Oftentimes, the main course of any given title will be the best possible offering, giving you an emotional story with beloved characters and intense gameplay. However, there will be many instances where you get completely sidetracked by a mini-game, pulling you away from the main attraction for hundreds of hours, such as what happened with The Witcher 3’s Gwent.
Unfortunately, unlike Gwent, most of these other mini-games live only within their respective titles, meaning it’s impossible to get a fully fleshed-out, dedicated experience of them in a standalone or spin-off release. And, the shame of it all, is that these mini-games would thrive as their own title, as they are just THAT good!
Pazaak
Star Wars: Knights Of The Old Republic
Setting the stage, we have the fan-favorite Pazaak mini-game from Star Wars: Knights of the Old Republic. In this mini-game, you must attempt to get as close as possible to 20 without going over that score. While it sounds simple enough, your decks will drastically impact your odds of winning.
Infuriating Minigames That Have All Made Us Rage Quit At Least Once
They might be minigames, but they give me a massive amount of rage.
In Pazaak, you have access to two decks, the Main and Side Decks. The Main Deck only consists of Cards with values ranging from one to ten, while the Side Deck has a slew of special properties that can either help you out tremendously or spell your defeat. Each match is tense and will have you on the edge of your seat, and we NEED it to return!
Blitzball
Final Fantasy 10
Of course, you can’t speak about mini-games that need to have their own standalone release without bringing up Final Fantasy 10’s Blitzball. We understand why some players may not be as big on this mode as others, but once it clicks, that’s all you’ll be playing until you have no other option left but to continue the main story.
Blitzball is exhilarating and ultra-competitive, and we cannot believe it doesn’t have an entire spin-off dedicated to it. Performing special actions to send the ball hurling past defenders and straight into the opposition’s goal always feels incredible, and the underwater aspect of the game adds a whole layer of atmosphere that ties everything together. Blitzball is awesome, and we just want it back, Square!
Chao Garden
Sonic Adventure 2: Battle
Following that, we have the Chao Garden mode in Sonic Adventure 2: Battle, allowing you to hatch, raise, train, and put your Chaos through a variety of mini-games. This entire mode is a delight, and seeing what each Chao can transform into, depending on how well you treat it, is remarkable. There are also exclusive areas for your Chaos, which become available if they’re perceived as good or downright evil.
How is it that there hasn’t been a standalone Chao Garden title yet? Everyone loves these adorable things and wants to raise theirs to be the best of the best. Imagine a modern Chao Garden with online multiplayer and PvP. Doesn’t that sound incredible? Please, Sega, give everyone what they want!
Hacking
BioShock
BioShock
One of the more simplistic entries on this list is one of the most enjoyable, and that’s the unique Hacking mini-game found in the first BioShock, having you quickly rotate and place pieces of pipe to direct the flowing liquid to the exit. Again, it’s very straightforward, but it will leave you wanting more and more.
Since the liquid cannot be stopped, you must find ways to either direct it away from a hazard or a dead-end, as you attempt to find the proper parts needed to have it reach the exit. It’s this brief moment of panic and strategizing as you shuffle through pieces that makes this mini-game so much fun. We would play an entire game that’s nothing but this mini-game that gets progressively harder and more complex in a heartbeat!
Zombies
Call Of Duty (Series)
Okay, this one may be cheating a bit, as it’s technically a separate game mode rather than a mini-game, but we desperately want a standalone Zombies game from Treyarch. And, at this point, we don’t think that’s ever going to happen. They make magic happen with a mode buried away in the base game, year in and year out. Can you imagine what kind of brilliance they would make if they had years to make a Zombies-only game?
We get that Call of Duty isn’t in the best of spots at the moment with its community, but there’s no denying that a standalone Zombies game would go hard, especially if it came with every map the mode ever had. We’d do anything for this to happen, as would millions of others, which is odd that Activision/Microsoft never jumped on the free piles of cash. Hopefully someday!
Cabaret Club Czar
Yakuza 0
Next up is the one and only Cabaret Club Czar in Yakuza 0, which can also be found in other titles of the series to some extent. Still, we absolutely adore how it’s implemented in Yakuza 0 and would love it if this mode were extracted from the game, polished, and expanded upon for a standalone release. It has no business being as good as it is.
Managing a Cabaret Club as Goro Majima isn’t something we knew we needed in our lives until we had it, and now we don’t want anything else except for a game that is nothing but this. Do you hear us, Sega?! This could easily be a gacha game where you unlock different outfits and makeover options for the hostesses, and no one would bat an eye. Like the Chao Garden from Sonic Adventure 2: Battle, Sega is leaving so much money on the table here!
Queen’s Blood
Final Fantasy 7 Rebirth
Move aside, Triple Triad, there’s a new fan-favorite Final Fantasy card game in town, and it belongs to Final Fantasy 7 Rebirth’s Queen’s Blood mini-game. While we did enjoy our fair share of Triple Triad back in the day, and within Final Fantasy 14, even we can’t ignore the fact that Queen’s Blood is head and shoulders better in every way, shape, and form.
Queen’s Blood matches can get extremely intense, having you scour every inch of the massive zones Rebirth has to offer in search of worthy challengers, having you stop only after you secure every card and have stomped everyone daring to step in your way. We haven’t been this gripped by a mini-game since Gwent, and we just desperately want more. How far away is Part Three?!
Tin Pin Slammer
The World Ends With You
Lastly, we have a bit of a curveball, as we cannot believe how underdiscussed Tin Pin Slammer is regarding this topic. We get it, The World Ends With You is a bit of a niche series, but we will not idly stand by while everyone forgets the beauty of this mini-game, which is essentially a large-scale Beyblades battle with up to four players, where each controls six Pins.
Your goal is to knock the opposition’s Pins off the arena with your own. If your Pin gets knocked off, it will be swapped out with the next available Pin in your deck, which has different properties and stats. Collecting and battling these Pins is unmatched, and the satisfaction you get when your Pins emerge victorious after laying out the opponent’s is pure euphoria. You can also play this mode locally with friends, which is where the most heated and exhilarating encounters happen. This mode should have been a spin-off release ages ago!
These Minigames Had No Reason To Be Better Than The Main Game
These games are great, but their minigames might just be better.
