Topic: Monster Hunter: World

Oh, and my armor was fully upgraded too, if that has any effect on elemental damage. I think it's just apex guild quests being nutso again, though. They love their insane quests.

Dang, do Zorah, Bazelgeuse, and Vaal Hazak ever have good themes. I think I still like Tri's soundtrack the most in the series but, if you're going to give a monster a chance to appear in nearly every quest, give it Bazelgeuse's theme over Deviljho's any day.

I've been listening to the soundtrack. You can't tell, right?

I prefer Deviljho's theme to Bazelgeuse's one. Deviljho has more of an "imminent doom" feel to it.

I'll need to have a listen to the soundtrack at some point. There's probably plenty of great themes that I don't notice when playing as I'm too busy dodging and running away from a monster.

I mean that is the feeling, but the start of Deviljho’s theme is really loud and cocophonous and not really fun to listen to every time you fight a Qurupeco. Bazel is more dramatic, like its the soundtrack to a climactic battle. I find it easier on the ears.

This probably goes without saying, but I have a new favorite Monster Hunter game. There are still some aspects Tri had that aren’t present here such as the water combat and details to do with progression and centricity in the maps, but there are so many other sweeping improvements that it’s not really a contest. I’m just drooling over what the DLC will be and MH6. This series is already so far ahead of other games’ boss battles and ecosystems and they’re going to make sequels out of it XD.

For sure, definitely has turned out to be my favorite MH game too.

There's still some things I liked better in previous games but, there's far more I like better in this game. Which, no game is perfect- it's the bigger picture that matters.

And tbh, all they did was modernize stuff that should have been modernized back in the 7th gen. There's nothing groundbreaking here, just a refinement of what works. Finally modern graphics and loading screens removed (well, most anyways, the room and gathering hall take foreeeever). Monsters that actually attack each other instead of pretending they don't exist. Faster gathering, less rigid requirements for obtaining rare drops and armor sets (bounty system was a good addition, particularly limited weekly bounties). Just having basic amenities like a full button set, HD graphics, voice chat... it makes a difference. It's all stuff that's pretty straightforward, so it's simply benefitting from being the game it should have been years ago.

My thirst for a new portable entry is real though, more so now than ever. We need a more modern entry on Switch (would say "on handhelds" but, let's face it, Switch is the only viable portable gaming device there is now, and the only one that could even remotely offer a similar experience). I don't care if it's a multiplatform release of the next entry or it's own separate portable 5th gen entry, just get me a new entry to play when I'm at work, and can hunt with my coworkers at shift change in side by side tabletop mode, that I can play at my brothers house and hunt local co-op with him, that I can bring home, dock, and be right back on the TV with a quality experience.

That's probably my #1 desired game. But that's a ways off yet. For the time being, I'm just enjoying the here and now.

@JaxonH the voice chat seems to be a big plus, yet I've not seen it used once. Doesn't help that I'm only like at rank 6 and only just discovered that third bit of land in the story, so maybe that had something to do with it...

The story stuff and assistance you can get is really well done here. I hope to see more human interaction when I'm further through single player material though. This is game will last me a long, long time.

@erv
It's like MH3U. Voice chat is there, but it's mostly used among friends, and even then not everyone does.

But I was playing with this dude who randomly joined me and my bro, and we chatted. Used to chat with a few randoms back in MH3U also. It's a nice feature. Not necessary, but it does add to the mp experience.

Not feeling the music. There's some good tracks, for sure, but hardly any monster themes compared to past games.

I'd rate World as having the worst soundtrack of any MH game I've played to date.

Uh??? Bazel theme is the only one I've seen and I'm HR14. I'm sure there's a couple more but, World is using a dynamic soundtrack like Zelda.

Coincidentally both have the worst soundtracks in the history of their respective series.

Compare that to Zinogre, Jho, Astalos, Glavenus, Mitzusune, Gammoth, Alatreon, Brachydios, Jhen Mohran, Ceadus, Dire Miralis, Nargacuga, Duramboros, Seltas Queen, Kudzu, Seregios, bird wyvern, Shagaru Magala, Teostra, Fatalis, Chameleos, Ukonlos, Kushala Daora, Tigrex, Kirin, Gogmazios, Rajang, Yian Garuga, Barioth, even the Great Jaggie, and I believe Rathian and Rathalos in some games.

And I'm sure that's not even close to all of them, that's just the more popular ones.

@Tsurii
You can try to rationalize all day, but it all sounds the same. You could have 500 different themes but if the majority are slight variations from the dynamic music, it all feels the same

The fact I cannot recall one single theme aside from Bazel after 125 hours of gameplay is case and point.

Previous games had epic themes, and by the truckload.

That's not a particularly useful comparison, you're listing themes from at least 3 different games there. But I agree though, it doesn't feel like there's many unique themes whilst playing World. It could have done with at least a few more memorable unique monster themes.

There's some great tracks in this game, but overall I think 3U and 4U had better soundtracks. Some of my favourites battle themes so far include the Coral Highlands large monsters, Rotten Vale large monsters, and Bezelguize.

I didn't like what they did with Teostra's theme in this game, it just doesn't feel as intense or dramatic as it used to. However, Kushala Daola's feels like a much needed improvement.

Yep. I hated it in Tri.

@crimsontadpoles
I can't keep track of which monsters were in which games, but the point is still clearly made. The majority of those were in MH4U or MHGen/MHXX though. Which are the last 2 games I played and remember. Even MH3U had a good chunk of those, among many others not even listed.

But ya, I literally just got done fighting Kushala and I can't even remember if he had a theme. Which speaks to how non-memorable it was. Even if he did have one, it didn't even register on the impression scale.

I remember playing Gen and MHXX... that Astalos theme is still, to this day, stuck in my head. The Zinoger theme is still, to this day, stuck in my head. Used to give me goosebumps every time I'd fight him.

I haven't experienced that once yet in World. Well... ok once. During the final stretch of Zora Magdaros. But that was just the MH series theme.

Reached the credits. Now that the bulk of the story is out of the way, it's time for me to slow down and focus on getting better equipment. Really need to make some better armour, as the latter half of high rank was really tough with just measly Barroth armour.

Edit: Nergigante armour looks like a good set for me. Once I get the parts, I'll have to think about whether to do the quick approach and grab the Alpha set, or whether I can be bothered to go for the Beta set and then set the extra decorations (probably just get the alpha one though).

It boggles my mind how many people don't eat before hunts. I have been watching some Let's Play stuff on YouTube just shaking my head haha. Never hunt on an empty stomach...

Alpha sets are almost never worth it, because the extra skill tacked on is usually something I don't care about. Even if I don't have a good decoration for a slot it's better to have the slot for down the line then a useless skill I don't need or want.

With that said there are some examples of alpha armer where the skill in question had a higher level than the beta, and in some rare instances had a skill I needed that wasn't even present on the beta. So my armor is a mix of different pieces to achieve the skill set I wanted, all while maintaining fashion hunter status.

I don't have any particularly good decorations yet but, I can tell you right now just using defense gems and elemental resistance gems, I don't know what I would do without them. My defense level 4 adds +20 defense and +3 to all resistances, while my Thunder Res Lv 3 increased my -9 Thunder to +11 and added +10 defense.

So I would've had 30 less defense points, and would have been in the hole double digits for negative thunder resistance. That to me is worth far more than whatever paltry auxiliary skills they want to tack on to alpha armor. And when the time comes I should be able to squeeze in an Evade Distance or two.

For a solid Hearing 5/Evasion 5/Critcal Draw 2 set, I recommend Bazel helm, Legiana Chest, Bazel Arm, Bazel Waist, and Ingot Greaves. I think all of them are the beta versions, aside from perhaps the Bazel Arm. Toss in an Evasion 3 charm, 2 defense gems and 3 Thunder res gems and 1 Dragon Res gem, and you're good to go. Nearly 400 defense and all neutral to significantly positive elemental resistances.

I've finished the story and now that I've beaten the Xenojiiva (which I've got it's armor) I don't know what else there is to do. I've already gotten most of the higher HR ranked Monster armor/weapon when I was still doing the story mode so at this point nothing much left. There seems to be some missing side quests with HR8-9 though but that's basically it.

I used Dual Blades till the end and right now I am using a LBG. It sucks that for whatever reason I can't find rare decoration so my damage is poo. Xenojiiva reminds me of Midir in DS3 and that's not a bad thing. He is awesome to fight and that Vaal Hazak's OST is soooo good. I think I might be wrapping up with this game and I'll be playing SOTC next

@Tsurii Your thoughts about "Zelda" U are literally incorrect. Breath of the Wild has something like a 4 hour soundtrack with lots of piano notes and silence while Twilight Princess and Skyward Sword both hit the 6 hour mark.

Yeah, especially since Monster Hunter 4 was like 90% remastered monsters from 6 or so first and second gen games (also pulling all of the flagships with unique themes from third gen's expansions). Of course games like Zelda love to sample previous tracks as well, but most of those get rerecorded or newly composed in some way making them more new than just transferred mp3s.

Anyway, I'd like the series to have unique themes for monsters too, but no generation has done that outside of final boss-type monsters and flagships. The soundtrack makes it seem like they built World to expand, creating unique themes for small monsters, weak large monsters, and normal large monsters in all 5 areas and layering unique themes on top of that. They can just slot in different large or weakish large monsters into that even if they're something like Duramboros that doesn't have its own theme.

Must have, must have, MUST HAVE!

Doesn't really matter if 90% of the monsters were remastered or not, they still had awesome music. And awesome music is awesome music is awesome music. No two ways about it. Half the monsters in World are remastered, they still don't have awesome music though.

This game... simply does not. There's nothing "wrong" with it. It's good, even. Just... not epic. Not great. Nothing stands out. Fighting Nerg should sound epic. Fighting Anjanath should sound epic. Fighting Tobi Kodachi should sound epic.

And... it just doesn't. They could have a separate theme for every monster and small monster in the game- still doesn't make it sound any more epic.
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