Topic: Monster Hunter Wilds

Yeah with all the talk of ugs and performance issues, I think I'll wait on this one. Excited to play it for sure, but I can wait. Either for an (unlikely) Switch 2 port or a decent Steam sale after they've patched some issues.

From what I've heard it was the entirety of the game being rushed. They apparently cut out two monsters because of needing to get the game out by a shareholder's meeting.

A real shame, considering how well optimised World and Rise were/are.... even Rise on Switch ran pretty decently. (as you would expect it to)

45 hours, hunter rank 47.

With zero plans for the weekend, I'm ready to hit the endgame hard.

Pop trophies, optimize my build. Let the fun...begin.

I've started to grind to HR100 to unlock all the weapon melding options and then get some good weapons and decorations before they patch out the flower thing. Thankfully HR seems to go up pretty quickly, up to 82 so far.

@CJD87 From what I recall with World, it wasn't well optimized really. The game had to get patches down the line to make it run better.

@VoidofLight ah fair enough. Rise was my entry point (got on release) and that ran very well on Switch. I only got World last year on Steamdeck … but I actually much prefer Rise!

@VoidofLight What concerns me is Capcom acting like there's no more optimization work to be done on Wilds. As if this game isn't a hot mess across platforms.

@Ralizah That's concerning, yeah. I hope that if the don't talk about it, they at least silently try to fix it.

73 hours, hunter rank 82, 37/50 trophies. Although I haven't bothered to build my artian weapon yet, I feel as though my build in finalized. Agitator, Maximum Might, Burst, Attack Boost, etc. 2-piece Dahaad and 2-piece Guardian Fulger for my lance build. I just need the assorted decos to top it all off.

Rather than aiming to build my artian weapon, I spend my time running down the miniature and gold crowns. Roughly 40 minutes per crown on average. Too many 1-star-strength monsters who aren't miniature and too many 5-star-strength monsters who aren't gold. Crowns feel random.

Just got into high-rank. It feels good being able to wander about freely without the game holding your hand constantly. The main narrative was pretty good, so I'm not complaining there.. but I'm glad I finally get to play the game like it was showcased in the beta, instead of having to go from story moment to story moment to get through the hunts.

83 hours played, HR 96, 42/50 trophies.

So near the end of vanilla, I can smell it. Just some misc garbo trophies remain. Fishing, small creature capture, and x-number of missions ran in and out of multiplayer. The trophies for many miniature crowns and many gold crowns will take some doing. I just need to sacrifice several small woodland creatures in order for RNJesus to bless me with their appearance.

Where's my hatchet?

90 hours played, HR 106, 45/50 trophies.

I have around half of the gold crowns and two-fifths of the mini crowns. All that remains are the fishing of whoppers, fifty apex monsters fought, and one-hundred multiplayer sessions played. The end is near.

The build feels good. I'm ready for title updates and dlc to move things around.

Lance Build
Arkvulcan Helm Beta + Burst 1 & Maximum Might 1 & Speed Eating 1
Guardian Arkveld Arms Beta + Flinch Free x2 & Speed Eating 1
Arkvulcan Chest Beta + Agitator 1 & Maximum Might 1
Gore Waist Beta + Agitator 1 & Maximum Might 1
Gore Legs Beta + Agitator 1 & Antivirus x2
Agitator Talisman

Artian Weapon (Reinforcement = 3x Affinity, 1x Sharpness, 1x Attack)
Razor Sharp 3 + Guard 1
Guard Up 3 + Guard 1
Offensive Guard 3 + Guard 1

Skills
Agitator = 5
Maximum Might = 3
Razor Sharp = 3
Offensive Guard = 3
Guard = 3
Guard Up = 3
Weakness Exploit = 3
Antivirus = 3
Flinch Free = 3
Speed Eating = 2
Constitution = 2
Black Eclipse = 1
Burst = 1
Convert Element = 1
Hasten Recovery = 1

I like how the decoration system reminds me of gems from Xenoblade Chronicles.

108 hours played, MR 133, 48/50 trophies.

I probably would've completely finished the game over the week if RNJesus had been on my side. Unfortunately it took me six hours to source the crowns for the apex monsters. However, the end is now in spitting distance. All that remains is for me to fish five whoppers and obtain the gold crown for Guardian Doshaguma. And it'll be all she wrote.

114 hours played, MR 139, 50/50 trophies.

Done.

I'm ready for the bubble dragon in the Summer.

@Magician Ah well done friend..!

I have major FOMO at the moment, and am living vicariously through everyone playing Wilds right now. I ploughed 800+ hours into Rise/Sunbreak, finally hitting AR300 level before putting it down for good.

I have Worldborne on Steamdeck, tried to start a couple of times.... but I just wasn't 'clicking' with it like I did with Rise. I understand it is sacrilege within the MH community to prefer Rise>World, but I honestly think Rise is a much more fun experience. The pseudo-'tracking' element in World is really tedious... I actually love how Rise lets you get straight into the action, trying/testing your new build etc.

I might give World another shot, or maybe even return to Rise and learn a new weapon?

@CJD87 No disagreement, I also enjoyed Rise more than World. The mobility that comes with the wirebugs is awesome. But coming off of Wilds, I can't help but feel that I need to give GU another go.

The real question is, MH4U remaster when, Capcom? Have it as a Switch 2 exclusive for a year before being ported to other platforms. I think it would be an easy gap filler while Capcom work on Wilds title updates and dlc.

@Magician I agree, and the Rise/Sunbreak really demonstrated that there is a huge audience on Switch - especially in Japan. I recall at the release of Rise, a number of Japanese firms have staff an official holiday day - in response to the number of annual leave requests!!!

I wouldn’t begrudge a portable ‘stop gap’ title that was a remake of an earlier game… or even perhaps bring World to Switch2.. updated QoL features? Maybe even build in Palamutes or Wirebugs lol

I never really understood the World v Rise difficulty debate. To me, Rise filtered down World's best parts into a more focused experience, that just made the whole act of hunting monsters more fun than it had never been.

Then I played Wilds, and I kinda see it, to be honest.

Rise's difficulty still makes sense to me overall, because of how it had been refocused into a more bitesized, action focused, experience over the more drawn out, intentionally arduous, monster battling epics from World.

Wilds though wants to do this strange thing of trying to still present a focused Rise like experience, while still trying to roll back a lot of that refocusing to create a more Worlds like Hunt. It then tries to do this while also making the game easier than a Monster Hunter game has ever been, and it feels like it broke something at the core of the experience.

Like, we still have this grindy, honestly kind of tedious, material grind to craft new weapons and armour but it is a grind now that has no real purpose. In past games, the payoff to completing these extensive grinds was self evident. You overcame the strongest monster you could at that time, with the best gear you could put together at that time, to upgrade your gear so you could go back to a monster that used to bully you and absolutely mollywhop them. It was a satisfying staircase of difficulty you slowly climbed, to give your grind a purpose.

Here though, there are like maybe three monsters in High Rank (if I am being generous) that felt like they offered a bit of a challenge, but it is mostly singular overturned moves, not like some epic battle you barely overcome. I can beat tempered arkveld in close to five minutes, with AI companions, without a build, random decorations and not a single invested armour sphere. That isn't me trying to flex, I am awful at this game, but it is a reflection of just how far the bottom has fallen out of the difficulty paradigm.

So to me, it just kinda feels like Wilds end game basically has no loop. There is no need to chase for more power, when you have all the power you need. The roster isn't big enough to have a truly varied play session from one to the other of different hunting experiences.

So I guess you just beat every monster once and you are just done? And like I guess that is fine, but I kinda didn't expect for that one and done feeling to arrive QUITE that fast.

And you could say "well maybe its a you problem, you have just got better at these games over time and your experience is not reflective of the wider one, especially for new players" and its like maybe? But looking at the consensus online, I don't buy it.

And again, I'd stress, I don't think I've actually ever been worse at a MH game, since they refocused almost every weapon this time around on accessing the strongest parts of the kit through perfect mechanics I cannot achieve. Weapons that were once like my baby like the Lance or the Hunting Horn, cannot get to grips with them at all. Ended up using the Gunlance, cause its strongest combo can be bound to a single button if you use the ingame macros and the Glaive as its basically the only weapon without a "perfect x to do biggest move" mechanic.

And even then, it all just feels like a massive faceroll.