Side quests worth doing?

[AMD Ryzen 7 5200HX 2.9GHz]

I still don't understand which one is the side quest or they are connected to the main plot or they just go and defeat this type of quests. I do not like that cop woman gives me random uninteresting quests or...they ARE interesting at some point? Do I need to be in certain level to do these side quests? What annoyed me most is the map barely works, sometimes zooms out sometimes zooms in sometimes does not zoom at all. And the icons on map buggy too. They do not appear properly and even save slot menu comes out empty if ı click quickly.

I do want to do side quests however they seem in red colour higher danger so I must get in higher character level? or I must get a better armour regardless of the level?

And why on earth there is so few of them? do they respawn after a while meaning they replayable?

Which ones are connected to the main story?

Are they include main story characters in them at some point? You can give me spoilers, I pre ordered and pre loaded this in day one, did some starter quests and never played again,
hopefully they fix the broken messy texture missing bug and draw distance.

[Elettricità sovieta]

Most of side quests are just a filler, repetitive activities and nothing more (like those proposed by the cop woman). Others are more interesting, and are real side stories, sometimes related to the main quest. It's not so easy to distinguish the main story by the meaningful side missions, as the HUD is pretty a mess, and I believe that some of those you have exchanged as part of the main quest are probably side missions.

[NorthernDavid]

In the quest log the more filler ones are named gigs or ncpd scanner hustles. The more story related ones don't have those names. There are a couple of filler ones that don't share this property but for the most part the stuff not labelled a gig is more story or interesting. If it is labelled a gig it as mostly filler.

[WarForged]

On the map, the blue circles with what looks like a baseball bat inside are incidents that you can deal with. They usually have a small back story from a shard that you find in the main item, and also include nice items including some skill shards that give you free perk points or bonus XP in a skill.

The hexagons with a question mark are organized crime activities. These can be a bit harder as they usually have a lot more enemies on site. That, or there'll be a shard or computer that'll give information that'll lead you to a drop point where you can find more equipment. These sometimes have nice crafting items, if you're interested in crafting, as well as more bonus XP and items.

The silver circles with an exclamation mark inside (which turn into the quest symbol upon finding them) are side quests which can be anything from rescuing someone from a gang, to a subplot with Johnny and his band. They can also be main quests, but there aren't so many main quests on map at one time (three at most). The amount of side quests increases as you level, with more side quests becoming available based on your street cred and actual level.

Yes, they all have difficulty ratings, I would suggest going for Moderate and below. It's an RPG so it's nothing unusual there, Downtown is just the highest level area, while the outskirts tend to be lighter. If you follow the main story, it'll take you into the new areas as you can reach them. I tend to clean out an area, then move to the next part of the story, clean out that area, until I come to the end and am level 50 with 50 street cred.

[Michael Daemon]

Side quests are absolutely worth doing and are some of the best content in the game. All side activities however are not really that great though there is some interesting tidbits here and there.

[NorthernDavid]

Also the blue hex with the handshake is the local fixer in a zone. If you visit them in person most of the gig types will get new symbols if they have been revealed.

[WarForged]

I forgot one. The silver circles with a question mark inside are side quest 'incidents'. They're not as involved as a side quest, but are more like random encounters. The funniest one is in the starting zone, with a guy who has a malfunctioning Mr. Studd implant. The rush to get him to the ripperdoc is funny, as a group of schoolkids are crossing the road in front of you (no you can't run them down, psycho!), trucks pulling out, and a police roadblock. Funny. :-)

[AMD Ryzen 7 5200HX 2.9GHz]

Thank you all for long detailed replies, they should have drop down tooltip to have a short description on the map icons in my opinion, in that way it is easier to understand what that really is, the rewards and the plot etc, map HUD barely works in my game so dunno if its an issue in my end or everyone have this boring error. My mouse allows me to double click and left click on its middle button and map freaks out lol,

[NorthernDavid]

There is one. Hit M (by default) to bring up your main map. Then hit X (again default) to open the legend.