The literal only thing holding this game back from being THE best MH game in the franchise is the fact that Capcom couldn't figure out how playstation achivements worked, so they never made G-Rank for the Vita. This also in turn held back the Vita so much because this franchise was HUGE in Japan. It's Freedom Unite, but easier, but because they never made G-Rank for it it has way less content to do. Said content is very, very good however, but it pales in comparison to MHFU due to that game's sheer vast competent playtime. Basically, it's less of a good thing that we already had plenty of.

just a note, I put down my completion date as when I beat the jhen mohran village quest. in terms of guild quests I'm pretty early on in high rank still, so I have yet to encounter deviljho, amatsu, or any of the hidden mhfu monsters. I'm at over 60 hours now tho so I feel like my opinion on the game isn't gonna change much from here on out

+great monster variety. you get the virtually all the new additions from tri, a couple new monsters (zinogre and duramboros in particular are great fights, fuck nibelsnarf), and some good returning wyverns like nargacuda and tigrex
+the feudal japan theme that yukumo village has is so gorgeous, it's a nice area to look around in. obviously it doesn't affect the gameplay very much but it's lovely, with great music as well
+the hot spring is a nice touch to streamline quest preparation... since its benefits are also shared between hunters, it's extremely handy when playing online, esp when trying to grind through low rank
+online is still bustling through hunsterverse, I think I usually see about 50-60 people online at any given time. obviously it's difficult to play this game ad hoc now, but the fanbase has done an amazing job keeping online play for this going
+getting to play the hd version on emulator is such a treat, for one because it runs extremely well (psp emulation is very mature) but also because the original textures have been replaced with hi-res or touched-up variants, making this game look just as good as entries like mhgu or mh3u
+I never played far enough in mh3u to get to underwater combat but regardless I'm glad there's a 3rd gen game that doesn't have it at all, it doesn't seem fun
+cross-promotional free dlc with metal gear solid where you can unlock big boss and the boss costumes....
+overall it's hard for me to list off exactly I like about this game so much since it's just monster hunter, but something about this one really sucked me in. I'm glad this has been the first old-school MH game I've sunken time into as everything so is streamlined while still retaining a wide variety of weapons, monsters, and hunts.
+there's a lot of QoL upgrades here that I can't really speak to since I never played tri or mhfu, but I'll list them off here: the farm is streamlined (though still a bit of a chore), weapon classes that weren't in tri like bow and GL got brought back, and you can now send a load of items back to the village once per quest, just to name a few

-village quests are annoying to prepare for, as there's no hot springs or item box accessible after you've accepted a quest. you have to run into the guild hall, use the hot springs, switch out your items, and then finally exit to go accept the village quest. very annoying
-since this is pre-mh4 the areas are rather flat. not something that really detracts from the experience too much but it does make the game a little less dynamic
-why is it so hard to uncrouch.....
-the small monsters can really be a pain in this one, I know they aggro less than in the super old ones but they're still a nuisance here, esp ones that can bowl you over from behind

mhw was the first one I played and the one that helped me understand how this series should be played, but this game has been where I actually can't stop playing it and want to keep getting better and better stuff. thanks to the (partial) english translation, the HD version rip, ppsspp, and hunsterverse, this game is honestly even better to play now with right-stick camera controls, free online play, high-resolution rendering, and so much more; thank god for preservationists. the gameplay loop is so addicting here and everything seems to fall into place just perfectly. I'll definitely be playing this one for quite a while longer, hopefully to the point where I can face amatsu, or even further beyond that.