The Witcher franchise has always done an excellent job of interweaving dozens of powerful stories into their games' main storylines. All three of the biggest titles in the franchise have tons of side quests for players to seek out, and many of these tell complex narratives, some small and some massive in scale and implication.
The Witcher 3: The Best Optional Quests In Every Major Location
The Witcher 3 has so many amazing quests to tackle, but a few of its optional quests rise above the pack and prove why the game is so widely loved.
What helps set so many individual stories apart, is the way that the series lives and dies by their morally complex choices. Players are consistently forced to investigate and experience truly horrible characters and events, then make decisions that might not make them better.
10 Where The Cat And Wolf Play...
Makes Players Question Their Morality
The Witcher 3: Wild Hunt
- Platform(s)
- PS4 , PS5 , Xbox One , Xbox Series X , Xbox Series S , Switch , PC
- Released
- May 19, 2015
- Developer(s)
- CD Projekt Red
The Witcher games live in the gray area between right and wrong, and this quest from the third game does a great job of trying to explain just how that is possible. The dark aspects come immediately, as Geralt stumbles upon a village where every single person has been killed and mutilated except for one little girl.
He soon learns that a fellow Witcher is responsible for killing the whole village, but they made an attempt on his life first. The slaughter was inarguably horrific, but the reasoning may be uncomfortably sound, making this a quest that leaves the player feeling weird long after they finish it.
9 Possession
Players Must Feed A Demon That Literally Feasts On Guilt
- Appears in The Witcher 3: Wild Hunt
Even if it is just a ruse, it doesn't get much darker than putting a baby in an oven. This side quest from the third game has Geralt trying to help rid a Jarl's daughter whom he believed was being haunted by a ghost.
Geralt is able to uncover that she is not haunted but instead has fallen victim to an evil creature called a Hym. The demon forces self-harm and feasts upon despair, and the only solution outside of killing it is to lure it to someone even more guilt-ridden than its host. So, naturally, Geralt tosses a baby into an oven, successfully luring the creature out and towards him.
8 The Rotfiend Contract
Desecrating Corpses Is The Only Way To Stop These Creatures
This optional Witcher contract from the second game in the series is arguably the only one on the list with a happy ending, but the way Geralt completes it is still plenty dark. Geralt is asked to help fend off creatures called rotfiends that have been attacking an encampment of soldiers.
Geralt figures out the creatures are actually necrophages, creatures that eat corpses. These monsters haven't been out to kill the soldiers but were trying to suck the marrow out of their bones once they were already dead. After killing many of them, Geralt realizes the only way to send them away for good is to remove their food supply, and he burns the bodies of every dead soldier around the camp.
7 Blue Eyes
Helping Anyone In This Quest Likely Means They All Die
This optional quest from the first Witcher game has all the tone and moral ambiguity that the series would become partially known for. Geralt is asked to help a man find his sister, who disappeared after bitemarks appeared on her neck. Geralt finds her working in a brothel, where she claims to be happy.
8 Worst Jobs To Have In The Witcher Universe
In a world filled with monsters, disease and lawless streets, there are some downright awful jobs to have in The Witcher universe.
The player's choices then come into play hugely, as every choice they make leads to death and despair. If they kill the vampires at the brothel, they learn that they are basically innocent, but if they side with them, they end up killing the brother and his friends in a bloody slaughter.
6 In The Claws Of Madness
Players Explore A Haunted Asylum Full OF Trauma
- Appears in The Witcher 2: Assassin of Kings
This side quest from the second game of the beloved trilogy starts when Geralt is asked to check on a group of men who went into an abandoned hospital and didn't return. Geralt finds the men one by one, each having gone more insane than the last.
The cause of their insanity is the plethora of spirits and wraiths roaming the creepy hospital. Geralt, incidentally, uncovers the reasons for the spirits, and it is a batch of unbelievably dark backstories, the most saddening being that the doctors of the hospital were doing horrific experiments on the mentally disabled.
5 Wild At Heart
A Beastly Curse Viciously Destroys A Family
- Appears in The Witcher 3: Wild Hunt
This optional quest starts when a distressed man asks Geralt to help him find his missing wife. Geralt heads into the woods to look for her, only for her sister to arrive and ask him to give up his search and tell the husband his wife is dead.
If the player pushes on in their search, they learn the horrible truth that the husband is a werewolf and killed his own wife while in beast form. It doesn't stop there, as Geralt then learns that the sister led the wife into the woods that night, leading to her death. This enrages the husband, who then kills her. Then, just to wrap everything up with a bow of despair, Geralt must kill the werewolf that hired him to begin with.
4 Till Death Do You Part
These Characters Will Be Alone For Eternity
- Appears in The Witcher 3: Blood and Wine
This optional quest from the Blood and Wine DLC has Geralt tasked with finding out what is causing a ruckus at night in a cemetery. Believing it will be gravediggers or a creature that needs slaying, he goes to the graveyard at night only to find the noise is coming from a couple of arguing ghosts.
The Strongest Weapons in The Witcher 3: Wild Hunt
Many players are returning to The Witcher 3 once again, and here is a rundown of some of the best weapons that players can find in the game.
The ghosts are a married couple that can't stand each other, so Geralt does the simple thing of separating their remains. The story is already a downer, but it is made heartbreaking when the ghosts almost immediately regret their decision, realizing they will spend eternity apart and alone, and they will never have a chance to work out their relationship.
3 Scenes From A Marriage
The Ghosts Of This Manor Have Dark Histories
- Appears in The Witcher 3: Hearts of Stone
Technically a main quest, but for the DLC Hearts of Stone and not pivotal to the main Witcher 3: Wild Hunt story, this somber adventure has Geralt tasked with bringing Olgierd von Everec the rose he gave his wife shortly before her death.
Geralt must travel to the now abandoned and haunted manor and enter a surreal and creepy spirit realm to seek out the ghost. Before finding her, he meets a series of spirits with increasingly dark stories of trauma. Even though the bulk of this tale comes out through conversation, there are still a few genuinely unsettling creatures in this world waiting to kill Geralt as well.
2 A Towerful Of Mice
A Young Girl Meets A Terrible Fate
- Appears in The Witcher 3: Wild Hunt
A secondary quest that can have lasting ramifications for other quests (and one romance option) in the game, A Towerful of Mice sends Geralt to an isolated island full of strange creatures and specters. It seems like typical monster-hunting fare until the story of one of the island's ghosts comes out in full.
Annabelle, the lord of the island's daughter, drank a potion she believed was poison, only to learn too late it was a paralysis potion. Unable to move, she was devoured alive by plague rats swarming her castle. This quest is made even darker by the fact that players aren't actually helping by freeing Annabelle, as their actions unleash her to spread more plague wherever she chooses.
1 Return to Crookback Bog
The Player's Choices Lead To A Sorrowful Ending
- Appears in The Witcher 3: Wild Hunt
The fact that this quest is even considered a secondary quest in Wild Hunt is shocking, as it shows the final conclusion of the Bloody Baron series of main story quests. This entire arc is tragic, with abuse, miscarriages, and death all showing up.
Even with so much tragedy in the past, the final conclusion of this story is equally dark, with almost all the choices the player made during the earlier quests leading to more death and despair. Even if a player makes every choice perfectly, they will be hit with what is arguably the most tragic ending of all.
The Witcher 3: 5 Things To Do If You're Bored
Geralt spends most of his time killing monsters, but that's not the only activity to pass the time in The Witcher 3.
