Came for the twins, stayed for the Kingdom of Elgado!

Monster Hunter Rise is often compared to its very popular predecessor MH World and I don't think a comparison between those two games is fair, as it's really just a case of apples and oranges. For the sake of explaining it, I'll give a rundown of the differences between the two entries though.

First of all, this game was designed for the Nintendo Switch in mind. Given the portable nature of this hybrid console, Rise streamlined the gameplay loop a fair bit in order to make it more accessible to a pick-up-and-play gamestyle. This includes faster hunts, monsters being instantly shown on the minimap, increased traversal options with the Palamutes and the ability to pause the game anytime when you're not playing with others - a very nice feature to have (which was missing in World)! As a tradeoff, it doesn't have the expansive ecosystem or the tracking of monster footprints from World, so it's less immersive in that regard. But those gameplay changes aren't necessarily bad, they're just different. I for one appreciate the fast-paced and direct nature of Rise; it's a welcome change after spending hundreds of hours with the slower gameplay of World. Rise's combat specialises in the usage of the wirebugs, they serve as a mechanic to either perform special skills (similar to the ones in Generations) or can be used for easy movement as a grappling hook. Getting used to these little fellas can feel weird at first, but once you know your way around them they're just a ton of fun to use and can totally change the way you approach certain monsters. As an example, the flagship monster Magnamalo inflicts a special debuff that can only be cleansed through wirebug usage, so you need to keep the bar in mind and use the dash whenever you want to cure the ailment. Alongside Magnamalo, most of the other newcomers in Rise are great to fight aswell! Goss Harag is probably my favorite new addition, love his Yeti-inspired design and the fight in general. Looking forward to many great fights in Sunbreak too!

The Village quests ease you fairly well into the game, even though the first set of ranks were quite boring for someone acquainted with the franchise. Still a good introduction for new hunters and even allows you to skip the entire Low Rank of the Hub quests. Speaking of the Gathering Hub, it's rather... desolate these days on the PC port. Atleast there's the Better Matchmaking mod, which removes the Region Lock and helps you find matches a bit faster, but having to rely on a mod for something as basic as worldwide play is quite a bummer. Note that this is not an issue with the original version of the game on Switch and was only added to the PC port for some strange reason, so the game itself can't really be blamed for this. Another cool mod I can recommend is RiseTweaks for removing the framerate cap on cutscenes - another thing that should have been in the PC port from the start! Anyways, finding multiplayer matches over join requests isn't that hard for key quests (good luck finding a partner for event quests on PC though) and you should be able to reach Master Rank in no time. I can't really comment on the Master Rank content yet, as I just started Sunbreak yesterday, but it's pretty amazing so far!

My final thoughts? Rise is another wonderful Monster Hunter game and I had a great time with the base game on PC despite the aforementioned strange issues with the port. Liked it so much that I got the Sunbreak bundle on Switch as well, so make of that what you will. I think you'll get a great experience on any platform, just pick between the eye candy version (PC) or the one with the thriving playerbase (Switch). Can't go wrong here!