We are less than a month away from the release of Monster Hunter Wilds and fans cannot stop hyping it up. Since the release of Worlds 7 years ago, Monster Hunter has been on a steady climb. Monster Hunter Rise’s release in 2021 furthered the franchise even more. However, it looks like Wilds is going to be another golden era for the Monster Hunter community.
A True Open World
For the first time in Monster Hunter history, the entire map is an open world. That’s right, Monster Hunter Wilds is going to be an Open World game. Much like the guiding lands of MH Worlds, Wilds is going to feature one big map instead of separate areas and biomes. Honestly, they took one of the best aspects of Worlds and blew it up and made it even bigger. That’s something I can get behind.
How will quests and your home work now? Well, in addition to the quest board in your home village and the quest giver travelling with you, quests now trigger dynamically out in the wild! You can trigger quests while out exploring and you don’t need to keep going back to your home village. As for your home, it appears that you’ll be setting up camps in certain locations and these serve as bases in addition to the main village.
Wilds puts an emphasis on exploration and so many fans are happy that they gave us an open world to explore. It always felt weird going off and exploring areas outside of the quest areas in the old games. If you wanted to explore, you’d often do fetch quests. In Monster Hunter Wilds, that concept is thrown out the window.
Honestly, having an open world makes the game so much more immersive. There’s a sense of continuity when leaving the village for quests now compared to teleporting to biomes after cutscenes.
New Hunting System and Mechanics
As sad as I am that Wirebugs are gone from Monster Hunter Wilds, I don’t really feel it too much due to everything new with the game. There’s a ton to cover but there are definitely some stand out features.
The main aspect of this game that I found interesting more than Focus Mode was the environment interaction. In Rise and Worlds, we had environmental traps that dealt damage or CC’d monsters on hunts. They’ve retained this mechanic and added more interactions. For example, you can use the gunlance to set fire to certain patches of dry grass and the fire will spread and deal some damage. Likewise, environment and weather now affect the players even more. It’s not just the stamina decrease or health drain from hot and cold environments anymore. There are biomes that can hinder your movement or even mess up your combos.
Like I mentioned earlier, Focus Mode is the new cornerstone mechanic of Wilds. Rise had Silkbinds and wirebugs, while Monster Hunter Wilds has Focus Mode. While in Focus Mode, hunters are able to aim and direct their attacks and guards in specific directions and areas. You will also see wounds and weaknesses highlighted during this mode. If you aim for these areas, you will do what is known as a Focus Strike. It’s an attack with a special animation and does a ton of damage. It makes hunting way more than just a repetitive grind of memorizing monster moves and timing then repeat X100.
Did I mention there’s a lot more thought into hunting? That’s because they improved the Monsters’ internal AI. That’s right, they will now react and move more realistically based on your actions. This adds a whole new flavor and mechanic to hunting. Rather than memorizing moves and queues, you’re now familiarizing yourself with monster reactions!
New. Monsters. (Oh, and weapon changes too, I guess)
The best part about any new Monster Hunter game are of course the new monsters! It’s literally in the name! We only got a glimpse of the new monsters in the beta but we’re hoping there’s going to be a lot more when the full game drops in three weeks.
As much as players love returning fan-favorites and evergreen bosses, new creatures to hunt is what always makes an MH game exciting. Not only are the new monsters big and intimidating, their movements are way more unique and such a joy to familiarize. Nothing brings a hunter more joy than learning how to hunt a new monster.
Now, to hunt said monsters, every hunter needs a good weapon. The weapons in this installation of Monster Hunter have undergone changes that are more than just cosmetic. While some have changed more drastically than others, I think that they’re all balanced for the most part. The Longsword is still going to be the instalock easy mode for most people but it’s nice to see that there’s a little more thought in using them.
As a Switch Axe player, I am overwhelmingly happy in Monster Hunter Wilds. I thought that the Swaxe in MH rise was a joy to use, but Wilds completely overturns that. Focus mode is exciting and such a rush to use with the Swaxe and we get what is essentially another counter move! I haven’t been able to try the other weapons outside of my usual rotation of Swaxe, Gunlance, and Greatsword, but I can tell that players are definitely going to have a lot of fun.
Get the Game
Just from Beta alone, I’m already totally sold on the game. There’s so much new content to unpack and I can guarantee that it’s going to be worth it. If they do in fact release it for the Switch 2 when the console comes out, it’s going to sell like hotcakes.
If you’re a Monster Hunter fan, you absolutely HAVE to get the game. It’s fun, new, and introduces way more stuff that I didn’t get to cover today. You know that we’re going to have a review for it when the game comes out. Till then, stay tuned for more updates on Monster Hunter Wilds.
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