Monster Hunter is a series I've always had something of a troubled history with, in that I've long been a fan of the series on a conceptual level, but find it lacking when it comes to executing on its plethora of interesting premises. Hunting down these larger-than-life monsters as a capable hunter of your own design sounds amazing on paper, but has always been hampered for me by the control scheme and monsters' tendency to run away mid battle, requiring an awkward pursuit mission that drags on due to every map being divided into zones/loading screens. Exploring these huge, fully-realized biomes and learning the lay of the land to use to your advantage is something that, again, sounds perfect on paper but is a strength of the series that has always felt hampered by the map's zone division and the amount of time it takes to load into new zones. I fully realize that, yes, these are a result of hardware restrictions and not necessarily the fault of the series (or individual game) itself, and therein lies what I believe to be the central issue - a divide between dev ambition and the capability to actually achieve said ambition with hardware restrictions. World is the first game in the series (that I've played, at least) where it feels like so many of its ideas have been given their long due justice.
Maps are still separated into zones but gone are the loading screens that push back on my enjoyment of exploring the map. Hunting monsters is made much more enjoyable for similar reasons. Quality of life improvements improve the overall experience as well (particularly, I'm a huge fan of the variety of options the player has at their disposal to stop monsters from running away). Most of the game feels like a super streamlined version of what the series has always been trying to convey, which is all this game needed to be in my opinion. The game isn't perfect though, of course, with my main annoyance stemming from how often the endgame devolves into tracking down monster tracks over the act of actually HUNTING the monsters themselves, but this was an impressive showing overall and I'm happy I gave it a shot.
Shoutout to how fun the multiplayer experience is in this game, playing with friends made the entire thing way more memorable.
Maps are still separated into zones but gone are the loading screens that push back on my enjoyment of exploring the map. Hunting monsters is made much more enjoyable for similar reasons. Quality of life improvements improve the overall experience as well (particularly, I'm a huge fan of the variety of options the player has at their disposal to stop monsters from running away). Most of the game feels like a super streamlined version of what the series has always been trying to convey, which is all this game needed to be in my opinion. The game isn't perfect though, of course, with my main annoyance stemming from how often the endgame devolves into tracking down monster tracks over the act of actually HUNTING the monsters themselves, but this was an impressive showing overall and I'm happy I gave it a shot.
Shoutout to how fun the multiplayer experience is in this game, playing with friends made the entire thing way more memorable.