During Chapters 3, 8, 9, and 14 of the Final Fantasy VII remake, when you’re given a bit of a free hand to explore Midgar, you can pick up a few extra freelance jobs. There are a total of 26 side quests in FF7R, many of which are worth valuable upgrades, including Manuscripts when you play on Hard Mode.

While not all side quests are created equal, the following is a list of each one by chapter, including how to unlock them if necessary, who to talk to to start them, and what you get for your trouble.

Final Fantasy VII Remake Side Quest Rewards Master Guide, Part 3

When you complete all 26 side quests in FF7, you receive the Best in the Business Trophy. This cannot be completed on an initial run through the game, owing to a certain story branch that’s explained below. You’ll have to wait until after the story campaign, when you’ve unlocked the Chapter Select feature, to finish up the Trophy.

All side quests are also exclusive to the chapter in which they’re found. If you miss one, the only way back is to start the game over or hit the quest up later via, again, Chapter Select.

Please note that when rewards are listed in the following table, it also includes items that you happen to receive from mandatory fights over the course of the quest. There are a lot of side quests on Hard Mode that offer new rewards, typically Manuscripts, that drop from monsters that you can only find via those quests.

Many side quests also reward you with a free one-time restoration of all your HP and MP. This isn’t a big deal on your first run through the game, but on Hard Mode, these are actually a big deal. It’s worth not turning in a side quest with a restoration reward until you could actually use the boost.

Chapter 9: The Town That Never Sleeps

Once you’ve completed your business at the Colosseum in Chapter 9, you can head back to Madam M. She’ll suggest that you look around town for ways to help out, which is a subtle hint that it’s once again side quest time. You’ll need to do all three currently available quests before you can grab your next main story mission. This time, however, there’s a significant complication.

You can always get the “Burning Thighs” squats challenge in this chapter. However, there are two sets of two other side quests in Chapter 9 that are mutually exclusive with each other. You cannot pick up all four quests in one run through the game, which means you can only finish 24 side quests in total on your first play through FF7.

Which set of quests you receive during Chapter 9–Chocobo Sam’s ”The Party Never Stops” and “A Dynamite Body” vs. Madam M’s “The Price of Thievery” and “Shear’s Counterattack”–is determined by several choices you make early in the chapter. Both quest lines will send you to the Colosseum for a fight eventually, and winning there will reward you with Aerith’s Arcane Scepter in both cases. In the short term, there’s no disadvantage to getting one over the other.

However, it does mean that if you want to get the Best in the Business Trophy, you have to replay Chapter 9 at least once via the post-game Chapter Select feature and get the other set of quests. You also have to make sure to get Sam’s quests in order to complete the hidden The Johnny Experience Trophy, as one of the necessary events with Johnny is exclusive to “The Party Never Stops.” If you’re on Hard Mode, you also earn two different Manuscripts for Cloud from the two different Colosseum fights in each quest line.

At time of writing, no one outside Square Enix seems to be absolutely sure which choices specifically lead to which set of quests you’ll get in Chapter 9. The current best guesses in the community include:

To get Madam M’s quests:

• Skip Sam’s coin toss

• Buy the 1,000 or 3,000 gil massages at Madam M’s

• When you run into Johnny, either dodge him completely or tell him “No”

• When Aerith asks about her dress, pick “Does it matter what I think?”

• When you’re talking to Sam about Tifa, tell him “She’s great at handling the books”

To get a job from Chocobo Sam:

• Pick either heads or tails in Sam’s coin toss

• Buy the Poor Man’s Massage at Madam M’s for 100 gil

• Talk to Johnny and tell him “Yeah”

• When Aerith asks about her dress, pick “Looks comfortable”

• When you’re talking to Sam about Tifa, tell him “She’s in great shape.”

The two primary drivers of the quest branch appear to be the first two decisions on these lists – your choice in massages, and whether or not you try and call Sam’s coin toss – but many others have at least some impact on your final result. Consider this an evolving topic. 

You only have to beat Ronnie to complete “Burning Thighs,” but it’s worth sticking around to beat Andrea, too. The Champion’s Belt is one of the best overall accessories in the game.

The dress that Cloud gets to wear later on is determined by which quests you did during Chapter 9. If you skipped side quests entirely or only did ”Burning Thighs,” you get the black dress; if you did both of Sam’s side quests, you’ll receive the blue gown; and if you helped out Madam M, you receive a frilly purple gown and a tiara.

You’ll need to make at least two more runs through Chapter 9 in order to get all of Cloud’s dresses and secure the Dressed to the Nines Trophy.

You can find information on many other challenges in FF7 at our game hub, which also contains guides on how to:

• Where to find all of the various kinds of Materia
• Do a little reading and find all the SP-granting Manuscripts
• All of the bonuses you unlock by completing the game for the first time

Click here to read the next part of our master list to all 26 side quests in Final Fantasy VII, and be sure to follow @PrimaGames on Twitter to keep up with our other articles.