Monster Hunter has become the only game I buy at launch

Promoted from our community blogs

_{[In this community blog, Destructoid user Moths delves into why the Monster Hunter series still has so much goodwill after 15-plus years, and why players keep coming back for more without burning out. The hunt can’t stop. -Jordan.]}

We live in an era of truly endless games. Regardless of your tastes, it has never been easier to find a game to enjoy and play. It is true that there could always be more: more variety, more quality, better preservation of old titles. But in the end, the fact of playing games nowadays is that they exist already more than you need in your whole life. And yet it keeps coming.

This can be overwhelming. Presented with such a vast territory, there is an impulse to come up with ways to divide and traverse it. We create or present niches for ourselves: loyalties, habits, aversions, etc. Shortcuts. Maybe you don’t play racing games, you can often play whatever happens to be on PlayStation Plus. Zeitgeist is a great one. There are always a handful of games that have a much greater cultural traction than the rest … until they do. But this is the essence: an external force that is able to answer the question “what to play next?” whenever he is called to do so.

Personally, I’m a little uncomfortable with that. First, the games of the moment are usually new, and the industry is such that a game at launch is usually more expensive and worse than the same game two years later. Coming late to a party has become a smart move if you are more interested in the contents of your glass than you are able to click.

I also don’t like the idea of ​​allowing someone else to tell me what to play. And I really I don’t like the idea of ​​letting everyone else do it. I ended up designing a small system designed to give me a balanced game diet, while easing the burden of choice. This is completely neurotic behavior, but damn it. It works. I like games more with my stupidity than without me.

Anyway, Monster Hunter Rise it’s the only thing I’ve played since it came out.

It didn’t have to be that way. I should play Anodyne 2: Go back to the dust. But they caught me, just as so many of you received. Monster hunter win again. Just like he did with World before that and with Generations before this.

Why is this still happening? Well, here are some ideas:

1: Pedigree

Monster hunter he was good and has grown so much now that he has gained a rare amount of confidence. It has seen unpopular ups and downs, but never a real blow to the collective trust. Never Assassin’s Creed: Unity or 2077. Cyberpunk time. Maybe never at the level of, say, The new Super Mario Bros.2. Something fine, but worryingly tiring.

In other words, believers have been given little cause for hesitation and so little cause not to speak aloud about how well Monster hunter it is every time he goes out. Example: this post. I had every reason to think I would love INCREASE, so I bought it and I do. And now I’m all the more likely to do everything again next time.

2: The life cycle

Monster hunter it’s pretty much on the same schtick as every MMO or live-service game. It’s a huge, repetitive timer that greets you with a celebration and then tries to connect you to a dripping food. It attracts early adoption by offering new content at a measured pace, which, in theory, creates a satisfying feeling of keeping up with something over time, without ever feeling overwhelmed. Unfortunately, we have been conditioned to trust this way of doing things – it so often announces everything that is ugly and artless about the gaming business. An attitude that doesn’t care if you have fun as long as you play and doesn’t care about burning bridges as long as the toll booths continue to operate.

Things feel different Monster hunter, especially that World. Less as extortion and more as hospitality. There is no pressure and everything is free, except for extensions of a size that feels fair to pay. There is no attempt to convince you that you have to stay or pay beyond the point where you are satisfied: all that comes is more Monster hunter, after all. More monsters, more tools, more grinding. Take as much as you want and leave the rest. It is a strategy based fundamentally on the desire for players to like the game. Players who like the game keep playing, keep talking about it, keep seeing the cross-promotions you put in, and keep buying the next one.

The other aspect of Monster hunterThe life cycle is just as simple: there is a gap. For all players, except the toughest, there is a long enough wait between the point where you fall with one game and the point where the next one comes out. In fact, long enough to start thinking that you could really choose a new one. Probably not an accident. You mean that MHCreators know what their ecosystem can support, and they know that meeting those boundaries is in everyone’s best interest.

3: It’s like Pokémon (but better)

So … listen to me about this. Monster hunter it’s not a game about collecting monsters. This is true. But it sure is a game about a collection of monsters and is very good at it.

The same as Pokemon, each new Monster hunter comes with a mix of new, old favorite and not so favorite old creatures. Each new entry has several stock roles that will be occupied by new creatures: Pokemon it has the beginnings, the errors at the beginning of the route, the birds and the normal types, the cover legends. Monster hunter he has a new bad lizard to serve as the first big monster, a new flagship, some new old dragons. Both franchises will try to revitalize or capitalize on older creatures by offering them new variants. There will always be a new region with a new distribution of adorable aids and a new preface to a story, and they will all be strikingly similar to the previous generation.

The difference is that an individual monster is way more fully realized than an individual Pokemon. Pokemon he offers relatively few tools to work with and often does not even make the most of them. What about these models and animations? Those shouts? Into the Monster hunter, everything about a given creature creates a coherent image. This is how it moves, its attacks, its appearance, the equipment you can make of it: everything. And you will spend enough time with everyone to be able to see. Even those who frustrate you do so with growing familiarity. An upset pet is still a kind of pet.

Maybe the simple way to express it is that Pokemon often it only leads you to build a relationship with your team members and a handful of other distinctions. The rest are not much more than noise. Monster hunter it allows you to build that relationship with most of the distribution. It helps that it takes ten times more to hunt a monster than to catch a Pokémon and that there are ten times as many of the latter. You get to know Rathalos in a way you can’t get to know Rattata.

And the thing is, Pokemon It still works! Hell, that really it works, although it is a bit dubious nowadays. I think Monster hunter brings a stronger version of the same appeal to a smaller audience. There is something at home in opening a new search list and seeing who is there: a knitting of continuity and novelty that gets thicker and fluffier every time you return to it. The world is a scary place. I can’t say no to a good blanket.

And this is mine Monster Hunter Rise post. It’s not consistent enough, but it’s okay: I don’t think we’re past them. The result is that this franchise seems to turn into a bit of a masterclass in how to manage a long-running series. Enough for even this inveterate opponent to be happy to leave everything and jump back on the cart. I also really like fantastic dinosaurs.

And you? What is a game that always makes you bite? I’d love to hear about it. Looks like there might be some good stories there.