I've never been a fan of the old monster hunter games; they're far too clumsy and janky. I played Freedom Unite and couldn't understand why you'd choose it over the new one, unless it was for nostalgia. It moves... too slowly. Coming from a newer game to an older one and having to play without quality-of-life features like Lance's omnidirectional hops or the exclusion of certain attacks that smooth out weapons. (Gunlance Sweep) It feels like I'm playing a neutered version, which is understandable given the game's origins in the second generation.

It's just not my thing, and the same goes for the other old games. The cool weapons and insane monster designs were the only things that drew me in (despite the fact that I knew I didn't like old Monster Hunter). Unfortunately, after playing the game and remembering "wow, I sure don't like the old-style monster hunter games," I was quickly disillusioned. Cool for people who grew up with Monster Hunter, pretty underwhelming for others.

Where are the colorful score indicators? Good Great Perfect? Why is the camera behind a metal beetle? Why is all of the music electro-industrial noise? Thumper is NOT a music game, it's a true rhythm game.

The core gameplay is not too dissimilar to the typical BEMANI series games. You stay on a track and react to "notes" coming your way. Hit them on time and you can score an S rank on a stage. The main difference between Thumper and it's coworkers in the genre is that Thumper cares little about how well you can perfect hitting notes, it cares about how well you can preform overall. The game allows you to get hit once before you die, but you can alleviate this issue by taking a risk and going for a "thump". Each successful "thump" nets you another life and is the key mechanic in the game.

The game is HARD, but the developers made sure to ease you into the chaos with a fantastic learning curve. Each mechanic is shown off in a very easy to understand way, and as a plus the more mechanics you learn the better the game starts to feel. You'll find yourself trying older stages and wondering why any of it felt hard in the first place. The best part about that is that the game is pretty short too, so you'll get to that point in maybe one or two sessions.

I care a lot about aesthetics in video games and for something that isn't some otaku appealing nonsense, I quite like the direction the game goes for. It works very well with it's abstract noise OST and you REALLY do feel like... a space beetle fighting geometrical structures and vaguely aquatic objects. (It's just like Dariusburst)

Play it, if you want a real challenge of reaction time.
Despite it's very off-kilter "music" game design, I got a very similar rush of adrenaline I'd find in the representative faces of the genre.