I have never really liked Monster Hunter games. I never understood the appeal of grinding the same monster fights that are more tedious than anything else, in order to farm gear that provides marginal upgrades in defenses and damage. The irony is that on paper this should be my thing, as a long time MMORPG player that gameplay loop is kind of the thing we do. Except MH games always felt bad to me about it. Even farming gear and going back to older/easier monsters didn't make me feel strong and that's really what I want out of a grinding game. I have to feel strong by the end of it.
The last Monster Hunter game I buckled down to put actual hours into was World, and while it was pretty and cool looking, it suffered the same problems that I just didn't enjoy.
To be honest I was flat out going to skip Wilds, but since Civ 7 and Avowed turned out to be wastes of time imo, I figured I'd give MH one....more....try....
And son of a ***** if I don't really like this game.
What in the fuck happened? How? The core gameplay is the same, farm monsters for parts to make gear that provides marginal upgrades. Except that I enjoy it this time.
Okay there are some very big changes that have pulled me into Wilds more than your typical MH game. Namely the story and the characters are quite fun, the character creator in particular let me create Tifa Lockhart so....I mean that's at LEAST a 6/10 right there. But on top of that Wilds introduces a couple of systems and changes that really reduce the potential boredom.
Number 1: The mount and auto run system. When you accept a quest most of the time you can hop on your mount and it'll auto run to where the monster is and you never have to think about it. But as a bonus you can look around and gather materials like bugs and honey and mushrooms while run on the mount. Which vastly reduces the thought behind having to prep for hunts, you'll gather materials on the fly and it's super easy to make a quick detour to kill beasts for a bunch of meat to keep your supply up.
Number 2: The fucking wound system is amazing. As you damage a monster you can see bleeding wounds on their body, and by focusing those wounds you'll break parts of the monster off and knock it down. But not only does it cause damage, knock down the monster for more damage, it also gives you pieces of the monster automatically. Which means by the time you beat the monster and carve it at the end of the hunt you'll have most of the parts needed to craft everything that monster can offer you. I've not yet had to fight a monster more than 2 or 3 times in order to fully craft a set of it's armor for me, my felyne and weapons if possible.
The other thing notable is that there aren't any filler quests in the game that I can tell. I remember Worlds had several side quests that basically asked you to gather random herbs, or bugs, and didn't tell you where that shit was so finding it was frustrating and annoying especially since these missions didn't even require combat. Wilds has yet to provide me any side quests beyond one side quest to catch a fish. The focus on the story has been very helpful in keeping the games pace rolling and the quick gathering of materials makes preperations so much easier to deal with.
So color me shocked when I started playing this game last night and before I realized it 5 hours had gone by.
The last Monster Hunter game I buckled down to put actual hours into was World, and while it was pretty and cool looking, it suffered the same problems that I just didn't enjoy.
To be honest I was flat out going to skip Wilds, but since Civ 7 and Avowed turned out to be wastes of time imo, I figured I'd give MH one....more....try....
And son of a ***** if I don't really like this game.
What in the fuck happened? How? The core gameplay is the same, farm monsters for parts to make gear that provides marginal upgrades. Except that I enjoy it this time.
Okay there are some very big changes that have pulled me into Wilds more than your typical MH game. Namely the story and the characters are quite fun, the character creator in particular let me create Tifa Lockhart so....I mean that's at LEAST a 6/10 right there. But on top of that Wilds introduces a couple of systems and changes that really reduce the potential boredom.
Number 1: The mount and auto run system. When you accept a quest most of the time you can hop on your mount and it'll auto run to where the monster is and you never have to think about it. But as a bonus you can look around and gather materials like bugs and honey and mushrooms while run on the mount. Which vastly reduces the thought behind having to prep for hunts, you'll gather materials on the fly and it's super easy to make a quick detour to kill beasts for a bunch of meat to keep your supply up.
Number 2: The fucking wound system is amazing. As you damage a monster you can see bleeding wounds on their body, and by focusing those wounds you'll break parts of the monster off and knock it down. But not only does it cause damage, knock down the monster for more damage, it also gives you pieces of the monster automatically. Which means by the time you beat the monster and carve it at the end of the hunt you'll have most of the parts needed to craft everything that monster can offer you. I've not yet had to fight a monster more than 2 or 3 times in order to fully craft a set of it's armor for me, my felyne and weapons if possible.
The other thing notable is that there aren't any filler quests in the game that I can tell. I remember Worlds had several side quests that basically asked you to gather random herbs, or bugs, and didn't tell you where that shit was so finding it was frustrating and annoying especially since these missions didn't even require combat. Wilds has yet to provide me any side quests beyond one side quest to catch a fish. The focus on the story has been very helpful in keeping the games pace rolling and the quick gathering of materials makes preperations so much easier to deal with.
So color me shocked when I started playing this game last night and before I realized it 5 hours had gone by.
