little bit, now do all the side stuff, because I've just unlocked these bronze ingots that you're looking for, and then you get all that, and now you can do the main story again, and now branch out and do all these side quests, and it just does this segmented thing over and over again. And like that, that kind of does tend to weigh down a little bit.
00:19:30
Speaker
Yeah, yeah, I know. This ties back into the loop, but it just feels more so like this isn't optional, right? This is just a very long-winded segmented, almost filler, and so to speak, in a video game, or even like the anime sense of like this kind of, you know, we had to do this, otherwise we couldn't have done the main, but it wasn't as fun. I'm gonna pick on you slightly if you're used to the word optional there, because I've raised this question before, what does optional mean in video games?
00:20:00
Speaker
I mean, it's not on the critical path. I mean, the whole playing the game at all is optional. This is our fun time. This is our leisure. I like a game that sort of mandates a certain amount of side questing to like get people to really engage with the extended broader gameplay of the experience.
00:20:22
Speaker
Yeah, I mean, it just goes back to the authored feeling, right? If it feels like they cared, if it feels like this genuinely is like a small... If the game is a cake, here's a cupcake for you, instead of just like, alright, here's a bit of, like, scrappings from the cake, a bit of left over ice and joy, you know? It's funny, I... Oh god.
00:20:42
Speaker
But on the other hand, if your game is a really enjoyable core gameplay loop like Spider-Man, we might appreciate just having quests where you can just do that without having to stop because you got to the end of the narrative thread of the side quest.
00:20:56
Speaker
Yeah, there's ones where it's just collect follow birds or go and wind tunnels or, you know, do a little race thing and they like a race as in like a foot race, not race war. Yeah, but you know, so you have those
00:21:13
Speaker
You have side quests that can be, uh, the rewards can be fulfilling. You have side quests where the, um, the mechanics can be fulfilling because they're just fun. Uh, there's also the ones that, um, there's side quests where I don't remember what I got for it, but the fleshing out of the world and the kind of story appeal made me care about my main goal even more. Um, I think back to stuff like helping out all the townsfolk in Majora's Mask.
00:21:40
Speaker
Like you don't need to do any of that, but like seeing through the, the cafe and Anju like wedding, uh, quest line all the way through the end, like gives you the impetus to be like, I should, I need to save this world because like, I just saw this like beautiful kind of three act story of this couple in love. And this is like saving the world for, or at the, uh,
00:22:02
Speaker
at the end of Chrono Trigger, there's like a handful of side quests before you go to, um, the final dungeon and each one kind of centers on one of the, one of the party members. And so you get like closure of their narrative arc through these side quests. Um, and, and near automata does a similar thing and even, uh, like red dead, some of the hanging out with, with your homies by the fire. Um, I feel like it adds, adds a layer to the, to the overall story.
00:22:28
Speaker
What we're talking about here is engagement. And yeah, that can come from being engaged with the story. And that could motivate you to want to save the world. Or maybe you just want to save the world because you like having fun in the world and the world is fun. Right. To me, I
Personal Preferences for Side Quests
00:22:42
Speaker
kind of like it when side quests feel like overflow. Like there's as much love and time and effort put into the side stuff, but there was no way we could have made an entire game out of it. Right.
00:22:53
Speaker
So it's just like self-contained in itself in that sort of way. But do you guys get sort of executive dysfunction, this feeling of like, oh, God, I have to do the side quests? I don't. I know some people do. My wife does. She's, as I've said before, she's very completionist when it comes to games. I put her onto a sesame black flag and she got bored of it because she felt she had to do every single side thing before she moved on to the next bit of plot.
00:23:22
Speaker
Yeah.
00:23:26
Speaker
I'm choosy with what I do. I definitely don't, you know, if I don't have to, I don't rush through a game. But if I'm liking the side things, I will take the time. If I start feeling like they're just sort of randomly generated filler activities, then I'm really quick to bounce off that. Like I don't need to see a clean map, but if I'm enjoying the things, like I've by and large enjoyed the stories of the like a dragon side quests. And so,
00:23:53
Speaker
as I'm running around Honolulu, like anytime I see something like two blocks away, I'll be like, well, I'll run over there and see what's going on there. And it's usually something entertaining at the very least.
00:24:02
Speaker
Do they intimidate you that they are timed or that you might end up skipping them? Like with Dredge where you found those little starving guys on the island. I still don't know what that is. They all died. I'm not fully sure what happens, but I mean, you still get the achievement even if they die. That's what the guy was saying. But now that he had to remove that because people genuinely in the reviews were saying this horrible game has timed side quests.
00:24:28
Speaker
Yeah. Well, those people wouldn't have much fun in Dead Rising. No, yeah. Dead Rising, at least, I feel like makes the timingness of it apparent, right? Yeah, very much so. Whereas Dredge was just like, I don't know what these dudes are, and then you go back and you're like, oh, they died. I don't know what happened.
00:24:48
Speaker
Yeah, Final Fantasy VII Remake, the 2021, had a similar thing where there was like a handful of chapters in the game that were more of like the side quest chapters. And so you could choose to just breeze through the chapter and go on to the next one or take your time and do a handful of side quests. But if you just breeze through, those side quests kind of got locked out.
00:25:08
Speaker
So you would go to the next, if you come back later, you'd be like, well, you just can't do those. Um, whereas I think they've said in, in, um, rebirth, um, that's not going to be the case. Is that side quest you could do at any point in the game? I mean, you paid money for the game. Why wouldn't you want to experience everything there is in the game to experience? Yeah.
Factors of Player Engagement in Side Quests
00:25:26
Speaker
I mean, the whole attitude of just wanting to get to the end, aside from because you need to review the game. Well, it reminds me of how Ubisoft were trying to sell time saver passes to people so they could just finish the game and get to the ending quicker. Why did you fucking buy the game? You know, they've got kids. If you want to pay extra to complete the whole thing for you, go for it.
00:25:55
Speaker
One kind of side quest we didn't talk about, which thinking of a recent game, I guess, Prince of Persia, The Lost Crown is the one that comes to mind, are the hardcore challenge-based side quests. So Prince of Persia had those kind of challenge rooms where you'd, similar to Hollow Knight or even a room where you had to do a crazy platforming challenge, do a big loop, and not touch the ground because the ground is spikes or lava or something. And they are like,
00:26:23
Speaker
I don't even remember, again, what the reward for those were in Prince of Persia, but I liked the feel of the game and I liked the mechanics so much that like the Spider-Man ones. I wanted to do those because I wanted to see 2D platformers. I liked one of the genres I think I'm actually good at, and so I wanted to see if I could actually complete them.
00:26:38
Speaker
Yeah, because yeah, it's often the case that the very, very hardest challenges in the game are the side challenges, because those are the people who are really engaged with the game and want to fully explore their skills. Yeah, yeah, for one thing, one thing I knocked against Russ at Moss, because it would do those right where it's just like, all right, this room, and he would even tell you where it's like, this is just a challenge room, right? And you do get a reward for it and whatnot.
00:27:03
Speaker
But what they were trying to say is they'd encourage you to kind of complete the game first so you could have as much gear as possible and then come back and do it. And so I was like, oh no, I found this side quest way too early and I'm stuck here for five hours. And I didn't get it until I got back the second time. And now it's, it's super, super easy. So I guess like when they approach me is also as important as like what it is. Right. I kind of do like, uh, like Metroid venues are my favorite in that sense of,
00:27:29
Speaker
You have an ending, but there's also so much other stuff that you could have another ending, really. Yeah, yeah. Have you really had an ending if there's another ending? Yeah. That's the near automata question, isn't it? Too many endings. 26, that's a good number of endings. That's a healthy number of endings for a story.
00:27:54
Speaker
Yeah, there's also the kind of going alongside that is like the rate at which they're doled out. Like a lot of games will just be like there's a community board or a hunting board.
00:28:04
Speaker
And then you click on it and
Metroidvania and Emergent Side Quests
00:28:05
Speaker
you're like, Oh, here's a bunch of side quests. Like that's how Final Fantasy 16 side quests work. You would go back to your base and you'd go to the community board and be like, Oh, there's these five things you need to do around the world. And if there's like too many of those at a given time, it's just like, am I just adding these to the list? Like in the same way that someone's like, Hey, you should watch this YouTube video. And I was like, yeah, I'll add it to my watch later list. And I do.
00:28:25
Speaker
I'm never gonna watch it. I'm never gonna do that. Yeah. See, if a game does side quests like that, like for some reason Dead Island is leaving to mind, where all the quest givers are in one place, like a town, and they say, hey, go to this place in the open world and do a thing and come back, then I'm less likely to do them. But if I'm just randomly hovering around in the open world doing stuff, and someone runs out into the road and flags down my car and says, hey, help, my wife's pinned under a tiger or something,
00:28:56
Speaker
I'm far more likely to engage with that because that feels like a much more organic engagement with the game. I think, I guess I want to say Red Dead Redemption feels like a game that does that more. Where like SideQuest just sort of happens to you as you go and that's kind of my ideal model for it. And I also, I like when
00:29:17
Speaker
you can solve a side quest before you've even gotten it without realizing it. Like maybe you explored a cave and you got a thing, or you killed the monster in the cave, and then hours later you find someone who's like, hey, this cave's got a monster, and then they're immediately like, oh, you already killed it. Thanks. Instead of it just respawning the monster, or the monster wasn't there until you initiated the quest, that's some real bullshit.
00:29:39
Speaker
I loved that in Deus Ex, because whatever you did, they'd have to like dialogue for it, and they'd always... I tried to create some kind of justification for the main character being a complete psychotic vigilante Randian or something. Like in the subway station level, there's like a gang leader who asks you to kill a drug dealer. And if you've already killed him, just randomly for no reason, your character just goes, already dead, just another parasite.
00:30:09
Speaker
That's great. That's so good. Yeah. Cause I was going to bring out even like with skull and bones sometimes cause I'm a horrible hoarder and I just get everything. Sometimes I go in to accept quest, but then it's like accepted, submitted because it's already in my inventory. But since it's not tied into the, into the quest, it's not as special as something like that. Yeah. You're just kind of a sicko here at this point.
00:30:32
Speaker
And you say, you say emergent side quests, but it does that a lot where it's just, you'll see boats screaming, I hope we've been, you know, we're sinking, help us, you know? Yeah. I do like those, those that, uh, aside from the ones that come out of nowhere, uh, almost self-imposed side quests, like I was, I was got done with Far Cry 3 a few months ago, and I would just play and play, but it gets to a point where you get, unlock so many guns that you do kind of need to hunt animals for better pouches. So in the middle of doing the normal quest, I'm like, I'm going to go,
00:31:02
Speaker
over here real quick and just get some skins, you know, and not having to complete everything but just sort of almost out of necessity.
00:31:11
Speaker
I love to do a nice, a nice skinning. A nice skinning. Midway through my games. Yes, at the Redemption 2, where they fully animated it because they're psychotics. I feel like it was just one of those things where like the other team still had like two years left on the game and you're like, well, I guess we gotta do some things. Let's give the horse some balls and let's animate skinning.
00:31:33
Speaker
That's my theory for the horse pooing and the shrinky balls thing. Yeah. Yeah. How's it feel? Good.
Mini-Games and Their Evolution
00:31:42
Speaker
Um, when it's like, okay, this is really difficult to explain, but I'll give it sort of like outer wha- outer worlds. Is that the time loop one? Nope. Outer wilds. Damn it. I always get those confused. Outer wilds. It's understandable. Yeah. Yeah. Or it's like, okay.
00:31:58
Speaker
Here's your main quest, but we have no idea how to accomplish it. So you are nothing. It's just all side questing, essentially, even though it is part of that sense. There's a lot of exploration games is what they're being called. They kind of do that where it's like, there's this one thing you want to accomplish, but we're not going to direct you. So you kind of have to interact with the rest of the world and side quest away until you accomplish the main objective. Yeah. Yeah. It's interesting because without a wild, everything you do
00:32:26
Speaker
feeds into the main objective, but you don't need to do everything. You can kind of stumble upon the solution to the game, you know, without really fully exploring certain planets or bodies. But yeah, that is interesting. I would say nothing in that game is a side quest, but a lot of it is optional, which is
00:32:48
Speaker
weird those feel like those game is optional I hear morning well every game yes but some are more optional than others sure yeah some some are absolutely you mentioned earlier I think Frost you said it's they could be
00:33:07
Speaker
a vessel to showcase a mechanic that might not be able to be strong enough to hold up on its own. Sometimes we do get those ones that are so popular, like you get a Gwent that is so popular that it ends up becoming its own game, or like when people think back to like Triple Tri, I don't know why I keep going to card games, but like Triple Triad and Final Fantasy 8, which people just wouldn't...
00:33:28
Speaker
nuts for the captain toad levels and super mario 3d world yeah that's perfect example yeah became its own game and so like it feels like no idea why but they did captain toad is nice was it good nice like gwent didn't do well they should have attached an rpg to their card game that's what they went wrong well it is funny that gwent didn't didn't do sprawl
00:33:54
Speaker
Well, you know, they saw all the shit Hearthstone was doing and thought, gotta get me some of that. Yeah. Yeah. I don't know. Is there an example of like, uh, of a mini game that did almost surpass?
00:34:07
Speaker
like the legacy of the main game, like the Chao Garden maybe in Sonic Adventure 2. The only thing that people seem to have fond memories of in that game. Yeah, yeah. And then you go back to play the game. What's that thing in Final Fantasy? It's like soccer or some sport. Blitzball. But that's also part of the main story because your character is like a star Blitzball player. And that is atrocious, like genuinely atrocious. It is like one of the worst. Just fucking underwater basketball. Get out of here.
00:34:36
Speaker
What a horrible concept. I suppose any game side quest has the potential of completely distracting someone from the rest of the game if it like particularly appealed to them.
00:34:46
Speaker
And if they have enough depth to them and, you know. Like, like a dragon, both like a dragon games seem to be like almost trying to provoke that sort of thing with the best management and the animal crossing side stuff. Yeah. Yeah. And the Tsujiman, like, I mean, the new, like a dragon has Pokemon, it has animal crossing. Like it is, um, yeah, it is crazy taxi. It has Pokemon snap. It has all of your games inside of it.
00:35:12
Speaker
shall we go to super chat we shall before we do oh yeah mid-roll mid-roll ad sorry another word from our sponsor thank you so much Eric
00:35:24
Speaker
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00:35:43
Speaker
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Speaker
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Speaker
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00:36:39
Speaker
We did it. Yay. I hope you enjoyed being reminded of Lasty Park. Which comes out tomorrow. Oh yeah. A little Diablo 4 killer for you. Absolutely. Yeah. Yeah, probably. Anyway, our super chats start this week with a good old Tommy Salty.
00:37:00
Speaker
old, uh, adventurous, now music composer man who gives 10 Polish slottys to say too many side quests are mechanically boring. I am H O. Yeah. And narratively boring too. And narratively. Yeah. Yeah. Again, that's, that's where you, um, if it starts feeling like busy work and you're not enjoying the work itself, then you're like, what am I doing?
00:37:24
Speaker
Other games where the main gameplay feels too much like busy work. Those are just bad games. Those are just absolutely, yeah. Oh, you're not liking banishers?
00:37:39
Speaker
Well, let's save that for my review when it comes out a week after this week, next week even, let's say. Well, you called this week. And then before we go on to Wesley, Tommy, thank you so much for being in the tip jar. Andrew, welcome to the tip jar. And two Andrews in a row. Welcome to the tip jar. Andrew Ball and Andrew Collett. A couple of Andrews cutting it up.
00:38:03
Speaker
Wesley Thomas, uh, gives to Canadian and says, every side quest is that much more XP and GP I get. I guess that goes back to what I was saying, that every side quest feels like you need to at least be moving forward in some way. I mean, that's what I, that's what I'd like. I want to know that, uh, if, if nothing else, I've at least made some money in some experience. So I'm in a stronger position than I was before. You see that, but then like, if you do the main question of all the others just become such so trivial, really.
00:38:34
Speaker
Let people do that. People want that. People want to feel overpowered. And that's why they do all the good stuff. Oh, I would. If it would let me. If it would let me get overpowered. Absolutely. But if it's just like, essentially, this all amounts to 10 percent of your overall power level in the end. I was like, OK, it's just you're wasting me time. Wiggle toffees ears. Oh, yes. Would you say social links are side quests in the Persona games or are they?
00:39:05
Speaker
Well, it's hard to call it a side quest when it's the thing you engage with as part of the main campaign, I suppose. You know, you got to find something to fill your time. Yeah. Anyway. I guess they're optional in terms of like you choose if you want to focus all on one character or if you want to get yourselves a nice little harem going. I guess. I mean, it's I suppose in the strictest sense of the word, it's optional.
00:39:35
Speaker
During Nick's playthroughs, he spends all of his time at the batting cages.
00:39:39
Speaker
I'm like, Nick, you can go on dates. He's like, I just want to go to the batting gate. That's the beauty of the persona games. You can do that. You can just hang out at the cafe that makes your face greasy and improves your charm score all day every day. How much side questing is too much side questing? That was kind of my issue with David Diver. I felt like that was a game completely on my alley, but it was just like, here's this new thing. And now there's new thing. And now there's other new thing. I was like, wait, all righty then.
00:40:08
Speaker
Yeah. Well, I might have said something like the Yakima games have put a little bit too much effort into the side stuff, but then that's kind of the appeal. Yeah.
00:40:19
Speaker
But yes, I agree with you on Dave the Diver, at least. Hey, bet on horses. No. I won't. You can't make me. E.E. Newton gives $5, says, I am all about side quests. In Elden Ring, I literally got to Lane Del before I beat Margit. What do you want, a fucking medal, E.E. Newton? You got lost, did you? No. How did you even get around? How did you get to Lane Del? I'm going through the castle. What do you mean? You could just walk in.
00:40:48
Speaker
Without beating Margit, Margit, don't you need Margit to go through the castle to get to Wiernia to get to Eindel? Yeah, because remember all those fucking chests that take you elsewhere. Oh, those sneaky little chests. And yeah, you can go straight past Margit and go to Leirnia if you want. I didn't know that much.
00:41:09
Speaker
like i was it i still i somehow ended up to the back door of the volcano manner i didn't know it was it's like how the hell did i get up and yeah i got i got it that happens when you get killed by one of those sarcophagus ladies you wake up in volcano manner the suck up for you everyone keeps saying there's side quests around the cliff yeah the side quests can get you that you can go past the first
00:41:32
Speaker
God, but you can't get past Margit from that side quest, right? You need to beat Margit to get to the little path around the castle, right? I believe if you go either north or east, they both have chests that will take you to Gary, Indiana, and elsewhere. So you can kind of just end up going all the way around. You know what game was great?
00:41:52
Speaker
Elden Ring. Elden Ring was a great game. This is a good game. Yeah, it's pretty good. I hear. Yeah. SBS Guru 2005 Euros says, Side quests are best when they're little story vignettes. Sometimes they're better than the main quests, like that Aranara world quest in Genshin. And I wouldn't know about that, because I'm not a fucking weeb. Oh, you're a little bit of a weeb. You just played Persona 3 again. I like weeb games that are unlike what weeb games are usually like. Genshin is very weebie.
00:42:22
Speaker
Yes. It's extremely weepy. Yeah, I don't know. It's got like a little companion with a high-pitched voice. So does Mario? Oh no, Mario's very weepy. I don't know who Aranara in Genshin is, but I hope they have a good time. Kind of fish, isn't it? Aranara? No, that's a mahi mahi. Yeah, you're thinking of mahi mahi.
00:42:49
Speaker
Well, no, I think there's something else. Well, marijuana, that's what I'm thinking of. Marijuana? For marijuana. Blazing it.
00:42:59
Speaker
Well anyway, FoxD gives side dollars and says side quests are getting full on salad and breadsticks to the point where you can't finish the entree you paid for. Well, it depends on the game, FoxD. And some games are like the salad bar at Sizzler where you pay 10 bucks to eat whatever you want and that's kind of your meal. You just load the plate up with ham cubes and egg. Ham cubes and egg? A single egg?
00:43:25
Speaker
Some of them have dessert stations where you get like fill your bowl with apple crumble and cake and then get soft serve ice cream all over it. There's no laws that say you have to finish the main campaign. If you're just having fun doing side quests and then you get tired of the game, that's fine. You just stop. Yes, maybe the main campaign is optional. Think about it. Think about it. Oh, there you go.
00:43:48
Speaker
early berm gives $10 and says hi frosty did you ever do the side quest where you look right into the camera and say hello beautiful daddy's home every day yeah to me pops but right now this one yeah go on do it hello beautiful daddy's home
00:44:05
Speaker
Dad, we need to charge more for that. What is going on? That's what we needed. I had to be careful because as I was going halfway through there, I was like, Oh no, Jack Nicholson's coming out. Oh God. Hello, beautiful. Daddy's home. What's at the wobbly face when you say that? That's Jack Nicholson's thing. Yeah. He wobbles a lot. He just like wobbles his face. Yeah. He did a lot of cocaine in the 60s. Big eyebrow energy too. I got those Jack Nicholson eyebrows. Oh, that is pretty good.
00:44:35
Speaker
Have you ever heard about Princess Leia's coke finger? No, I heard about Grandpa Joe and Willy Wonka. Well, back in the day, if you were on coke, you used to grow out one of your fingernails to have a thing you could snort bumps off of. And if you look closely, Carrie Fisher's got one in some of the Star Wars. Grandpa Joe's got one in the Gene Wilder Willy Wonka. Princess Leia's coke finger is a great band name, by the way.
00:45:06
Speaker
Uh, Mikko Raccoonan gives five euros, says, what is a game movie book or piece of technology you love that is objectively average or bad? Mine are Harvestella and Anobutaceone. Everything I love is great. Is anything objectively bad in the world of art? No, I don't have that.
00:45:29
Speaker
I mean, I love going through demos. A lot of them are actually tragic, but just the concept and ideas they present are fun. Sure. I really liked Sonic Frontiers, and I feel like it's bad. I enjoyed myself with it. It has its positive qualities. Yeah. It goes back to those games that we love that others don't kind of think about, but I actually do enjoy some work as in progress, because it's just nice to see it before it buds.
00:45:59
Speaker
Yeah. Slightly creepy way of putting it. Okay. This is just a smidge. Yeah. John Connor gives five Canadian dollars and says I do all the side quests if the world is fun to be in. Got to have a good world narrative like Baldur's Gate 3, Witcher 3, Mass Effect.
00:46:18
Speaker
Yeah, if you like the place you're in and you like the crew you're with, I think you're willing to put up with a lot. And especially if there's little crumbs through it that give you a little bit that expand upon that world or your party. I think liking your characters can do a lot of heavy lifting when it comes to the role. I love the one you're with.
00:46:41
Speaker
Yes, I guess it was fun taking TA to the bathhouse in Persona 4. Exactly. Nick wouldn't know if he just played baseball. Do you guys like the romancing in Midnight Suns? A little fishing with Blade? I did like that, actually. I don't really feel that way about Spider-Man. I wish Spider-Man would get back to punching Mysterio. I don't really want to snog him. I feel that way about Blade.
00:47:09
Speaker
Daywalker. Yeah, yeah, I know. Yeah. Yes, I know. What's the other word for that? No, that's a werewolf. My mistake. My mistake. Another word for a daywalker? A habsies? Yeah, a half-vampire. Half and half? Yeah, half and half. In some canon, there's a special word for that. Oh. A dompere?
00:47:39
Speaker
Yeah, that's it. Alucard in Castlevania is a dampier. Oh. Alucard, put that name backwards. Dracula. Oh, I didn't realize that. Think about that. Put that in the 500 other Japanese works that does the same thing either. Put that in your Google Translate. Anyway, void check. So a vampire is a full vampire and a dampier is just a half vampire?
00:48:06
Speaker
Yes, but it's not a pun on damp. It's just a wet vampire. Yeah. So excited for that. Yeah. He was like, Oh, we're talking about damp years. God. He's a he's a fan. Yeah. Yeah, cut that yawn out for an emoji. Why don't you?
00:48:27
Speaker
Oh, anyway, uh, void tech gives $10. Ask read is a good example of good and bad side quests. Sometimes they're engaging, rewarding, and completely optional. Then it has quests that you're forced to grind for XP. Yeah. I think between every single ask read game, it's done the entire spectrum of side stuff. Yeah. Um, in the very first game, people used to take the piss out of the flags. Yeah. Yeah. Uh,
00:48:56
Speaker
the racing in the second one that got me. They always did those, didn't they? Time trials. Yeah, for a while, basically every sandbox game had to have some kind of race, which is fair enough.
00:49:06
Speaker
Yeah, it feels like those are just easy, like, crutches to be like, we need to fill some things. Easy ways to engage with the open world environment. Yeah, yeah. Okay, I'll give you that, where it's just like, I'll send you off through the countryside and you'll get to see what it is that you're about to do, but I've just seen some heinous races. Oh yeah, it's not easy to do them well, it's just easy to do them.
00:49:28
Speaker
I've seen some heinous racism. Oh, and in our comments, be good. Mafia three. There you go. It has both races and racism. Yeah. Vampires and dampers. Shut up. I know you're fascinated by the word down here now. It's very funny. Don't worry. I'll burn through it by the end of the podcast.
00:49:52
Speaker
Tsunami Dushir gives $5, says, can you think of any games where side quests recontextualize the main story of a game and its conclusion? Now, I have a funny feeling you're gonna bring up God of War Ragnarok, Matty. God of War Ragnarok does that. Yeah, God of War Ragnarok and Nirotama were the two games. I was thinking of with that, to where it rewards you by... It's so you get what you put into it, and there's certain side things that feel...
00:50:23
Speaker
feel like it should have been the main game. You're like, this should have, this seems crazy to remove this from the main game because it feels like it provides such like narrative oomph that the main story was lacking. Is that like those, what is it? Those good option, bad option ones? Like Bioshock or an old Dishonored?
00:50:42
Speaker
It's like, if you save the girls, you get one ending and if you don't, you get a different ending. Is that what you mean by recontextualize or? No, not really. Recontextualizing is more like the Sion Hill 2 twist that changes how you see the entire game. Yeah. Oh, in that case, a lot of Metroidvanias do that because they give you the good ending, the bad ending, but then the true ending. Like, this is actually what went on. So, okay. Yeah. Yeah, it's more of like you don't, um,
00:51:13
Speaker
Like the... In an example like near Automata, there are side quests that...
00:51:21
Speaker
teach you about the rules of the world and the history of the world that makes the ending, and it's the same ending, land with a heavier punch. Yeah, it's just, oh, I know something now. In the same way to where if you rewatch a movie, you can be like, oh, I can start seeing the threads of it earlier and earlier, but it would be like if you could miss those threads.
00:51:48
Speaker
Vojtek gives $20 and says, complete tangent. Thanks to Yahtzee and team, adventurers and I inspired my wife and I to start playing D&D. She overheard an episode and now she and I watch the show together. Oh, that's great. You're welcome, Vojtek. Thanks for saying Yahtzee and team. That's how I see a lot of my relationships in life. It's me and everyone else.
00:52:12
Speaker
Yeah, yeah, yeah. That was our first idea of what to call second wind. We're just going to call it Yahtzee and some other dudes. Yeah, yeah. I've voted ten to one. Yeah.
00:52:25
Speaker
But yeah, that's awesome. And remember, folks, because the finale is so jam packed and animated heavy, it will not be airing this weekend. It will be airing the following weekend. So March 2nd, the season three finale. And then right afterwards, the team is zoot scooting to film Ventress Night season four on location. Zoot scooting, eh? Zoot scooting. Yeah, you're just getting in your zoot scooter and you're just hoofing it across the country. Yes, putting on my zoot suit and getting on my zoot scooter. Exactly.
00:52:55
Speaker
And then doing that song from The Mask. Zoot Suit Riot? Whatever. What a song. Luis Perez gives $2 and says, favourite side quest or one that stands out? You know, I was just thinking about a bit in... I think it was... I can't remember if it was Gravity Rush 1 or Gravity Rush 2. But there's a quest in that game that's part of the critical path, but you think it's a side quest.
00:53:20
Speaker
Okay, like you run into this lady who says, Oh, no, I dropped my love letter from my spouse over this cliff. Could you go down and use your gravity powers to get it? And you're thinking, Okay, this is just a side quest might as well do is like five minutes of a time. But then it turns out, you like fall out the bottom of the world and you get your character is stuck there for 20 years. And it's like,
00:53:41
Speaker
the entire rest of the game is past that point. And then you finally call your way back to the city and everything's changed and a fascist government's taken over. And the girl you were getting the letter for has entirely forgotten that they sent you on that errand. Yeah, yeah. I love that. That's great. Yeah. I like an RPG where entire party members are locked behind, are kind of optional, locked behind side quests.
00:54:08
Speaker
Final Fantasy 7 original had Eufy and Vincent who were missable, Final Fantasy 6 has a bunch of missable characters. Ooh, Miss Mouse in Paper Mario, The Thousand Year Door. Oh, that's a good one. Thousand Year Door was the one that you had to get all the side quests from the main town, right? Yes. Like from the board or whatever, yeah. Miss Mouse. An entirely optional party member.
00:54:31
Speaker
Yeah. To me, it's all my favorite ones are in American wasteland, Tony Hawk game. It's just, Hey, let's have some vandalism. Let me teach you, you know, piss all over the Hollywood sign. Just do a little vandalism.
00:54:49
Speaker
A4nm gives 10 Polish slottys and says, what about side quests that unlocks true ending? That gets back to the old question of what is optional in video games. Sure. Yeah, going back to like Persona, you need to like Persona 5 Royal, you need to do certain amounts of social links before a certain day in order to unlock the third semester. Same with Persona 4, you need to do certain things to unlock the third semester.
00:55:16
Speaker
If it's relatively obvious, I don't mind. If I have to look up, how do I finish game? That's a little much, in my opinion. Yeah, I had to do that for how to not get the bad ending in Persona 4, because you have to figure out specific conversation options to prevent your party from stone cold murdering a dude. Yeah, and it's not like it just... Yeah, you can really bone yourself.
00:55:42
Speaker
No one likes boning themselves. That's like Liza P, isn't it? You're not there to bone yourself, you're there to bone the waifus. Exactly. Does Liza P have a similar thing? Yeah, like you miss out on an entire boss fight, if you don't. First playthrough I was so fatigued with the game where I knew which one was the option. I was like, alright, I'm just gonna take the wrong ending, because I want the game to be over now. Oh, look at Toffee. Little babushka!
00:56:09
Speaker
No, please help me. My children are starving. Oh, little babushkas. Uh, Gerard Artech Prain gives $5 and says, yes, off topic. But are you guys planning on doing any possible meet and greet type things while recording Adventures 9 DC? No, nothing like open to the public because we'll be too busy doing stuff. That's a super secret location. Super secret time.
00:56:38
Speaker
It's the, it's the one, it's the one monument that looks like a, a dong. That's what we don't want to have to do. There's a lot of those. There's a lot of those. Oh. Plorbs. Uh, no, Nick Nick's plan is in the future to organize an actual official, some sort of gathering somewhere, a gathering of the Jugolos, if you would. Oh, and the, the old escapist expos. Well, I know you don't. Yeah.
00:57:04
Speaker
I do not know. I don't think any of us. I think you and Nick are the only ones to remember. Maybe Omar. Not even Nick. This was like Escapist 1.0 days. And Pre-Nick? I mean, me and Jim Sterling were there and Total Biscuit was alive. Anyway, Bobby Joe Lord gives it 10 seconds with memberships. Thank you very much. Thanks for bringing the mood back up after I brought up Total Biscuit dying. Oh my gosh, Bobby Joe Lord. Thank you so much. And I did it again.
00:57:33
Speaker
You gotta give another 10 to make them less sad. Look at Dobby. You little Dobby. You little Dobby, would you just say hello? Hang on, I lost my place. I can scroll all the way down again. There we go. You're at Neurast. Yes, Neurast 25 gives 25 rons. It says, I recently got my hands on a drawing tablet and found some genres work really well with it. And have you ever tried to play on a drawing tablet?
00:58:02
Speaker
like a like an iPad. Yeah, I don't I don't prefer a few of pen people shit. Eric's just reminded me I accidentally said Jim Sterling there. I should have said Stephanie's Yahtzee. Stephanie's early I'm confused because you know, was Jim then? I was about to say that but I thought how about I not say that how about we dig up. So they are always definitely certainly friend of the show. Yes.
00:58:30
Speaker
Anyway, I played a drawing tablet, played video games on a drawing tablet. I suppose like point and click adventure games would probably be pretty easy with a drawing tablet. And anything that requires clicking like real time strategy. Yeah.
00:58:50
Speaker
Osu? Have you guys seen Osu? Osu? Yeah, it's essentially a rhythm game, but it requires you on top of the tapping to also do like some swings and some holds, some circling. And so... Is it related to Osu to Takai Uindon, also known in the West as Impeach agents? I thought you weren't a weeb.
00:59:09
Speaker
Yeah, I'm not, I'm not, I'm not a weeb. I'm a video game expert who happens to know that elite beat agents was based on an original Japanese game called osu tatake uenden. Yeah. I know it's too much.
00:59:24
Speaker
Oh, no. Oh, so rhythm games, I guess they're just your best bet for those. Bring back Pokemon Ranger, please. I'd love to lasso my Pokemons. Yeah, I think creating a digital, like a controller facsimile on a touchscreen is always real wonky to me. Like I remember they released the Mega Man X, I think, on an iPhone, like early iPhone.
00:59:48
Speaker
And you just had to play by, like, being like, here's kind of where the D-pad is, and here's kind of where the A and B buttons are, and it is junk. Real junk, in my opinion. Brad, I've been for two months in the Green Gang, says, I deaf worry about missing things if I skip sides. Yeah. Do you mean sides as in, like, courses to a meal? Yeah. Okay, it is. Wagga Wagga.
01:00:15
Speaker
Wagga Wagga, et cetera. The Chevy Ferrari gives $10 and says, should side quests provide unique rewards that you couldn't obtain either by following the main plot or exploring, like powerful weapons and RPGs or a new bat gadget in Arkham? Please do. Well, that's certainly a motivation to do side stuff. And then Bully, if you did all the racing ones, you got the best bike. If you found all the rubber bands, you got a rubber band ball you could fight with. Absolutely give me something. Yeah.
01:00:45
Speaker
Yeah, it almost feels like a badge of honor you can show off by that you've completed something because of a new vehicle or weapon or something unique you have. Yes, just makes sense, really. Quinn Thompson gives five Canadian dollars and says New Vegas did side quests. Well, do them to get more involved with the world and can receive more options for the end game. And Yart's new McKeown book when? Soon. In audiobook form, at least. Next week? Not that soon. Okay.
01:01:15
Speaker
Probably in a few months. That's a nice healthy soon. Oh, that's as soon as I have like to give a clear release date, you'll all be the first to know. Yay. The brain sturgeon gives two euros and says, do you like whiskey? If so, what's your favorite? I don't so much like whiskey by itself. I do like whiskey sours and I like Jim Beam in my whiskey sour. There you go. This is an open bottle of Jack.
01:01:44
Speaker
Good time. Nice implement. Yeah, I'm a brown liquor is my go-to. I like a nice smoky scotch, a PD scotch, a LaFroy.
01:01:53
Speaker
I want to smell like a camp, a LaFroy. There's a, there's a pH and an R and an O and an I and a G. There's all sorts of weird letters there. Oh, the French is like, look at us. Sprinkles them everywhere. That's not French. LaFroy is Gaelic, isn't it? Yeah, I think Scottish. Gaelic? Oh no, I was thinking Gaul, damn. Yeah. Um, I like, uh, yeah, I like it feeling like I just made out with a campfire. I like a spiced rum, especially with like a wedge of lime.
01:02:21
Speaker
That'd be good. Captain Morgan's. Yeah, whiskey is definitely not my favorite. Captain and Coke. Go for tequila. Cause I'm like, if we're there to get messed up, get me there fast and then I'll drink something that's actually enjoyable. There you go. Fair enough. Yes. I've certainly found myself lent greater sexual potency on tequila.
01:02:45
Speaker
sort of plan around that. Exactly where it is. Yeah. Robo knob the snob gives 11.99 euros and says for me a side quest needs a core gameplay varied enough to sustain extra optional hours build upon the core themes and have good rewards not just weapons but maybe unlocking new areas i.e. Elden Ring. Well you don't ask for much do you Robo knob the snob? A little slow fishing game too. Bye bye Tophie. Bye Tophie. The damp here.
01:03:10
Speaker
He wants his walk. And then Robo knob the snob gives 599 euros and says also I just joined the live Don't Lamb Aspley with a year we already said that yard say
01:03:21
Speaker
Give it to him for me. We actually did. I don't think we did say. We just lambasted you for just asking too much. I do like a side quest where all of a sudden you do something and you're like, oh, there's a whole part of this world I didn't even know existed. No. There's a painted world? I was like, oh, shoot. Like, you know what? I give that. That's fine if it reroutes itself back. But sometimes it gets to be too much where, like,
01:03:44
Speaker
That one cave in Skyrim, you're like, oh, I'm just going to come in here and loot. Then fuck all it's like more quests within this place. Like, no, one quest. Yeah. One quest per location. That's it. Uh, arms and legs gives two Canadian dollars. There's fully ramblimatic for ghost runner two. Hadn't planned to arms and legs. Leave the ship on that one. Yeah, I came out a while back.
01:04:11
Speaker
Did you plan it on? I started it, but then other games took precedence and I never really went back. I feel like I was around the time we transitioned over here as well. I think so, yeah. I mean, I like to go from the one at some of it. Oh yeah, it's the end of October. We fucking quit a week later. Oh yeah. Yeah.
01:04:33
Speaker
Buchanan gives five pounds. Did any of you guys have a world of Warcraft phase? And if so, what stopped you? I did. I played it for three months. Way back before 2000 way before zero punctuation. Actually, it was part of what inspired my first novel Mog world. That's right. And what stops me
01:04:53
Speaker
Yeah, I reviewed Cataclysm a while back as well. But I also played pre-Cataclysm World of Warcraft for three months, and what stopped me was that I ran out of the three-month free trial that Blizzard gave me for being a game journalist. I guess I don't really have an addictive personality. That's good.
01:05:17
Speaker
Yeah, I played probably like 20 hours when it first came out and that was about it. MMOs have never really done it for me. I got a max with my girlfriend, but we just, we kind of did everything because like you can accomplish everything and then it's just raiding, right? I never did raids. That's the end game content, yes. My game ends way before then. Yeah, fair enough.
01:05:44
Speaker
Uh, Andrew Franjis gives $2 and says, anyone watch the dice awards? Opening was rough. Well, after all that shit, we talked about the video game awards. We didn't end up covering the dice awards. First off, it was at like 10 o'clock in it. So we were going to do live. Second off, I was gone at the end of the week and I told Nick, I was like, you guys could just do a watch along on Friday of the VOD and he didn't. So I don't know, blame Nick. And secondly, they're all dull.
01:06:13
Speaker
Yeah. They're fine to watch. They're just not necessarily. Aside from Keely's, they're dull as hell. I've been trying to tell you all this and you only want to watch them for your honor. I saw like a montage of the winners and it was just, you know, the usual shit. Like, yeah, I'd have had two, one something. Alan Wake two, one something. Ballerskate three, one something. I was like, yeah, the usual crap. It was literally, I'm going to make my own. No blackjack or hookers.
01:06:40
Speaker
The thing is they're like there's certain things that are fun to watch on your own and there's other things that just don't really like Aren't conducive to a watch along kind of atmosphere. It'd be like if you did like there was that Xbox podcast last week that where they were like they're gonna change the industry and then it was just them saying some of our games are coming to other other
01:07:02
Speaker
platforms. And there's a bunch of channels that did like straight up watch-alongs of that. I'm like, you're doing a watch-along of a conversation. That seems strange, right? Like you're coming for a conversation. Also, a lot of people yelling at me that I promised. I did promise. And the counterpoint, I was at a fucking hospital all weekend. I was playing games on my PlayStation portal using hospital Wi-Fi. So let me back off, everyone. By the way, why were you playing online?
01:07:31
Speaker
Were you? What were you doing in the hospital? Were you giving birth? I was not giving birth. No, I was there because I have a family member who's dying. And there was just a lot of waiting. And I was using the wifi to play. You're all assholes. This is why you never ask how people are doing. This is why you never ask. I probably shouldn't have joked about that. No, it's great. I like joking about my loved ones passing away. It's wonderful.
01:07:53
Speaker
I was being sick. I'm not. It's fine. I'm not. I was more curious about the PSP online. Did you not have like cartridges or? The portal. Fuck me. Oh, oh, within reach. That's the thing where I can using the Internet. I could play my PS5 at home and I was on a deadline to finish a video game. I finished it as God intended using hospital Wi-Fi. And I guess PlayStation portable just isn't a thing anymore. Might be coming back supplanted.
01:08:21
Speaker
I think it might be coming back. I think there's with the success of the Switch. Well, if you can just play it on your iPad, where would you need it? Hang on. Okay. Now we do share. Give us $20. And there's a question for all three of you. Just how obscure do you want a side quest to be in order to begin? Bring points in a general direction, given a task completely off the main path and only discovered by pure exploration?
01:08:47
Speaker
I know people hate this. I love the water cooler talk when it's like, how was your playthrough? And it's like, yeah, I just completed this little side quest area down beneath the dungeon five feet down. Like what? I completely missed that. It makes me want to learn that I can do it. Ash Lake, I'd never gone there. And then my friend told me about it. I like hearing it, especially if it's like years out. I know people have their FOMO, but nothing makes me want to play a game again. Like someone saying, oh, I discovered this random area in the middle of nowhere.
01:09:15
Speaker
Yeah, yeah, it's a tricky balance and that's it's because that's cool. But also from the developers perspective, it would be really annoying if you put a lot of work into something that nobody bloody noticed. Cowards. Good obvious. I already paid for it. Pose. Yeah, pride in your work.
01:09:38
Speaker
Sure, but if they don't get all of it, it's fine. I mean, if I was getting paid the same amount to make videos that just wasn't built on YouTube, like some rich asshole just held onto them and didn't release them, but paid me the same amount, I would not be satisfied with that job. Yeah, but there's a difference between someone got it and they enjoyed it a lot versus everyone got it. You know what I mean? Like, I feel like you have some very clever bits that I enjoy more going, ah, that's funny. That's very specific. And I know a lot of other people won't get it.
01:10:07
Speaker
Right. And especially whenever you do like a call out to some random city in the fuckhole nowhere. I look in the comments and like, Oh, weren't expecting a shout out to wherever they're from. Got doxed on a Wednesday. Yeah. You know, so there's something special about that. And then if you do have that friend who gets it, you get to share that moment. Yeah, I remember. And there's like, stuff used to like pass around kind of organically like that. And you still get that in the early stages of like,
01:10:34
Speaker
a new Zelda or a new Souls game. But I remember finishing Symphony of the Night and just killing Richter and being like, well, that's a bummer. And then someone at school being like, you know, there's a whole goddamn upside down castle in this game. And it's like, what? Where's that come from?
Redditor Debates on Nier Automata
01:10:51
Speaker
new secret area found in near automata either an amazing discovery or an elaborate prank someone on reddit was like i'm lost where am i yeah the redditors were like what i've never seen that room before so five years later they're still discovering new content i believe that was uh that was probably a hoax but still like that yeah so it's a balance oh toffee is ready to go
01:11:14
Speaker
Yes, I know you're still here. I know you want your walk. You don't have to keep walking around me and noticeably stretching.
Cowboy 3030 and Other Game Mentions
01:11:24
Speaker
Anyway, Alex Armstrong gives $5 and says, hope you still like Westerns, yeah? It's found an oily excess game called Cowboy 3030, Imagine Fury, but Roguelike over the shoulder and set in the Wild West. What's an oily excess game? Have I given off the impression that I like Westerns? I've given off the impression that I like historical naval fiction. I don't remember ever saying Westerns were a particularly hot button thing for me. No, but you do the funny voice sometimes.
01:11:52
Speaker
I've not known it. Google oily. Don't Google. What is oily access? No, it was just a Reddit. It was a Reddit thread to of gamer girls saying does anyone else get sweaty when they play games? I once I don't really access because it's a pun on early access. I think that's. Oh. Hmm. Funny. Yes. One of mine. Pretty, pretty funny.
Humor and Puns in Gaming Discourse
01:12:22
Speaker
Sadarac1980 gives two pounds and says, SideQuest definition. Zelda, Breath of the Wild is all side quests. Well, that's what we talked about at the top of the show. And yeah, technically the only main quest is just go fucking kill Ganon. Everything else is- I like that. Have you guys seen that video? Guy just walks in, takes the fight, and does nothing else. That's three yards. It's fun to see, yeah. I'm not gonna do it. It took him three hours. Snake in the Garden, member for three months in Tip Jar.
01:12:51
Speaker
Thank you, Snake. Sorry for butchering the Gaelic culture, as I always do. El Munico gives $5 and says, other than improved graphics, is any part of Skull & Bones superior to its equivalent in Sid Meier's Pirates?
Graphics and Comparisons in Gaming
01:13:05
Speaker
Are the graphics that significantly improved? I wouldn't have said so. I mean, it's certainly not better than Assassin's Creed Black Flag. There's probably more graphics. That doesn't mean they're better graphics, but there's just more of them. Oh, this is a very old, cartoony-looking game. Oh, OK.
01:13:21
Speaker
There's, there's a couple of nice parts. There was like a 1991 and then there was like an original Xbox generation one. Yeah. He's probably talking about the second one.
01:13:33
Speaker
Anyway, the brain sturgeon gives two euros, says, for Frost, when's the next Chronicle coming out? Yeah, Frost, when's it coming out? It's the editor, I believe. Jesse said Friday. I believe Friday is the point. I believe Friday is the next one, yeah. There you go, Friday. Mark those calendars. Dr. Theo gives two dollars and says, maybe the real side quests are the friends we made. Certainly in the Pizona series, Dr. Theo. Ah, the kisses you kissed.
01:14:04
Speaker
But all the more tragic are the kisses we don't kiss. You miss 100% of the kisses you don't kiss. But also you shouldn't kiss all the time. You shouldn't. That's the need to be some consent to kiss. That's how you get diseases. John Connor gives $2 says if the side quest is too good, they keep it for DLC.
DLC and Game Endings
01:14:23
Speaker
Maybe that used to be the case. Now it's if the game's actual ending is too good, they keep it for DLC.
01:14:29
Speaker
Looking at you, Suicide Squad. Oh, no. I thought it was Yakuza that did that. No, Yakuza had New Game Plus. Suicide Squad's hiding the ending behind DLC. Yeah, yeah, because you get to the end of Suicide Squad and it goes, oh, we have not defeated Brainiac. There's like 13 of him and they all have to be killed and you have to live serve his grind to kill each one. But then you just kill one of them and then the game goes, now come back for the next season's content. Bye. Oh my God.
01:14:58
Speaker
There was a trend late late aughts early teens where a lot of games were doing that where Dead Space 3 hit its ending behind DLC. Asura's Wrath had its ending behind DLC. Alan week one.
01:15:13
Speaker
Like the wrap-up of the story was in American Nightmare. Yeah. It wasn't strictly DLC. It was like, uh, Prince of Persia 2008. Yeah. Yeah. The ending in DLC. Getting away with a lot of bullshit around then. Uh, Alex Armstrong gives $5, says, side quests should be on the side and not something you need to progress. Am I right, Sonic Unleashed?
01:15:40
Speaker
Is that the werewolf one? Is that the dumpier one? Is Sonic a dumpier one? No, he's a lycanthrope. Well, he's not even there. I complained about this in my review of Sonic Unleashed. He wouldn't be a werehog.
01:15:52
Speaker
if he turns into a wolf. It's not a werewolf. Because a werewolf is Old English for man-wolf. Where is an Old English word meaning man? Because a wereman and withman. A hog-wolf. Wolf hog? Yeah, so a werehog would be a man-hog. A hog-wolf school of witchcraft and wizardry? Yes, he should have been going to a hog-wolf school of witches and wizardry.
01:16:16
Speaker
I really want to play that game. I want to see that because he's already kind of looks like a werewolf. And so the idea that he transforms it. Yeah. I like werewolf things about him.
Werewolf Etymology and Historical Language
01:16:25
Speaker
Uh, like more so than like an armadillo. Man, like to mean, uh, people with a Y chromosome, uh, didn't know it wasn't always a thing. It used to be just the man was just the word for both sexes, like people, generally mankind. And if you were referring to ladies, you'd say with man. And if you were referring to men, you'd say where man.
01:16:48
Speaker
And the men evolved into women. And then we just started the same men to mean dudes with cocks. Look what they've taken from us. I know language evolves people. Words are wild. Anyway, that's just my little lingo cunning linguists complaint.
01:17:10
Speaker
Early berm gives ten dollars and says pal world. First boss, you use pillars for cover. Second boss, their attacks literally go through the pillars and there is no cover. I just want someone to know I'm mad about it. Well, we all know now. A roll has eye frames. Get good. Do we think, does pal world have a roadmap? Yeah, they've launched one.
01:17:32
Speaker
I don't look at those. My theory is, not even a theory, at what point is, I promised to put this in the game, an actual concrete statement that you're using to sell your game versus just, hey, these are just words I'm saying.
01:17:48
Speaker
So I don't know about that recently with dead cells ceased is said that they are no longer updating the game. And some folks are mad because there was promised another year of updates. Yeah. But they're going on to their next game or whatever. I'm gonna put out starstruck vagabond be satisfied there aren't any major crash bugs and I'm gonna never think about it again. There you go.
01:18:10
Speaker
That's my plan. No roadmap. I think that's just the way it used to be. I know. That's just the way games were for the first several decades. That's the era of games I'm nostalgic for. Yeah. SQ2 2000 gives five euros and says, and it wasn't even different bosses to be defeated in the future. It was the same boss 13 times. So f-ing lazy. Yeah, we'll all be having fun talking about Suicide Squad when this week's fully rambled about it comes out.
01:18:38
Speaker
And that was a good that was a great segue on that very subject. Yes, I was saying weighing to plugging the upcoming weeks content because we've run out of super jets. So thank you for listening to the windbreakers podcast
Upcoming Reviews and Content
01:18:50
Speaker
everybody. I was sufficiently bored. I was sufficiently bored toffee enough that he's gone to play with the toy. Ah, yeah. Well, he's not that
01:19:06
Speaker
Thank you for listening. As I said, I've been Yahtzee Crusher. I was joined by Marty Sleever and Sebastian Ruiz. And Eric was doing the producing behind the scenes. Say thank you for Eric. Thanks, Eric. Always. Thank you for Eric. What else is coming up? Well, I've got my suicide program for Mattik on Wednesday and Yahtzee tries I will be playing the Tomb Raider remaster and that other thing with the dumb name.
01:19:33
Speaker
Balatro. Yeah. Yeah. Balatro. Balatro. Yeah. Sounds like a dance. Sure. If you like. Or a musical instrument. And then I've got a semi-ramble-o-matic coming out on Thursday. It will be on the subject of the Lost Art of the Tutorial Level. The Toots? Whoa! Where did that down here come from?
01:20:00
Speaker
Just tell him he's not a barker. He does bark, just not in this situation. He barks at other people's dogs and he barks when people come in the house that he doesn't know. That's good. Me too.
01:20:17
Speaker
Uh, and, um, what else have I got? Well, Adventures Night. Oh, no, I don't. We don't have Adventures Night on Saturday because we're skipping a week so we can get the final episode done. But make sure you've watched last weekend's episode. It was a banger.
01:20:32
Speaker
I think that's it for my stuff. Over to you guys. All right. Let's see here. It's cold takes. Go watch the old one. It was a lovely, lovely time. As far as streams are going to go, definitely going to have better with friends on Saturday. No newly released for a while because Amy's getting ready for adventure is nighing. It's going to need that extra weekend. Was there editor's hour today, Marty? Do you know? I don't know. Nick is bad.
01:21:01
Speaker
Nick is naughty. Nick is naughty. I don't, I don't, I don't know. I'm at therapy. So I don't know. I'm doing an editor's hour with my, with my life editor. There you go. Nick said no editing unpacked. Okay. You should stream you editing a video. Think about that.
01:21:20
Speaker
There you go. I was going to do that, but those two matter, unfortunately. And then on my own personal YouTube content channel, whatever, I'm just throwing up random thoughts that I need out of my head. Otherwise, they start to fester and smell. But now, Mondays, you'll get your first of the new cold takes that come out on Mondays. It's going to be about demos. Enjoy that in the future.
01:21:42
Speaker
It's a good one. What do you got, Marty? It's a good one. Yeah, in terms of streams like Yasu Miyaju, Yasu tries tomorrow. We'll have Firelink tomorrow evening. We'll be talking about there's Nintendo Direct, Partner Direct tomorrow morning. We'll see what sort of...
01:21:53
Speaker
subtle butt they got going on there. We're not gonna be doing a live stream of that because it's at like eight in the morning and that's serial time. And then Thursday, I'm assuming I shoot the shit, definitely cry. Maybe we'll come back Friday, maybe we'll do a cheeky little Final Fantasy stream or something, because the second demo's coming out. And that's a, yeah, I can't, well, I kind of ruined that. Eric and I are working on a real cool video that you guys can watch later this week and I can't tell you what it is, but I played a game for 80 hours and I have thoughts. So much time. Oh my, I've played so much video game.
01:22:22
Speaker
I gotta go back to Persona. I miss those kids. I just left them in Tartarus. It's fucking abandoned them. We've all played a lot of video games. That is true. I must have played. Man, how many games have I played in my life? Must be like over 2,000. Well, you've almost reviewed a thousand. It's like over in the 900s. Yes, you played as a kid. Yeah, I've played way more games than I've reviewed. Yeah. God dang.
01:22:49
Speaker
Man. It's almost like it's my job. It is. That's why you put the shit on people and guess the game. There you go. You put the shit on them. One last one last one last superjack came in in the last minute from Nilo Cortex and it's their first superjack. Blimey. Oh my god. They said no question. Just wanted to say thank you for all that you do. Hope you'll have a great rest of your day. Heart.
01:23:16
Speaker
Nilo, thank you very much. You're my new favorite Cortex after Dr. Cortex, the antagonist of the Crash Bandicoot games. Dr. Neo Cortex.
01:23:28
Speaker
And well, sadly, Nilo has been slightly overshadowed by a sort of a barry who's come in with another 500 arses to say just catch the stream. I think you mean just caught the stream. It's a robbery. Nevermind. Sorry for the late super chat, but I didn't want to skip showing my support saying I love the last episode of venture is now looking forward to the big finale. The whole team is amazing. Keep up the good work.
01:23:50
Speaker
Thank you so much, Ator. Also, you need to crack people's grammars. What are you doing? Are you speaking two languages? How many do you speak? How many do you speak? You can probably speak a few. I don't know. You feel like you got secret languages? I know high school German. There you go. That doesn't count. I have high school German and high school French. I have high school German and that certainly doesn't count. I have high school Spanish and with the Spanish, it's awful.
01:24:16
Speaker
Turns out high school, if they know how to teach you anything, that sticks. Is that how to smoke cigarettes behind the bleachers? I know what select Japanese phrases mean. Suimasen. And it's not a weed. I know what hentai is. Yeah. Most people do. Yeah. I know what bakamitai means. What is that? It just means I'm such a fool. Oh, I got worried. I was like, I shouldn't have asked that. We should have just left it at the edge. We could have been done right now.
01:24:45
Speaker
Oh, I know what, I know what Pizzuri is. Pizzuri? What's that? Yes. It's tit-fucking. Ah. Right. Well. Yes. That'll get me up. When that's on there. A little knowledge for the rest of you. Didn't think you'd come here and learn something, did you? Anyway, thanks for watching everyone. Bye.
01:25:23
Speaker
you