Monster Hunter World is an ARPG with an emphasis on fighting boss style monster solo or in a team. Where the players use the parts of the monster they slay to craft new gear, weapons, and items. It is very quest ordinated with the main storyline and a bunch of side questing to do as well.
Questing Loop
Monster Hunter World does have a very pronounced questing loop. Since you are only based out of a couple of locations and enter into the few different zones on quests this was expected. While usually when people think about questing loops it’s viewed in a negative way. I find it very fitting for how the overall game works.
Expedition
When you arrive in a new area you get to go on an expedition to first explore and discover different parts of that zone. The game would give you a little bit of lore, a nice cutscene, and have you discover different areas of the map. They even gave the player a purpose for doing this first.
What was fun for me was not knowing how these expeditions would go. You enter usually under a pretense of one thing and after some discover things might end up changing mid expedition. While other times everything was expected. I liked the fact that the game might toss you some curve balls and break what expectations you had going into something.
Preparation
After the expedition portion, you end up getting into a normal routine for each quest in that area. You prepare for that quest in question and then you go out and usually slay some badass creature. You collect those parts and progress forward. If that fails you take what you learned and better prepare for your next attempt.
The more times you encounter a creature from tracking its tracks to gathering things like feathers or scales it drops. The more information you are able to gather. It also speeds up the process of you tracking down that create the next time you encounter it.
The game provides some detailed information once you have gathered enough information on a monster. This helps when deciding what type of gear to wear vs the damage it deals, weakness a creature has and other important information.
The monsters you end up fighting can deal with all kinds of different effects on your character. Some of them might light you on fire which is easy to deal with by just rolling to put it out. While others could poison and if you didn’t pack some antidote or nulberry to counteract any other effects a fight suddenly becomes extremely challenging. Which I personally like as it pays to come prepared.
Right before I go out on any quest my final stop in getting prepared was going to the Canteen and having Meowscular Chef prepare a meal. The game has a bunch of different short term stat boosts you can gain by eating these overly sized and crazy prepared meals for gaining attack, defense, and health.
Questing
Once the quest is underway and you enter them solo or with a group of friends and the timer starts to tick. You only get so much time to track down the objective, slay or perform its object, and get out with the loot.
For the most part, you get around fifty minutes and I found that to be more than ample enough time even soloing. Monsters can leave the map much sooner than that but usually what you are after for the quest will stick around for a while. I liked the fact they put a time limit just to keep the player from getting over aggravated if they came underprepared and geared to face the challenge.
The more you have run into something by tracking it the quicker and easier it is to find again in the future. The game gives you what is called Scoutflies that not only highlight areas of interest as you get near things. They can also lock onto the trail of a monster and show you a path to it.
I do wish it was a little more involved other than you running around a zone until you have found the right tracks and get taken right to the best you are hunting after investigating a couple of them by just clicking on them. There really no player skill involved other than you gaining research points and leveling up the knowable of said monster.
Once you have tracked something down the exciting part unfolds. Unlike in other games where the main fight might only take a few minutes. Depending on how well you are at using weapon combos, the type of weapon you have, and how geared you are. These fights can go on for quite some time.
Game knowable also plays a vital role in these combat encounters. As you are dogging attacks, healing damage taken, reshaping your weapon mid-combat, and curing yourself. You can target certain areas of the larger monsters and break them or even in some cases cut them right off!
Perhaps you are dealing with a horned dragon. He is not only attacking with sweeping tail attacks but charging at you with his nasty looking horns. Depending on what parts can be broken off of that dragoon. You might just be able to cut off its tail and skin it for parts, along with, cutting off its horns. Either of these reduces the effectiveness and damage when said dragon attacks with using those parts of its body.
I absolutely loved the design element of fights in this matter. You could make what would otherwise be a rippy fight with massive blows of damage if you don’t evade in time far more manageable if a mistake is made. On top of that, you get extra loot from breaking off different parts some of which are required in crafting.
As the fight progresses along the monster will also run to a few different locations as well. Often times it will lure you back to its nest. Along with any terrain where it could gain benefit from like into a muddy patch of water where it covers itself in the mud!
In the later stages of the game, you also don’t have to kill everything either if that not your kind of thing. You can try and capture a monster. This can conclude the fight much faster, provide more loot, and be a different way to go about the game as well.
There is just something epic about having each quest you go on having a high chance of a ten minute or longer fight with a massive creature. It certainly did give you a sense of abolishment when you got that kill or capture and the quest was over.
Once all is done you return back to the preparation part of the loop. Where you take anything you gained from the last quest and craft new gear, weapons, or make improvements. In the early and late game having different kinds of gear and weapons can help as each encounter is a bit different.
Optional Questing And Bounties
Outside of the main quest, there is a bunch of other questings to do as well. Some of it can be completed while you are about and about on other missions. While other side quests you are being sent to zones with it being a primary target.
While you can in the wild run into a former monster you have killed and had another go at them. You can also pick up quests that let you repeat that kill a number of times. Often times when you are trying craft gear you might need a drop you didn’t get or just didn’t get enough of something.
There is also stuff that falls more into line with what you expect most quests to be in a game. Go out and gather herbs or iron. Gather and deliver goods to a certain NPC. Kill an X amount of a certain type of monster.
All these side quests add a number of hours to the game. While you don’t have to do them there is a big chance you end up doing these tasks anyways. So you might as well pick up the extra quest for some rewards. Not to mention they can give you some needed resources like armor spheres needed in upgrading armor.
In the late-game, once a player has finished off the main storyline these tend to be the bread and butter for players who wish to keep playing. I myself always just picked up as many as I could every time I got back into town. It was nice getting the main kill for a storyline and going to turn in five other quests.
Crafting
So much potential for greatness and sadly a part of me died inside after what transpired midgame. Both the early game and the late game can be amazing for crafting. After all the whole point of slaying some crazy sized creature and cutting its tail off is so you can craft with it!
The game has a lot of different kinds of armor sets. Some of them provide just simple armor value upgrades over the lower tier ones. While others have different positive and negative resistances. Making them perfect in some fights and deadly to wear in others.
Amour than can be further improved to have better stats if you have the required materials. With the ultimate goal of unlocking skills that boost health, reduce damage taken and have other effects.
You also have weapons with an interesting upgrading system of going down the tech tree and upgrading different parts of it if there is a connection. I personally would have loved to see it more open and not be so l limited by their needing to be a connection to upgrade into. There are however fourteen base types of weapon to choose from and each type has dozens of different kinds in each one.
The game does a really good job of giving the player a wide range of playstyles with just how many weapons there are in this game. You have simple things like a sword and shield which is what I used for a large amount of my gameplay. Much slower two-handed weapons like greatswords, hammers, and lances. You even have things like bows and blowguns for those who enjoy ranged combat as well.
Early in-game you are killing monsters and using their body parts to craft new items. Which is fantastic and I love how they incorporated that element into the crafting system. It really gives you a reason to go out and seek a monster for crafting materials you want.
The part I dint like is you are making all this gear which was great. Then you can talk to the armory that is like “here some cheap OP gear you can just buy.” It’s better by miles than anything you will have for a very long time. It’s got a bunch of resistances on it and no negative ones as well. You are no longer crafting gear or needing to switch gear depending on the fight.
You just have this one set of armor, which is already upgraded to have skills. It is sold to you for a couple of hundred money each which is super cheap under the pretense that it will help you during the main quest. Because you know dragons are tuff and this is how the game decided to handle that part.
Yep, that BLOWS. It broke this cycle for a while of needing to craft upgrades. Everything you were killing no longer had a crafting purpose for that moment.
The Defender gear which does look amazing I’ll admit feels like it was some kind of catch up mechanic for those joining the game late. I would not have an issue with it if Monster Hunter World was a decade-old game and there was so much content they just wanted to the player to wiz past the older main questline. This game, however, came out in 2018.
With all of that out of the way. There is at least a point where you can start crafting better gear. It does, however, feel like it was after some kind of expansion to the game. As once you get to that part of the game the NPCs keep bringing up the point that it’s “been a while.” No, it has not been for me. Even more so since I was just more or less handed OP gear to go slay dragons in.
You also have a number of other items you can craft in-game. Like health potions, nets, and just general stuff you take along with you on questing. You can even roast meat you farmed if you wanted to. For the most part things like health and rations, I earned enough from playing to not need craft any in the short term.
Outside of this strange middle ground where you find yourself not needing to craft any gear. I do like the crafting system overall. You don’t have to craft all the gear and depending on what kind of skills a set comes with. It can even fit into different playstyle a player has.
Final Thoughts
I loved the epic battles and wish I had the time to keep playing. There is just something about getting crushed if you were not prepared enough for a fight. Along with fights taking some time to play out and you sometimes need to dodge away from them to sharpen a weapon or heal. Those fights are really what this game is about and I enjoyed them. Even more so when some of the monsters were just so odd looking!
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Screenshots were taken and content was written by @Enjar about the game Monster Hunter World
