Shin Megami Tensei: Nocturne actually has a clear puzzle mini-game, and it's clear that it's a mini-game, since the game switches to an overhead view at that point.

An interesting case is Mystery Dungeon: Shiren the Wanderer. The game can be described as a traditional roguelike; random generation, turn-based (enemies only move when you do), permadeath (there is a meta-progress mechanic, but it's limited to keeping equipment you manage to take back to town, and doing so isn't exactly straightforward in the original version), and of course, different game elements interacting in different ways (enemy turns an item into a riceball? Throw it back and the enemy with choke, unless you need the food). So, typical roguelike.

However, there is an area known as Fey's Puzzles. There are 50 of them, and each one gives you a single hand-crafted level that's designed like a puzzle. You need to figure out how to use the game mechanics (including what I mentioned about interactions) in order to get through them. It even has mechanics that don't normally get used much in the main game, like having to damage boost with traps and even deliberately equip cursed items, not to mention throwing money. I really did enjoy this mini-game, and I think it's a thing that should appear in more roguelikes (though the perma-death mechanic feels a bit out of place; an undo feature on this mode would make perfect sense).

Tetra Master

I enjoyed it so much i downloaded Card City Nights on android hoping to get that feel. I realize now i should've just reimplemented the game, myself.

Not really:
* In older versions of the game, you don't get much; I believe it's only 100 in the original version (or something like that), for example.
* In later versions, starting with the GBA version, the game is too easy for you to need to do this.

I disagree; if the gameplay is getting monotonous, the player can just pick up a different game and play that. When I play a particular game, it's because I want that game's core gameplay, not some other gameplay.

I disagree: i believe this is the whole point of minigames: to break genre to give you a break from the main gameplay loop of the main game. Somehow, i think of Tetramaster before this, though. Might have something to do with how ridiculously hard it was at times to find a buried chest. The minigame certainly has not aged well. Especially on mobile.

Maybe, but that's not the goal. Teh goal is to have you play their game, not some other game. It's actually more obvious now where you have steam, galaxy, and consoles all announcing to people what game you're playing. They want you playing that game to death with achievement hunting, minigames, etc, all to further advertise that game. But even back then, before all that, i think the goal was always to have you play that one of their instead.

Seriously, Tidus one of the weaker players? I played Blitzball long time ago, but I remember Tidus was one of the best players, think there was some secret move for him or something. But the real best one was some Al'bhed guy IIRC, which could never be bought in my game.

Anyway, on topic. Blitzball was cool, but Triple Triad for the win!

I wouldn't say I enjoyed it, but I thought the lockpicking "minigame" in Thief 3 was ok and made sense, it added an element of pressure if you had to quickly open a door while an enemy was temporarily away, at least this didn't detract from gameplay, maybe even enhanced it.
By contrast I found the lockpicking in Fallout: New Vegas really tedious, imo rpgs with stats for lockpicking shouldn't feature such minigames.
Can't comment on the card games in KOTOR and The Witcher, I avoided them as much as possible, seemed like a waste of time.

One minigame I did spent a lot of time on is that arcade space fight game ("Lost Viking" or whatever it's called) in Starcraft 2: Wings of Liberty. tbh I almost thought it was better than the lacklustre campaigns.

*Lights a cigar* Don't have time to play with myself!

I didn't mind the lockpicking games in Thief's (especially the first two games). There was enough there that had you "engaging" with the process of picking a lock (switching square vs triangle lockpicks around) and yet it was kept fast & simple so it never became annoying. I also didn't mind the Rock-Paper-Scissors in Divinity Original Sin 1.

As for the annoying ones, yeah there are a lot. I think they are at their best when there's a way to bypass them, eg, although I actually quite liked the "pipe puzzle" in Bioshock, it does get used a lot throughout the game but being able to "buy it out" goes a long way to ease the frustration late-game. Same goes for lock-picking in Oblivion / Skyrim (and that persuasion wheel in Oblivion), there are mods that can change that to become a LOT less annoying.

Pazaak was just Blackjack with extra steps.

I don't play card games in real life either, has never interested me.

Not saying these are a wrong answer at all, but I don't remember them being forced on the player much. I think there were a few mandatory dice games in The Witcher but the vast majority of it was optional. It's the "you're exploring a dungeon and have to stop and play Frogger every couple minutes" thing that drives me nuts.

The reason I play a specific game is that I *want* that specific game's gameplay loop; I don't want it to change to a different gameplay loop. If I want to take a break from the gameplay loop of a game, I can just play something else; I don't want to be forced to take that break before I can get to the part that I actually want to play.

And you are going to set universal rules based solely on your own desires and wishes?

Personally, it's a compromise between taking yourself out of the main quest while still being immersed in the world. I'm tired of the core gameplay, but I still want to be in that fantastic world. Case in point - FF13 would be a better game if they had added more other things to do to break up the monotony like 6-10. Obligatory 10's minigames for ultimate weapons were designed to be frustrating, though blitzball wasn't that bad.

Another possible reason why minigames were necessary was because digital distribution and huge libraries of other cheaper and funner games didn't exist back then. It wasn't really an option for kids or teens back then to do what you're saying when games were $30-60 USD if they got bored of that core gameplay.

I loved playing Arcomage in Might & Magic 7.

Winning all the Arcomage tournaments in the game was a really fun added little bonus thing you could do.