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Old Monster Hunter vs New Monster Hunter

dacencora

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I know that I'm a minority but I really like the swimming in Tri/3U. Movement was a bit slow, but overall I think fighting against the monsters in 360º was more interesting that the climbing mechanics in 4.
Most interesting part of 4U for me is the verticality from IG (and Lance, IIRC). You can jump on top of the monsters which is a fun mechanic and makes the fights a bit easier. I haven’t made it super far into 4U but it seems like IG has the least variety of weapon recipes. Still rocking a Glaive I made many hours ago
 

Vorark

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Didn't know where to post this, but Monster Hunter G for Steam was listed briefly on Capcom's Japanese site. Probably an innocent error yet why go through the trouble of editing the page of a 2005 game?

Archived page: https://web.archive.org/web/2021111...apcom-games.com/product/ja-jp/monsterhunterg/

Would be great if there was more to this and Capcom was indeed interested in porting past entries to PC, or at least the G/Ultimate versions. There's an audience for older style MH still.
 

mogwaimon

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I for one would be pleased if they brought MH4U to Steam. Hell, bring all the MH games, but MH4U is the most important one since it's still stuck as a 3DS exclusive and as nice as Citra is it would be far better to have a port of some kind IMO. PPSSPP is competent enough for MHF, FU, and 3rd P and Cemu I think can handle MH3U pretty well at least but afaik Citra still needs a bit of work.
 

dacencora

Guest
I for one would be pleased if they brought MH4U to Steam. Hell, bring all the MH games, but MH4U is the most important one since it's still stuck as a 3DS exclusive and as nice as Citra is it would be far better to have a port of some kind IMO. PPSSPP is competent enough for MHF, FU, and 3rd P and Cemu I think can handle MH3U pretty well at least but afaik Citra still needs a bit of work.
Seems like the 3DS is a tough system to port from, with the multiple screens. It wouldn’t be trivial, to say the least.
 

mogwaimon

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I for one would be pleased if they brought MH4U to Steam. Hell, bring all the MH games, but MH4U is the most important one since it's still stuck as a 3DS exclusive and as nice as Citra is it would be far better to have a port of some kind IMO. PPSSPP is competent enough for MHF, FU, and 3rd P and Cemu I think can handle MH3U pretty well at least but afaik Citra still needs a bit of work.
Seems like the 3DS is a tough system to port from, with the multiple screens. It wouldn’t be trivial, to say the least.

I'm sure they could make it work. They did it for Generations Ultimate after all
 
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I've been playing a lot of MH lately as I got one of my old RL friends to try Rise with me.

My first MH was MH Portable 2nd G on the PSP all those years ago when a partial English translation came out. I had fun with friends but I remember getting tired of the grind after awhile, despite feeling the game was very special.

I played a little bit of Tri some years later but then didn't play any MH at all since World. I played that on release and got bored at around 70-80h in. It looked great and all, but the forced story bits were awful and the grind felt pointless close to the end (a common theme with these games).

Since playing Rise, for some reason I've had the urge to go back to all the games I missed and I'm glad I did. I've been playing MH3U and it's probably my favourite, even though it's a lot simpler than current MH.

I think current versions have much improved controls, many more options and they feel great to play. Monsters look and sound awesome for the most part, however I can't help but feel that something of the character of the older games has been lost. There was more to them than simply killing the big monsters. You had limited inventory space, you had to make choices, sell some stuff to be able to afford stuff that you wanted, etc. At least early on it felt a little similar to say, Resident Evil in that respect. I think it was a deliberate choice. All those limitations are gone in newer entries, you have practically unlimited space, you never have to discard anything in hunts and healing items are for all intents and purposes, infinite.

In recent entries, but especially in Rise, you don't really have to prepare for hunts. Everything is extremely simplified, and the game boils down to loading a map, zipping to the monster in 30 seconds due to the obscenely overpowered Wirebug mechanic, and killing it with obscenely powerful weapons and Wirebug moves. Although the newer games have open maps without load zones and that feels great, somehow the gameworld feels much smaller because you can zip around so extremely fast, and everything, every gather point is obvious and highlighted on your minimap.

Gathering is instant. Tools don't break. You could say that all those aspects were simply annoyances and distractions from the act of killing the big monsters, but after getting some fresh perspective of all games in the past month I'd have to disagree - those very annoyances and limitations were part of the game's charm. I'm sure they can't simply revert back to that style, but I feel like they should at least attempt to bring some of the preparation aspects back and dial some of the numbers bloat.

I like how in the older games the smaller monsters are much more aggressive and an actual hindrance. The map feels more hostile and despite the earlier games' much simpler controls and fewer attack options, combat feels more rewarding. I like Rise gameplay well enough, but it plays much more like a regular action game than the older titles. It's nice that you can have a quick 15 minute session with your mates and kill some big monsters, but it doesn't feel nearly as rewarding as before. I don't like the floating damage numbers (I know you can turn them off, but still).

I would much prefer if the monster HP bloat was dialed back a great deal and they did a lot more damage. More lethal and less spammy combat would go a long way.

I feel like Capcom fell into a similar rut as From Software, albeit in a different way. What I mean is this: to combat the roll spam that's become ubiquitous in Souls, instead of changing the roll itself to make it less invulnerable (they tried doing that in DS2 but everyone cried), now 99% of their bosses have helicopter attack patterns and super delayed attacks. It's very tiresome and makes the game more homogenous. This is a sort of backwards solution to the problem, and something similar happened to MH - to compensate for the crazy amount of offensive skills and super moves the characters have across all weapons, instead of making monsters more interesting, Capcom just bloated their HP pool and made a bunch of 1 attacks 1 hit KO you regardless of defense rating (I don't count 1 hit KOs as higher lethality, it's just a simple on/off switch). I don't think that's the way to go. What I mean by greater lethality is status effects that matter (you shouldn't be able to ignore blights), etc.

Anyway, I like Rise better than I liked World (and I haven't even reached Sunbreak yet, I'm just clearing HR 7 now, my duo mate is very slow unfortunately) and the gameplay is undeniably fun. However, I hope that for the next game Capcom tries to recapture some of what's been lost - the more methodical progression, greater lethality, less spam, less flashy shit. I know that's probably never going to happen, though. Feature/power creep/super bloat is unfortunately very high in these games, and something has to give before they're completely unplayable.

In any case, MH was never a super monocled game or anything, but I just feel the series as a whole was way more interesting and could have evolved in a different direction than it did (i.e. survival, resource management and preparation instead of BIG DPS SEE MONSTER DIE FAST).

I read somewhere that someone's working on a full translation for MH 2 DOS (the PS2 game). I'm definitely giving it a shot when it comes out.
 
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Matador

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My favourite is MH4U and Generations Ultimate close to it (more content but introduced superpowers). 3 Is very good but maybe a bit too clunky.

You nailed with your post. Rise is better than World, but never catch me as much as old Monster Hunter games. For me the preparations/environment aspect was great, and if I wanted to play a fast paced combat game I would go for other games.

Its's a shame the PSP, 3DS hardware limitations. Would be great if the go back to old philosophy with the current hardware power.

Also agree with feature creep. I hated tower defense missions in Rise.
 
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Yeah, the Rampages were probably the worst new feature I've ever seen introduced in a MH game. It's good that Capcom themselves realized how bad they were and completely scrapped the idea in Sunbreak, but you still have to slog through them in the base game, which is unfortunate. They should have restricted them to the village and removed them from hub quests altogether.

I'm liking MH3U a lot. It's way better than what I remember of Tri. Controls are a little clunkier than the modern games but definitely better than say, 2G. I like the village progression even, it was done so much better than in Rise. Every monster is introduced via their own special vignette, even the small ones. These details go a long way to establishing their habitat and so on, and when you face the larger variant it's a lot more impactful. For example, when I fought the Royal Ludroth in Rise it was like whatever, but even the small Ludroths in 3U are more imposing because of the way they're introduced.

In Rise everything is bigger but feels much more inconsequential, if that makes sense. I really like the open maps in principle, and they're filled with cool details, but in practice they don't matter at all because you're just zipping around at great speed instead of having to traverse the terrain. It's barely a step above Asscreed auto parkour. You don't interact with anything, unless you're larping in a resource expedition, which has always been pointless in MH but is especially pointless in Rise. It would be very cool if the game forced you to interact with map elements to reach concrete objectives. I don't know if that changes with Sunbreak, but so far it's a huge wasted opportunity. The vast majority of players won't pay any attention at all to the care that went in building these things. It would also be very cool if monsters could interact with specific map features - imagine fighting the Rajang while climbing the Aztec pyramid in Flooded Forest; it would be a cool King Kong-like encounter. Instead you don't interact with that quadrant of the map at all while you're engaging in the game's main activities. Such a shame.

The sectioned-off maps of older games are a nuisance on the one hand, but on the other they become much more familiar to the player over time, because you're forced to pay attention to features on your screen instead of keeping your eye glued to the minimap.
 
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Matador

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Now that you brought the subject on maps, I can´t express how much I hate the ones in Monster Hunter World. Specially the labyrinth jungle, it´s very confusing in a bad, artificial way.

Also couldn't play the Coral map because triggered visual fobias in me.

The maps divided by sectors in the old games were made this way due to hardware limitations, but they are mechanically sound, well thought out and had good synergy with strategy and tactics.

Rise map design is better. But...... Wirebug
 

Elttharion

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Rise biggest problem is that the whole game is designed in 'go go go mode'. The combat is ultra fast, monsters jump around the map all the time, they never stay for long in one specific zone, you progress too fast because you need much fewer mats for equipment, etc, etc. For someone like me who liked the slow and metodical gameplay of the older monster hunters it is certainly an inferior game. Dont get me wrong its still a great game and bar the retardation with dlcs and mtx its better than most garbage being released nowadays.

One of my favorite aspects of rpgs is the downtime between combat encounters and epic moments, crafting, collecting materials, exploring the maps and interacting with the npcs, etc. Rise cut so much of the game you have almost no downtime, you are always rushing from the blacksmit to the talisman guy to a quest. In the quest you mount your doggo and run to the monster. There is barely any preparation, you dont need to stalk or locate the monster, just run and get into a 10 minute fight with a cocaine filled dinossaur who jumps around like a madmen. I can only play a few quests before I feel mentally exhausted.

Also pretty much every weapon having some kind of parry move is silly. Positioning and movement become even less of a concern when even with the glass cannon bow I can parry most monster moves.
 

Dishonoredbr

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Also pretty much every weapon having some kind of parry move is silly. Positioning and movement become even less of a concern when even with the glass cannon bow I can parry most monster moves.
I hope they remove half of weapons parry/dodge. As much i love killing monsters using Dual Blades' counter, the weapon already has better I-frames and dodges values than most weapons, why give a Dodge on top of it. IMO Counters should've been part of LongSword identity.
 

somerandomdude

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They had to speed the monsters up considerably in Rise to account for the increased mobility they gave to the player with the wire bugs, and more effective methods for dealing with the monsters using silkbinds for counter moves, iframes, or positioning. It was the easiest MH game out of any of them IMO. I prefer a slower, more methodical MH game where attacks actually have weight behind them, and you're more committed to your actions for better or for worse, and that requires a different type of skill and approach than going full ham, and bailing out on a clutch trigger with wire bugs and silkbind moves. Rise plays more like a standard ARPG than a MH game.

I'm hoping they slow the next game down to where it plays more like a traditional MH title, no wirebug bullshit. I don't have a problem with weapon arts per say, if they're reasonably well done. But giving every weapon a counter move is fucking retarded.
 
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Dishonoredbr

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Started playing Monster Hunter World yesterday and Wow.. It feels so much slower than Rise.. Switch Axe feels strange without the Amp state for the Axe transformation and Dual Blades feels like entirely different weapon. IG still feels very similar outside of canceling attack.
Rise plays more like a standard ARPG than a MH game.
Rise has a clearly Pick Up and Play feels to it. You can start Hunts fast, the monster doesn't try to run away as often as older games and the hunt is over after a few minutes, even against the strongest monsters.
 

unseeingeye

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My first MH was MH Portable 2nd G on the PSP all those years ago when a partial English translation came out. I had fun with friends but I remember getting tired of the grind after awhile, despite feeling the game was very special.
I get some of the Japanese and North American titles confused; is Portable 2nd G the same as Freedom Unite?

My first Monster Hunter game was Freedom 2 on PSP and although I was amazed by the game, I remember hitting my first wall and putting the game down in frustration, then returning it to the store to buy a different game (back when that was a regular part of life for gamers). A few months later when Freedom Unite released I bought it, thinking to myself that although it proved incredibly difficult I did very much love the gameplay and the art style, so I figured I'd try it again. My daughter had just recently been born about a month before the game released in North America, normally my memory is terrible about these kinds of details but because it came out so close to her birthday it stands out for me, and I spent many hours sitting on my old sofa playing it in between tending to her and her mothers needs. I was also an addict still back then but that is another story, though it is for me an inseparable connection with the game.

Anyway I fell in love with the game and it was an obsession for quite a while, and I was determined to clear all of the G Rank quests including the online tiers despite never once playing the game in multiplayer mode. I agree whole-heartedly with everything you said about the old games when compared with the new and have gotten into numerous arguments about it with essay length posts on YouTube in the past, invariably being grossly outnumbered considering my take on and preference of the originals are not popular opinions.

The older games I feel had an intangible, practically ineffable quality to them that are either outright absent or are present only as pale simulacra in the newer games, particular in World and Rise. Things you've mentioned already, such as the necessity of preparing for the more difficult hunts, and the limited inventory space made the game feel much more engaging, far more challenging and thus more rewarding. For instance I mostly used the Light Bowgun or the Bow back in those days, and my primary melee weapon when not adhering to my gunner playstyle or just to change it up a bit was the Great Sword, followed by the Long Sword. When you hunted as a gunner in that game, even on high rank village quests but almost always on high or G rank hub quests, you would consistently run out of ammo before felling the monster or even weakening it to where a capture becomes a possibility. This required that you learn how to craft your own ammo and each kind had its own recipe, while each monster had beyond their weak points certain elemental and material resistances which only by inference through trial and error were memorized. So given the limited inventory space you really had to be selective and forward-thinking in preparing for a hunt, especially once you acquired the powertalon and armortalon, crafted the charm variants of each and reacquired the base state items to make maximal your attack and defense before considering things like charms and consumables. And then there are the Combo books, which together with the talons and charms occupy precious inventory space yet when you run out of ammo they become absolutely vital.

So you would bring in your bag not only the maximum amount of ammo for each type, but the maximum amount of the crafting ingredients for each type, and with hub quests very often even these would be exhausted before taking down a monster and required scouting the environs looking for more materials. This really heightens the intensity of the hunt, especially when low on health, out of ammo and any healing consumables, but makes for glorious exhilaration and induces a desperate survival mentality. Those hunts that end with you firing the last handful of projectiles you have, with a minimal amount of health left which would see you cart a third time in a single blow, the clock running down with mere seconds remaining, are among the few times in my life I've actually leapt up out of my seat in exalting triumph, beaming with euphoria yet trembling like a leaf from the adrenaline and anxiety. Not even the Souls games have proved so visceral.

Much was lost in the streamlining of the core gameplay loop and the emphasis on the multiplayer mode, to where the single player games now resemble Skyrim or Fallout 4 in that they are only superficially similar to their predecessors. Hunting monsters now feels like taking a ride at a theme park, the way Fallout 4 presented its gameplay and minimal reactivity among its set pieces culminating in the penultimate postmodern caricaturizing of its own burlesque projection of its self-image, the amusement park made manifest literally in the final narrative DLC Nuka World. Rise is a decent game, but it isn't a masterpiece the way the earlier entries but especially Freedom Unite, 3U and 4U were. My own personal favorite is Portable 3rd which was only released in Japan, but back then while my cousin was still alive and hacked my PSP so that I could use it as an emulator and so forth, and I was able to play that game in Japanese, which given the similarities to Freedom Unite made translation pretty much unnecessary. Gone is the way the ferocity and sheer animal terror of the hunt and melancholy locales (the swamps, or the deserts at night) was tempered by the merry-making anime sort of hyper exaggeration that greeted you upon return to the village and especially the farm. The absence of the farm in World was one of the more egregious changes, replaced with a tiny and streamlined patch of earth right next to the market where the process of growing crafting ingredients is reduced to swift few button taps as you pass by in between quests. Seeing the farms in Freedom, Portable 3rd and Tri slowly accumulate in size and possibilities along with a growing population of felynes and other fantastic creatures was one of the best parts of the game, making the down time between hunts, gear-crafting and grinding for materials so much more welcoming.

I did play World when it first released but never bothered to try the expansion because of how put off I was by the many changes to the format I'd become so fond of. The fully open hunting areas was neat and some of the actual hunting mechanics were improved, but overall the story was abysmal and there was far too much of it, while nothing about the characters or environments made me "feel" anything significant. The graphics were certainly impressive and the movements and monster designs truly awesome, but ultimately it just didn't appeal to me the same way. And although Rise was somewhat a return to form, or at least to the portable form, the new hunting partners that you ride on (I already forget what they are called) completely changed the dynamics of hunting and made everything super sped-up, removing the cautious approach and tracking that was critical to some of the older games. I've since tried all of the original PlayStation 2 games by emulation and all of them just have a very different tone, one which I sincerely miss. With Rise I don't even remember how far I'd gotten before I bounced off of it, but I still own it and have a Switch so eventually I intend to finish it and try the expansion. I just don't expect they will ever manage to recapture the spirit of the original console and portable games, and due to the immensely greater success they've had with the newer iterations, it is almost certain that the effort to do so no longer even exists.
 

unseeingeye

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Oh man I completely forgot to mention how much I do love MH Generations! That one was the last truly great game in my opinion, and I thought the hunter arts unique to it were such an excellent addition. Not that I would necessarily be interested in seeing them return as a basic feature, rather they worked for me as an isolated affair, as yet another complex mechanic to spend hours pouring over the minutiae of and designing the perfect damage dealing hunter. I especially enjoyed the aerial style combined with the Light Bowgun; being able to flip off of monsters and blast them from the air as you fall back to your feet is such a satisfying trick to pull off. And using the Switch Axe in that game is just so much fun. Just thinking about it has me wanting to get back to using my Switch just to replay it.
 
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is Portable 2nd G the same as Freedom Unite?
Yep, it's the Japanese release of MHFU. That game was very special.

Great post btw, I agree with everything you wrote. I didn't play MHGU much but I'm pretty sure the Wirebug/switch skills in Rise are descended directly from that game's Weapon Arts. They're great fun for the most part, but in Rise at least yet another reason why the game is way too easy. Monster design simply hasn't caught up to the hunters' multitude of options.

Speaking of Rise, since last writing in this thread I've reached Sunbreak (currently on MR4) and although there's more of everything, I don't think it's much better than the base game, at least not so far. The new monsters have all been very easy - I don't think a duo (I'm always playing with a RL buddy who's never played MH before) should be able to beat new monsters on their first try without carting even once, yet that's what has happened 90% of the time (we just beat Lunagaron). We're also pretty old (I'm 43) so it's not like we're young players on Adderall or anything. The game's just way too easy. We were laughing at the 50 minute limit, which at this point is a completely unnecessary concession/nod to earlier games. Most hunts are over in 10-15 on the first try.

I guess the biggest new functionality of the expansion is them doing away with village quests altogether and allowing solo players to team up with NPC hunters on regular hunts and unique missions as well. It's alright for what it is, but I'm really not interested.

Just last week I was playing MH3U and the first hub Qurupeco carted me 3 times. There's just a gulf of difference between old and new games. Also, in that game, the village doesn't feel completely braindead/pointless as it does in Rise, there's a nice progression and you really feel like you're growing as a player together with everything else in the game. It's not just nostalgia either, because I never played 3U back in the day.

Anyway, as I said, it's probably a moot point to lament the direction that the series has taken in recent years. It's making Capcom a lot of money and it's still a good game, especially from a quick pick up and play perspective and, as you said, the multiplayer focus - although I'd argue that there has always been a multiplayer focus in the game, it's just that in earlier entries the exclusively single player aspect was much better thought out, and the progression felt more rewarding.
 

unseeingeye

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...although I'd argue that there has always been a multiplayer focus in the game, it's just that in earlier entries the exclusively single player aspect was much better thought out, and the progression felt more rewarding.
Yea, you're right actually and I realized that my perspective on this is not entirely informed given that I've always done hub missions as a solo player. I had a friend years ago who lived in Tokyo and we kept trying to make plans to play Freedom Unite together using some means to bypass the region lock and whatever else was necessary; we were mostly set to get but the time difference and my lack of enthusiasm ultimately led to it never happening. She was younger than me and had more experience playing multiplayer and was excited to show me how it was, I'm 37 today and back then I would have been about 25 while she was I think 17 or 18.

So I never actually got around to trying it, and since then the only time I've ever played multiplayer was a single instance when my daughter and I played Rise about a year ago, I remember it was right around the announcement of the expansion. My daughter was born like I mentioned before right before Freedom Unite was released in North America, and today she seriously loves Monster Hunter, though for her given her age she only has significant direct experience with World and Rise, at least as far a I'm aware. She grew up watching me playing Freedom Unite as a toddler on PSP (and Tactics Ogre), and I still remember vividly the day she and her older brother were watching me play the original version of 3U, Tri I think it was called? It was during the first time you encounter Lagiacrus in the wild, when you are deep in the second underwater zone and it suddenly appears and starts chasing you and you have to desperately flee then once you get out onto dry land and think you're safe, you turn around and see it climb right up out of the water onto the beach and with increased ferocity come howling towards you. I was playing it on my sons Wii and it was on a big screen television and he was sitting on the floor next to me a few feet away, and in the middle of that flight sequence he ran out of the room and hid, hahah. My daughter thought it was hilarious and she was maybe 3 years old, he is 4 years older and afterwards tried so hard to play cool and act like that wasn't why he left, haha.

Anyway I agree with your points again, especially about 3U, that game is seriously awesome. I actually kind of didn't like it that much at first, or rather I felt it wasn't quite as good as Freedom 2 and Freedom Unite, the original Tri version I mean. The environments in that game are second to none (especially that one with the Mayan style pyramid covered in dense jungle), the third bowgun variant was an interesting mechanic that never returned even in the G Rank version, the village was so cool and I especially loved the Desert Island "free roam" mode where it introduced an active day-night cycle that changed which monsters were active along with the return of the seasonal and daily variables determining monster population and temperament from the original console games. It was playing 3U that made me realize how much of a masterpiece that game always was, and the only complaint about that one for me is that they got rid of the mix-and-match bowgun mechancis and that free roam day-night cycle. You can still visit Desert Island at night but it is a predetermined thing; I can't remember but didn't they also remove the cyclical daily patterns with the breeding seasons and the feeding periods, etc? Both versions of it are among the best of the entire series, and really I would have to acknowledge it is mostly because it was my introduction that Freedom 2 and Unite are my favorite. I actually found my old 3DS XL a few weeks ago and along with my PS Vita it works, and I still have the cartridges for 3U, 4U and GU for it. I started up a 4U game because that was the one that didn't finish and sort of fell off the series for a few years, and I'd always heard how it was so many peoples favorite. I should start over again and return to it because I didn't get very far in my last attempt. I did get far when I first played it, but like I said never finished it. I might actually make that my next game! Shame there isn't a Switch re-release of it, that would be amazing.
 
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Yeah, I think Capcom are really sleeping on a great opportunity to re-release both MH4U and MHGU on Steam at a decent price, I'm sure they'd sell great. On the other hand, maybe they don't want to self-cannibalize and perhaps they consider that it would hurt the sales of their current products, I don't really know.

These days I play everything through emulation, 3U is perfectly emulated through Cemu (in fact it's way better than the original, higher resolution and quicker loadtimes); MHGU (Switch ver.) via Yuzu is likewise better than playing it on the original console (4k and there's a 60fps patch); 4U is not quite perfect because Citra isn't at the level of these other emulators, but it's still very good. I don't care about multiplayer in the older games, but it's there if you want it on 4U at least.

Great to hear about your story with the game, and how your kids grew up around you playing it and your daughter now loves it. Really cool. Did she ever try the spin-off jrpg series, I think it's called Monster Hunter Stories?
 

unseeingeye

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You know, I don't think she has tried the Monster Hunter Stories games! I know I bought one of them at some point for her Switch (we have two, the one the kids use and the one my wife and I use because the kids are constantly ruining the joysticks with that stupid joycon drift) but I'll have to ask her if she's ever tried it.

Thank you very much for reading my post and for your kind response, I appreciate it very much. We seem to have very similar perspectives on the series and I've often wondered similarly about why they don't re-release those classic games for PC or modern consoles, and I think you must be right because it doesn't seem to make sense otherwise. Like you I mostly use emulation as well, I treated myself to a powerful gaming laptop about a year and half ago and have it set up with a widescreen HDR monitor and external keyboard and mouse, speakers and headphones and it has been the greatest gaming experiences of my life since then. Mostly I use LaunchBox and have an obscene amount of games and older computers, consoles and arcades emulated on it and the majority of my time spent gaming is done through that frontend. It is the only way I've managed to reliably play the first two Monster Hunter console games, and I've been exploring obscure JRPGs and such for Sega Saturn, PlayStation, FM Towns, PC-98 and so on, emulation has gotten just crazy in how far its come since I started messing with emulators back in the 90s, it is a very fortunate moment in time where this stuff is all still easily accessible and I pray that doesn't come to an abrupt end any time soon, though the signs are already on the wall.

I've actually tried the Citra emulator once, I can't quite remember which game it was (may have even been 4U before I found my handheld!) but I do recall the split screen 3D effect requiring some messing with, it has been a while though and I really don't remember what it involved. I imagine that even though you are playing through emulation, that with a game like Monster Hunter you are using a controller? Or do you use a keyboard? As much as I prefer PC gaming I do keep an Xbox One controller made specially for PC at hand and plug it in for certain games like these. Maybe it is because that is what I am accustomed to for games like Monster Hunter and Dark Souls but that kind of intense action combat with dozens of instant variables all going on at once forces me to use a controller otherwise I'd be a mess.
 

somerandomdude

Learned
Joined
May 26, 2022
Messages
650
Started playing Monster Hunter World yesterday and Wow.. It feels so much slower than Rise.. Switch Axe feels strange without the Amp state for the Axe transformation and Dual Blades feels like entirely different weapon. IG still feels very similar outside of canceling attack.
You just listed reasons for why I prefer World over Rise. It's a more methodical and grounded game, actions actually have real weight behind them. In Rise there's a lack of commitment to the actions of weapons that were traditionally heavier commit weapons action wise. Switch axe was one of them. You really have know your match ups to play switch axe in world without abusing stuff like the rocksteady mantle. The biggest gripes about World are the mantles, and clutch claw (Iceborne).

The reason why Rise was an easier game than World is that I rarely had to worry about committing to actions or positions. I could do what I want and only react to what was occurring on the screen because the game gave me soo many tools that made that approach viable. I could turn my brain off, and let impulse take over. At no point did the game ever truly force me to learn movesets and patterns, and to be perfectly honest, I found many of them to be quite familiar on returning monsters anyway.

There's weapons like Charge Blade that got totally, completely and objectively soyfied in Rise. It's a zero dopamine weapon in Rise. When you guard point a monster attack, and land an SAED in MH World, where the axe drops on the monsters head, and you watch phials rip and roar through the monster, likely flinching the monster, or possibly KOing (for impact phials), it really feels like you landed a truly meaty hit. The same feeling when you head snipe a monster with a true charge slash with greatsword, the visual and audio effects when you land the hit which made it feel like you really just crashed that monster's face with an attack that mattered. An attack that was worth the commitment.
 
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Joined
Aug 10, 2012
Messages
5,871
I do recall the split screen 3D effect requiring some messing with
Yep, you have to use a patch on the game through Citra to disable the 3D stuff on 4U or it will look all fuzzy. It works perfectly as far as I can tell, though. And yes, I do use pads for console stuff, I have a variety of pads - my favourite is probably the 8bitdo M30, which resembles the old Megadrive 6 button pad, I use it for everything pre-analog stick, 2d platformers especially, and it feels great. For the more recent stuff and most PC ports I use a wireless Xbox One controller, the dpad is awful but it doesn't matter that much. Otherwise the controller is well built and has served me well over many years.

In other Rise news, I've progressed a little further into Sunbreak and the game is starting to get a lot tougher. Astalos, Seregios and Magma Almudron were all pretty hard. I'm playing hammer and the really fast monsters are hard to get a read on and bonk on the head. Honestly though the hammer is a little boring, the switch skills aren't great. I'm thinking of going back to GS, which is what I used in the base game, or maybe some other weapon. Or maybe I just need to spend some time figuring out Courage stance.
 
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Dishonoredbr

Liturgist
Joined
Jun 13, 2019
Messages
2,095
There's weapons like Charge Blade that got totally, completely and objectively soyfied in Rise
Charge Blades does seems really different compared to Rise, lowkey i want to give a try. Idk if it's something in the moveset is different but it feels good to use compared to Rise.

IMO so far the only weapon that's objectively better so far in Rise compared to World is Dual Blades. Arch Demon Mode feels terrible without the Demon mode dashes.
Switch axe was one of them. You really have know your match ups to play switch axe in world without abusing stuff like the rocksteady mantle

Especialy because in World you have to roll to Morph without taking 30 years.
 

Halfling Rodeo

Educated
Joined
Dec 14, 2023
Messages
963
Dual Blades feels like entirely different weapon
As a DB user I can't play them in Rise. World it's one constant flow and you never stop moving, it's all about being in the right place at the right time. In Rise the moves don't flow into each other and it feels so clunky. I had to switch weapon entirely they felt so bad.
There's weapons like Charge Blade that got totally, completely and objectively soyfied in Rise
Charge Blades does seems really different compared to Rise, lowkey i want to give a try. Idk if it's something in the moveset is different but it feels good to use compared to Rise.

IMO so far the only weapon that's objectively better so far in Rise compared to World is Dual Blades. Arch Demon Mode feels terrible without the Demon mode dashes.
Switch axe was one of them. You really have know your match ups to play switch axe in world without abusing stuff like the rocksteady mantle

Especialy because in World you have to roll to Morph without taking 30 years.
Switch axe got severely punished by World's mechanics. It's a shame really.

Did you guys know they ported the 3DS games to the Switch?
 

Damned Registrations

Furry Weeaboo Nazi Nihilist
Joined
Feb 24, 2007
Messages
14,983
On the subject of map interaction: I feel like one of the biggest declines MHW brought was the option to simply fast travel to camps. It really trivialized finding/chasing the monsters. You just see them on the map, teleport to the nearest camp and then you're like 15 seconds away through a route you've already used a million times. There's no need to dynamically route your way through the map. Probably part of why the jungle feels so mazelike; you're never really forced to learn it. Just bungle around until you stumble into the monster or it teleports itself next to another campsite.
 

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