Monster Hunter Wilds Review: Is This the Ultimate RPG Adventure of the Year?

Dive into our comprehensive Monster Hunter Wilds review, the latest RPG masterpiece that redefines open-world exploration and monster-slaying action. From breathtaking visuals and deep customization to seamless multiplayer options and an immersive narrative, this game promises an adventure like no other. But does it live up to the hype or stumble under its own weight? Keep reading as we uncover the triumphs and flaws that shape this thrilling experience!

Monster Hunter Wilds Review Pros:

• Beautiful graphics.
• 130.91GB download size.
• Steam achievements.
• Full controller support.
• Cross-play option.
• 3 save slots.
• Subtitle options – on and off, text size, background, speaker names both in and out of cutscenes, and closed captions.
• Anonymize other player names option.
• Controller settings – five button icon choices,
• NVIDIA reflex low latency, and GPU clock speed options.
• The frame rate can be capped or uncapped.
• HDR support.
• Graphics settings – overall quality, cutscene graphics, ray tracing, upscaling, anti-aliasing, and v-sync.
• You can further tweak the quality of every aspect of the scenery from fur to snow, sand, faces, and water effects.
• Your PC specs come up in the menus along with CPU, GPU, and Vram bars to show usage.
• FREE benchmark test download on the Steam store.
• A handful of FREE downloads like a starter pack with potions and materials.
• Accessibility options – Colourblind mode, arachnophobia assistance, auditory, visual, and motion sickness reduction.
• Monster Hunter RPG gameplay.
• Tutorial pop-ups as you play along with practice arenas.
• You can change the game speech to Japanese.
• Mouse and keyboard support and you can remap and edit the controls.
• Capcom ID link support and you get a reward.
• A full character creator for you and your Palico.
• Save, upload, and download character designs.
• Import BETA save data like your character for example.
• Palico is your cat-like companion.
• A massive open world where you can explore at your leisure and peril.
• The story is a lot more front and center this time around.
• Awesome cutscenes that are a combination of FMV and in-game.
• Full voice cast.
• A full 3D game world with 360-degree camera control.
• Tutorial pop-up options – display all, display some, and no tutorial pop-ups, and set if a tutorial can repeat if necessary.
• Login bonuses.
• You see your customized character in cutscenes and it changes as your armor does.
• Can skip cutscenes and speed up in-game interactions.
• 14 types of weapons in the game – great sword, sword and shield, hammer, lance, switch axe, insect glaive, heavy bow gun, long sword, dual blades, hunting horn, gun lance, charge blade, light bow gun, and bow.
• You get to pick your starting weapon.
• Save when you want.
• Seikret is your mount, he can run, jump, and fly. It’s possible to fire your weapons when on his back.
• You can pause the game in solo play.
• A cool thing is Seikret can follow a scent and you set him to follow it automatically and you can set the speed, this is cool as it frees you up to manage equipment or fight monsters or scavenge.
• Attack a part of a monster repeatedly to open up a wound, you can then focus (lock on) on the wound and attack it.
• With your grappling hook, you can grab and retrieve resources and materials from the world.
• Tracer shots can stick to the enemy and then make it easier for future attacks to hit that spot, this is more for ranged players.
• SOS flare is what you fire into the sky to call in random players for help. If no one joins after time then Ai-controlled characters will join you.
• Support players (Ai-controlled characters) join and will stay until real players join and then they will leave, and vice versa if a real player leaves a supporting character can take their place.
• Four-player Co-op support maximum.
• After finishing a quest you have 50 seconds to do what you want or you can press end now.
• End of the quest breakdown where you can send collected and earned rewards back to your chest or sell all, you then see the size of the monster, earned Guild points, cash reward, and any EXP your Palico has earned.
• When a quest is over you just carry on out in the open world, no going back to camp or anything like the older games.
• Call your Seikret at any time and he scoops you up instantly.
• The environment can play a huge part, you can pull rocks down, use vines, and generally use them to your advantage.
• No animations for picking up resources and materials it’s just a button press.
• The flies you have with you will help guide you to quests but also highlight resources and materials.
• A lot of memorable characters.
• Multiple choice questioning.
• Your character is fully voiced and an active part of the group, none of this silent protagonist jazz.
• Training camp lets you try out weapons, see damage output and you get infinite ammo.
• Unlock and use fast travel points all over the world.
• Play how you want.
• Materials and resources in the world have pop-up text so you know what it is before you grab it.
• Missions can end when out in the open and rewards etc scroll down the screen or… You can skip them with a button press.
• Damage numbers bang up on the screen as you attack and get hit.
• Eat meals and learn recipes to eat them and get health back but also buffs attached to the meal.
• Stamina-based system where the bar goes down with hit, attacks, and running.
• Health bar system and you can get meals, and items to replenish your health.
• Bow users can press a button to equip and unequip coating to shots like power, electricity, toxic, etc.
• The Smithy lets you spend cash (Zenny) and materials to craft weapons and armor for you and your Palico aswel as upgrade-equipped gear.
• A wishlist is a system where you wishlist equipment or weapons you want to craft and it will create a shopping list and you can view it in the world along with notifications as to when you have retrieved items needed.
• Every piece of armor has two versions and you can mix and match along with changing the color of elements of the armor.
• Seamless cutscenes integration.
• Palicos can join you in fights and add buffs or take aggro, you can also leave them at camp and they will automatically train in order to learn new skills and level up.
• Your tent lets you change gear, manage your quick access pouch, and manage your Palico. You can change what music plays when in your tent.
• Clan support but in the game they are called squads.
• When in the camp you can see other real-world players running around and doing tasks.
• Limited bounties populate every so often (there is a timer at the top) and have set rewards and criteria.
• You can play the game solo without ever playing with another real-world player.
• Private lobbies exist for friends only.
• Before heading out on missions you can check quest boards and lobbies.
• The online solo play option lets you still send SOS flares and you can still pause the game.
• A Slinger is a makeshift slingshot that can shoot a variety of pods to do particular things like get a monster’s attention or blind them etc.
• In such a huge vast living world, monsters can and will fight each other.
• The map uncovers as you play and is populated with icons and points of interest.
• A mini-map shows items and points of interest along with mission markers.
• Out of combat, you don’t use stamina.
• A lot of the little things are more streamlined like you don’t need button presses to vault rocks and climb vines.
• The long grass and bush can hide you and are more effective before a monster gets aggro.
• HR is your Hunter Rank and determines who you can hunt and what is available to you.
• You can have a primary and secondary weapon so in essence you can carry two weapons and swap when near or on your Seikret.
• The monster field guide fills in with monsters you have hunted displays information on them and has your biggest kill and capture stat on their entry.
• The map lets you place markers which in turn lets your Seikret follow it.
• When just roaming the world at any point you can choose a roaming monster and create a quest to hunt it.
• Full crafting model for creating potions, and cooking meet and you can set it to automate the process.
• You get reports of monsters being in the area or that are leaving soon, and the prompt allows you to quickly set to a quest.
• Each weapon has its own skill tree for crafting upgrades, it will let you add to the wishlist and add new abilities and passive to a weapon.
• Your Palicos will collect resources and materials for you and call out sights and collectibles.
• A pop-up camp tent can be deployed within the world and acts as a fast travel point, a place to manage inventory and if you faint you start back here.
• You have transmog in the game. (transmog being layered armor where you can change what your armor looks like without changing the stats of the equipped piece).
• Find scraps, footprints, etc to start hunting and identifying new monsters.
• Fishing is in the game and you are free to cast your rod wherever you want and move the lure around, fish move around and look realistic especially compared to the old game. You can freely rotate the camera aswel to help.
• Full emoji and text-based text notifications.
• Bait will affect what you can improve your chances of catching, luckily the description tells you and you can quickly swap between bait types when your fishing rod is out.
• Whetstone is infinite and always on you. It is used to sharpen your melee weapons that dull with use.
• Both main and optional. Side quests to take on.
• Speak with Smithy to get help with recommendations for gear.
• Pop-up tents can be damaged and destroyed by monsters, you can also dismantle or move tents along with customizing them using Guild points.
• In multiplayer games, you get awards at the end like did the most damage, etc.
• The camera can zoom in on an area or point of interest.
• Unlock nameplate entries.
• Seikrat can be renamed, and fully customized.
• After a multiplayer fight, the other players leave straight away so you can remain an introvert.
• The capture net lets you capture endemic life in the world.
• Areas can be hot or cold so drinking the opposite drink will stop your stamina and health being affected.
• The world can actually change depending on fights like a monster in the sand can smash down and flatten dunes or cause dips, in water, you can get caught bu torrents and hit by waves.

Monster Hunter Wilds Review Cons:

• Shader loading can happen periodically and it takes ages.
• Loading up the game is not as quick as you would expect. (this is via big picture mode)
• No controller layouts/icons for the Nintendo Switch Pro controller.
• Couldn’t see if the game used any of the benchmark settings and the game itself doesn’t have one.
• Pausing the game is not a button press it’s an option in one of the menus.
• The Smithy menus are initially very daunting with lots of bars and icons.
• It takes a while to get used to the new menus and layouts.
• The login bonus is not mentioned and it’s only by luck I saw it.
• There are a lot of menus to go through.
• It’s weird to me to see Palicos and Felines talking.
• The camera can go a bit crazy in tight spots.
• If you are new to the series then there is a lot to take in and a lot of the game mechanics are only explained within the manuals.
• You don’t have access to weapon transmog. (transmog being layered armor where you can change what your armor looks like without changing the stats of the equipped piece).
• Fishing takes a lot of practice and this game doesn’t prompt you to cast like it does in the older games.
• A lot of radial menus so you need to remember combos to know how to access menus quickly.
• It’s not easy to always put tools away fishing is more a case of leaving the area to remove the rod.
• You have to play the main missions to unlock new parts of the game.
• My biggest gripe is just not knowing where to go to do simple tasks and not having easy and convenient boxes to unload and load items.

Related Post: DODONPACHI SAIDAIOUJOU Review

Monster Hunter Wilds:

Official website.

Developer: Capcom

Publisher: Capcom

Store Links –

Steam