"The Guild Authorizes you to Hunt"
Monster Hunter:Wilds was released on February 28, 2025 for PlayStation 5, Xbox Series X/S, and PC as the latest mainline entry in the series. Viewed as a successor to Monster Hunter: World due to it sharing more similarities with it than with Monster Hunter: Rise, the mainline game that had most recently released. Monster Hunter: Wilds also is the first Monster Hunter game to have cross-play enabled for all platforms.
First Impressions:
First thing to mention is that I've been an avid fan of the Monster Hunter games since I first picked up the series with Monster Hunter Tri back in 2011. Seeing how far the series has come and how it's changed from one iteration to the next is very gratifying. The first thing you will notice when loading up the game is the graphics. Wilds is the second Monster Hunter game to be on Capcom's RE Engine and really pushes your hardware to make the game look as detailed as possible. Since I chose to play on PC, in the first few days after launch I experienced some issues with stuttering and frame-rate instability, but since then I've had no issues playing reliably. Character customization is by far the most thorough and detailed experience I've had in a Monster Hunter game. In Monster Hunter you often have a companion with you from the start of the game, the most common is the Palico, a bipedal cat. In previous games they communicated in various meows and noises that your hunter readily translates, in Wilds it defaults to the option that gives them an actual voice, or if you decide that you rather have them use the original cat noises that option also exists. The introductory cut-scenes and cinematic setup propel the story forward, focusing on Nata, a young boy who fled his village following a monster attack. He is on a quest to return to his village, finding the "White Wraith" responsible for the attack, and investigate its origins and activities.
Story and Gameplay:
After viewing the introductory cut-scenes and designing your hunter and Palico, you receive your mission: join the guild detachment heading into the Forbidden Lands to study the area and investigate the "White Wraith" that attacked Nata village. Your hunter isn't given much of a backstory, its left vague but it is alluded that you are a very well respected and capable hunter as you were chosen out of many to take on the mission, and take personal care of Nata. For older players of Monster Hunter some of the characters you meet may seem familiar from past games which helps convey the connected world between Monster hunter games. It also shows a passage of time as those characters are notably older than their first appearance. You are then given control over your character and must make an important decision, choosing your starter weapon. Luckily you are also given a static target to try out your new weapon so that you can give each weapon a test run in a safe environment, as well as combos and chains being displayed on your HUD so that you can practice them and commit them to memory. For returning players the weapons all feel familiar enough that you can pick them up right away and get to hunting, but have enough new attacks and features that you still have room to grow. New in Wilds is the ability to carry 2 weapons with you at all times, In previous titles you would need to return to the camp to switch weapons. You have the freedom to choose any 2 that you currently posses, you could take 2 different classes of weapons, different weapons for focusing on breaking specific parts of a monster, or maybe 2 of the same weapon of different elements.
In your first fight against one of the titular monsters you are introduced to one of Wilds new and controversial features, the Wound system. By attacking the same spot repeatedly you may be able to create a weak spot to exploit, by using the focus feature you can target these wounds and cause massive damage and stun/stagger the monster. Its due to this guaranteed stun that many older fans have mixed feelings on the feature as it does make fights less tense when you can practically stun a monster on demand. It provides players with plenty of time to inflict significant damage or to take a break, heal, and sharpen, ensuring they're ready for the remainder of the battle with minimal risk. I would also like to mention that Wilds introduces a new category of monsters called "Guardians." These are variations of existing monsters, but for narrative reasons, they possess regenerative abilities. If a wound on them is not addressed quickly, it will heal and eliminate the weak spot, encouraging players to attack them immediately when they appear.
The most visual new feature in Wilds is the dynamic weather system. As you play the game the world in Wilds goes through a sort of seasonal cycle, with some altering the terrain and adding weather hazards adding another layer of strategy to hunts. The spawn rate of a certain monster may change depending on which season the map is currently on, with some only appearing during a specific season, mainly the apex monster of each region. After you manage to defeat the monster you will be given a short amount of time to gather materials from the defeated monster, this period will be skipped if you instead captured the monster using traps and tranquilizer bombs. Each quest has a set amount of guaranteed rewards that range from monster materials, higher rarity monster drops, gems used to craft weapon/armor decorations, and late game you can get weapon parts to create customizable weapons.
After the quest you may visit the Smithy, they will be the ones who can turn the monster parts you acquired into either weapons or armor with certain parts being needed to craft each item. Each weapon and armor piece will come with preset perks that augment how your hunter performs, effects can range from increased health/stamina recovery rates, poison/ailment resistance or immunity, and increased attack power or elemental damage. Some may come with slots you can use to add decorations, which allow you to add specific perks you want to armor or weapons. Armor also have hidden perks only unlocked if you have a certain amount of pieces from the same set equipped. Weapons will often inherit the elemental affinity of the monster whose parts were used to create it, as such its wise to craft weapons of different elements to ensure you can exploit elemental weaknesses. Like weapons armor also inherits a monsters elemental defenses and weaknesses. It is best to always keep an eye on what elements you armor is strong or weak against and have different sets for when you are fighting monsters using elements your current armor is weak against. As you hunt stronger monsters and gather materials you can create stronger and more synergistic gear to tackle even harder monsters.
Inter-connectivity:
Monster Hunter: Wilds places a strong focus on online connectivity, becoming the first game in the series to offer Cross-play between consoles and PC. Upon entering the game, you can choose to join an online lobby, join or create a private lobby, or play in a pseudo-offline mode that still allows access to online features. However, this increased focus on online connectivity means that any network problems or issues can be extremely frustrating depending on the timing.
Wilds like past Monster Hunter games allows the creation of clans/squads which allows players to join large groups to find people to run hunts with. Wilds adds the Link system on top of the squads. Link makes it so that players are directly connected to each other and allows co-op play to be set up quicker than through the squad menu. Environment link takes it one step further making players exist on the same map simultaneously but requires all players to be at the same point in the story as the various locations go through changes during the story. Another returning feature is the SOS flare. Shooting off an SOS flare makes it so that your quest will be made available for anyone to join. Once you use SOS you will be given NPC teammates as placeholders until players join your quest, or as backup in case no other players join your hunt. At the time of writing this article, an update has been released introducing the Gathering Hub, a space where a large number of players can gather to socialize and communicate. Access to this area is restricted to those who have reached Hunter Rank 16, which requires completing the Low-Rank story.
Wilds added a lot of ways for players to group up and interact with each other, but that doesn't mean its always seamless in its execution. In the multiple times I've played alongside other players my experiences varied from session to session. Most had no issues to speak of but some sessions, especially early on in the games release, it wasn't as smooth as i would have liked. Joining a friends quest is still quite tedious as both or all players must have watched the story cut-scene before a hunt, meaning if 2 players in a Link party are at the same point in the story and want to advance together they must individually start the next story mission, then one has to quit their hunt and go back to camp to then go and join the other players hunt. There were multiple occasions of players being disconnected from the party mid-hunt because of server issues on Capcoms end, spikes in latency between players adding noticeable lag to the fights, and on one occasion a complete de-sync of the link party where everyone was disconnected at once. It does seem like Capcom is actively addressing these issues as stated before, the issues have become less prevalent as time passed.
Final Score: 4.0 out of 5
Rating score card
Monster Hunter: Wilds is an enjoyable addition to the franchise and serves as one of the most accessible entry points for new players, though it has its imperfections. The monster roster isn't the largest or most varied in the series, and the game lacks one of Monster Hunter's key features, the Elder Dragons. However, this doesn't diminish the appeal of the new monsters introduced in Wilds, which are quickly becoming fan favorites. Fortunately, Capcom is aware of the areas where Wilds falls short and plans to address them through "Title updates." Capcom has outlined a roadmap for upcoming updates, all of which will be free, ensuring the game will receive support for the foreseeable future with new monsters, collaborations, and events to anticipate.
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