For the past few years, I have been playing Monster Hunter on and off. The concept of a team-based hunting game that isn’t forcing player against player is a welcomed one. Cooperative teamplay is what attracted me to other games like the Destiny series, and what has kept my Battlefield dreams/hopes alive all these decades. It’s just fun playing a game with friends and accomplishing a common goal.
The last time I jumped into the MH series was with Monster Hunter Rise, which I found tough to enjoy at first, but then settled in once I understood the goals, my options for upgrades and customization, and my passion for tracking down imaginary creatures and wiping them out. The ever-expanding world in Rise also helped sell the title. I like exploring in large chunks, like a child wandering through a mall in the 80s, so it was right up my alley.
The look and feel of Rise was a bit unbalanced, though, as I found the fighting to be a bit rigid and stiff, if not flat-out unforgiving. It was helped by the game’s graphical prowess helped to shield that sentiment from completely taking over. Getting into a scrum with a monster and being forced to maintain an X-axis of attack without being allowed to break from it at any moment annoyed me to the point where the gameplay, at times, was not enjoyable. It’s like if they mixed NBA 2K with a hunting game. I don’t want that rigid control execution.
But Monster Hunter Wilds looked to break away from that pattern, as it brought a more improved gameplay structure, far better visuals than Rise, and simplified the entire gameplay system so that it was easily accessible to all levels of MH gamers (newbies or veterans). This new game moves the series forward in a good way and sets the tone for future releases. Hopefully, it keeps this tone.
So, sit back, sharpen that blade, and let’s go hunting for a review.
A monster of a story with outstanding visuals
Monster Hunter Wilds’ narrative involves a boy named Nata, who narrowly escaped death when his village was attacked by an overpowering monster called the White Wraith. When Nata is found by Hunters, the Hunters are called upon to investigate the White Wraith threat and soon find themselves in a gradual death lock of massive monster situations on their way to uncover Nata’s monster mystery.
The story featured in Monster Hunter Wilds is interesting. In the past, I had a difficult time attaching my attention span to the MH narrative, as I was far too focused on hunting down monsters with friends. This time around, Capcom’s devs have put together a world that perpetuates danger to the player in believable and intense, and makes the connection between player and story nearly unbreakable. For example, early in the game, your lead character is thrown into a chase with monsters in the desert. The monsters snake their way out of the desert and back into the sands, as they chase a helpless gatherer in the field. The way that Capcom presents this moment, gives context to how dangerous this world is and how dangerous things are going to get. Throwing in a shaky cam for good measure to build an uncomfortable race to rescue a person in need only magnifies the danger and brings out the story far better than in past MH games. There are many primers like this to push the story in Monster Hunter Wilds and increase what the narrative is trying to tell. Those are the hooks that get you into the story and they worked well here.
To help sell the emotion and all these dangerous moments and a never-comfortable world, the visuals in this latest release were upped considerably. One of the issues I had with Rise was that it was seriously cartoony. Everything felt straight out of a Crunchy Roll catalog, which didn’t do much to create the world that it was trying to establish through story. While I’m fully aware that Rise was a cut above the previous and so forth, Monster Hunter Wilds feels like it takes the visuals and brings it closer to a more grounded look. For example, and this is doubly so on a PS5 Pro, the models of the characters look like worn humans who are struggling to keep things in tune with the world around them. Facial features and movements are more natural, while the outlandishly giant weapons to battle monsters are a firm reminder of what the series is about. Both sides of those variables keep the equation balanced and offer more, while not taking too much familiarity away. In other words, there’s some good balance to the visual upgrade, while not moving this game too far from the previous entries in the series, but certainly establishing a more serious and grounded visual tone.
Character models aside, the environments in this game are stunning. The details in the environments aren’t flat with personality, rather they’re packed with details and the areas you wander through help sell the world. I’m specifically impressed with how deep and vertically tall some of the worlds can be. For example, the second world you get into, which is a jungle area, has long stretching branches from tall Redwood-like trees. These trees are so big that your character and his feathered bird can use the branches as trails and quick solutions to follow monsters. It’s all so stunning and, again, it just helps sell the world, which in turn helps sell the story. Capcom’s folks did one helluva job on this aspect of the game and I’m still impressed when I load up a level.
Overall, the story and visuals are huge bright spots for Monster Hunter Wilds. When you step into the game for the first time, you’ll be hooked to the story, while being mesmerized with the world and visuals. That’s always a good start.
Gameplay
As you would expect, the gameplay follows the narrative closely. The game flows with Nata’s story and all the rest stops for your team as they traverse new lands, meet new people, and come in contact with threatening monsters that are sometimes tough to overcome. The story helps drive the gameplay well, as you will fire up a story plot point and then get pushed into battle almost seamlessly. For example, one of the more interesting, and frightening, storylines in the game was the attack of the Doshaguma. These bear-like creatures, which have mostly stayed away from a village of people in the game, decide to attack suddenly and your quest of monster hunting turns to your need to warn the villagers and convince them to leave their homes before it’s too late. The entire scenario went from 0-60 and made the gameplay seem more urgent than it might have previously seemed. It was a beautiful bridge between story and gameplay, and the game does a great job of continually doing that throughout the experience.
As for the actual gameplay, I have some pros and cons of it.
The Pros
The game is essentially the same type of sword-swinging, swashbuckling, and monster-hunting experience that you’ve had in the past. The controls have been tweaked and refined to feel more fluid, and the fights feel much better. They at least feel like you’ve got some good elbow room to swing and start combos to take down beasts. I haven’t played Rise in a while, but getting right into Monster Hunter Wilds wasn’t an issue.
Understanding the environments and how they work was also quite easy to pick up on. Going into a village to discuss shipments, purchase supplies, upgrade or forge weapons/armor was not rocket science. Everything felt a bit more accessible and grounded when it came to understanding and executing prep and hunting. The most important part of this is that none of it felt overwhelming. I’m not sure if it is my age with Rise, but going into places, such as a village, always felt overwhelming and somewhat confusing. God, I can’t believe I typed that. Anyway, it did. It’s one of the bigger turn-offs with the previous games in the series. They always felt a tad disorganized. Monster Hunter Wilds is not that and it feels like Capcom finally found a groove that makes sense, if not just on an information architectural level.
On the fighting side of the tracks, it felt good for the most part. The big positives are that I never felt like I was outgunned/sword-ed during fights. The elbow room that I talked about above lent plenty of space to strategize better and to run away quickly (or on my feathered friend) to regroup. The game’s girth helped the game’s gameplay tremendously.
On the action side of the tracks, sword-swinging felt good (I’m a sword guy). It felt like I would expect, especially when the player is equipped with a giant-ass sword and has to slowly swing with power to hit the mark. In addition, the game’s multi-hit combos on monsters felt far easier to pull off than I remember in previous entries of the series. They felt effective, dangerous, and most of all fun.
Speaking of danger, Capcom has done an amazing job of working on the monsters in the game and providing some creative variety to their fighting, form, and structure. The monsters I ran into during my time with Monster Hunter Wilds felt like they belonged in certain regions, while at the same time felt unique in their looks and fighting styles. Lots of details and gorgeous animation helped to sell them and make them somewhat terrifying, if not just a downright horror show (but in a good way). The effort that Capcom gave to make the monsters so much more detailed and animated than in previous games was on full display with Monster Hunter Wilds. It was damn good. It helped to sell the action much easier.
To wrap up the action, I like that you can play solo in this game or you can play with friends. While that sounds general and uninspiring when talking about gameplay, it’s nice to have that option. It’s even nice to have help when you’re going solo, especially when you can shoot a flare in the sky and call an NPC to come wreck a monster. While you’re certainly going to get dinged for this option, when you’re trying to barrel through a game like this, and not have to juggle times with other writers/friends to help out, having the ability to just cast a flare and get help is a huge plus in my eyes.
Now, having said that, let’s talk cons.
The Cons
Let’s be honest here – no one wants to hear the cons, but you will certainly feel them when you play this game. Starting with controls, while I appreciated how they felt overall, I’m still not happy with being stuck in animation sequences when fighting. Much like I despise this in NBA 2K, when an animation loop kicks in and there is no way out of it, I wish I had more control over my characters so they aren’t flailing about because I hit the triangle button. Having the ability to break out of that sequence and get reset would work wonders for this title. For example, during my third or fourth boss fight in a swampy area, I would begin an attack, watch the big monster I was fighting begin to move a certain way, and then I would have to wait for the animation loop to wrap up to jump the hell out of the way. This has been a common problem in the series for a while. It needs to get better.
I never understood why developers of action games haven’t contacted Sony’s Santa Monica Studio to discuss how they did it with their God of War series. That series is more intense and I feel far more in control during fights than any other series I have played. I want MH to eventually get to that point where the action doesn’t feel so robotic and sluggish because movement is so regimented. Beyond this, I have nothing else to gripe about in the game.
Overall, the gameplay was far more together, understandable, and executable than it has been in the past. The action was led by story, upping the ante with tremendously lovely, yet terrifying monsters, and together everything felt far more cohesive than I remember with the series’ previous games. And this is what you should expect from the MH series, and Capcom nearly delivered it perfectly. If they can loosen those animations up a bit and give character control over to the player more, then I think they’ll have a perfect MH experience. In the meantime, the gameplay is connected well with the story, brings great action to the forefront, and has good accessibility to play with friends, or not. Ultimately, you’re going to be playing this chapter of the series for a long time. It has a lot of legs and plenty of interesting moments to keep you hooked.
On that sweet note, let’s wrap this review up.
Conclusion
Monster Hunter Wilds from the developers at Capcom brings the series to a new level with its action, story, looks, and length. While it still has some tweaks to make in controls, the game is certainly worthy of your time.
