MonHuns console-team wishes they had even a 1/1000th of the competence Team Omega Force has in actually innovating their franchises and breaking new ground with how extremely well they pulled off this open-world hunting game.

I still liked the first games story more, especially in the expansion but the characters are about on the same level in terms of being likable and very well written. But pretty much every other aspect is a gigantic improvement that it's actually hard to wrap my head around when I started. The new weaps and old weapon moveset changes, the complete transformation of the Mitama system into an extremely fun and open loadout system, the redesigning of the entire map to be open world, the new Demon Hand grappling system, and even the improved and more brutal dismemberment system. Everything's just perfect.

Also, the absolute happiness of seeing Hatsuho again is indescribable but Gwen is definitely best girl here. Extremely sad we'll never get a follow up though.

It's kind of strange how this is the highest rated game of all time, yet still manages to often be undercredited. I think a lot of people I come across now don't realize how much of the groundwork this laid for 3D action games as a whole; Devil May Cry is essentially a Z-Targeting game, Souls combat is basically 3D Zelda (except worse, lacking the creative interactions OoT offers through item usage), etc
Every time I replay this and expect that maybe my opinion of it would be weathered by time, I always find that contrarily, the older I get the more I appreciate it. Gameplay, presentation, and story are all great.