Fallout 4 is full of interesting quests, yet a lot of its most interesting content is part of factional quests and companion stories. The bulk of the side quests are instead filled with fetch quests and simple “kill the raiders” affairs, and that’s before we get into the radiant quests. That said, there are some great side quests in Fallout 4 hidden among the rest.
Top 10 Fallout 4 Side Quests You Shouldn’t Miss
Dunwhich Borers
The Dunwich Borers is a quarry found in the northeast of the Fallout 4 world map. Although plenty of side quests lead the player to this location, it’s the mine itself that is interesting. Players come in from above, led there by a simple mission to deal with some raiders or recover a piece of tech. Then comes the long descent into the mine, intermitted with pre-war flashbacks of troubling content.
I won’t dwell much on the content of those flashbacks and on what lies at the bottom of the quarry. For one, it would make the entire process of exploring the cave much less fun. But even ignoring spoilers, the game itself avoids answering the question directly. This uncertainty, oscillating between an unfortunate event and a much more malign reality-shattering revelation, is what makes this quest memorable.
Emergent Behavior
Emergent Behavior is a quest tied to the companion character Curie. However, Emergent Behavior changes its protagonist far more than the other missions of this kind. Part of it is intrinsic in the character of Curie, a pre-war robot that was given much more knowledge and personality than normal. Curie is, no matter how you look at it, a person. Now she wants to look like one, too.
Curie’s life was also far from average, becoming alive directly in a small lab of just three scientists inside a vault. After the researcher’s death, Curie had to wait centuries alone in a bunker before the Sole Survivor freed her. It’s those extraordinary circumstances that make giving Curie a humanoid body so unique and interesting.
The Secret of Cabot House
The Secret of Cabot House is one of the more confusing and weird quests in the entire game. Of course, those are the same reasons that make it extremely entertaining. Two out of three missions in the quest line are about killing a lot of raiders and reporting back to the Cabot mansion, but the third is when it gets interesting.
In the course of the games, the members of the family slowly reveal bits of their history. This is quite normal as far as Fallout stories go, but some things don’t add up. The patriarch of the family, a certain Lorenzo whom the family avoids mentioning with care, seems to have been born in the pre-apocalypse. Nothing too strange, except for the fact that Lorenzo is not a ghoul.
The twist is that Lorenzo and his entire family have been alive since the 19 century. The family patriarch, an archaeologist, found a mysterious fluid that grants immortality in 1894. He found much more than that, too, calling into question whether magic outright exists in the world of Fallout, but you can ask him yourself when you take the quest.
The Devil’s Due
The Devil’s Due is an extremely simple but effective quest. It’s also one of the very few horror sections in all of Fallout 4. The player is sent to look into some weird disappearance in the old Museum of Witchcraft with no other information. Inside is a body and a holotape: a certain Private Hart and his men were running from some kind of monster. The survivors might have taken refuge inside.
Of course, what you’ll find inside the building is not the survivors, but the monster. I’ll avoid getting into details about this unspecified monster, though it’s not hard to guess. What’s important is the tension before the reveal. Body parts drop from the room above the entrance. Heavy footsteps come in from the next door, followed by the sound of something being dragged across the floor above. Fallout 4 has no business being this scary, yet it works immensely.
Last Voyage of the U.S.S. Constitution
The Last Voyage of the U.S.S. Constitution is one of the silliest quests in Fallout 4, but that doesn’t make it less impactful. Reminiscent of the Fallout: New Vegas’s quest Come Fly With Me, this version switches its disillusioned ghouls for a crew of jingoistic robot mariners.
This quest starts after meeting with Captain Ironsides, the robot in charge of the U.S.S. Constitution and (according to him) the highest-ranking member of the defunct U.S. Army. His flying ship has to be repaired and protected from scavengers until it can fly again. Of course, the ship gets stuck into another building as soon as it takes flight.
Human Error
Human Error is one of the few side quests in Fallout 4 built on genuine moral ambiguity. The quest begins when the Sole Survivor approaches the settlement of Covenant, a walled city that seems to be doing far better than the rest of the wasteland. Everyone inside is refreshingly welcoming, too, except for the anti-synth psychological test every visitor has to take.
Soon, the player is recruited by Honest Dan, who’s investigating the town’s involvement in the disappearance of Amanda Stockon, a merchant. It doesn’t take a genius to realize the connection between Covenant’s synth obsession and Amanda’s kidnapping. What makes matters difficult is the town’s reasoning. Amanda might be a synth, even if she doesn’t realize it, and torturing her seems to be the only way to improve the town’s anti-synth test.
The Silver Shroud
The Silver Shroud is pure camp. Take the mantles of the Silver Shroud, the world-famous pulp radio drama hero, and fight crime pre-war style. Fight a mob boss and his underlings who are, of course, ancient ghouls talking with a 1930s noir movie affectation. The quest starts when Ken offers the Sole Survivor to bring back the Silver Shroud and point the hero towards “bad guys” to fight.
As it turns out, Ken isn’t just targeting random bad guys. He’s also a pre-war ghoul, which explains why every other target is as old as him. Ken ends up biting more than he can chew when he tries to take on a gang of raiders. You’ll get the option of saving him, but most importantly, you’ll get to do it in character, as the Silver Shroud.
Brain Dead
Brain Dead is a fairly well-known quest from the Fallout 4 DLC Far Harbor. Part of what made it so famous was the controversy that followed its release, when the author of the Fallout: New Vegas mod Autumn Leaves alleged that Brain Dead reused many details, as well as the entire premise, of their side quest-sized mod.
Brain Dead is a murder mystery great side story, not one bit lesser than it was in Autumn Leaves. Vault 118 was a peaceful place, at least until recently. One of its robotized inhabitants, who have lived there since before the war, has been killed. It’s up to you, impromptu investigator, to figure out just how deep this rabbit hole goes.
The Great Hunt
The Great Hunt is another great side quest from the great DLC Far Harbor. The quest begins when the harbormaster of Far Harbor asks the player to hunt the legendary monster Red Death. Many of the town’s inhabitants have described this beast, even if some doubt its existence.
As it turns out, the beast is actually a small mirelurk, an overgrown swamp bug common in the post-apocalypse. Its glowing red eyes are probably what inspired the legends about the Red Death. What is interesting about this quest is the final choice: to tell the town the truth about their legendary monster or to keep the legend alive.
Confidence Man
Confidence Man is an interesting quest with some weird implications. The main objective is simple: make Diamond City’s DJ, Travis, a bit more confident. Stop him from stumbling through his words when he’s announcing the next song. To do this, local bartender Vadim wants to stage a fistfight with some raiders. Of course, the raiders end up kidnapping him and the fight becomes real.
I’m not sure how much a series of traumatic accidents is going to do for someone’s self-esteem, but perhaps those things work differently in the post-apocalypse. Besides, hearing Travis do a much better job on the radio is satisfying enough to wash away those preoccupations.
Those were 10 Fallout 4 side quests you can’t miss. If you’re looking for more game content, make sure to check our Fallout 4 content hub.
