Monster Hunter Rise- Living up to its name!

It’s been 4 years since the release of the switch. Every time I feel like the console is heading towards irrelevancy. It keeps coming up with some good games at the absolute last moment. Then again this year might just be the year for Nintendo. With its insane roster of Mario Bowsers fury, Monster Hunter Rise and the upcoming Shin Megami Tensei game. Anyway let’s get into the cream of my crop, the butter to my bread and the reason I skipped work for a whole week.

I grew up strictly with Nintendo and I am deeply ashamed that I never played any of the monster hunter games in the past. This being my first Monster Hunter game gave me quite a lot of things to learn. First of all I just want to say how straightforward this game is. There isn’t much lore and it totally lives up to its name. Monster Hunter a game about hunting monsters, no shenanigans, that is just it.

A lot of games have this identity crisis about what they are and should they be more than what they need to be. This causes a very big divide between what they are trying to show. What the customers are getting (looking at you bio shock infinite). Monster Hunter stayed true to its root and kept improving on it as the years went by. I have to say with full honesty that this game actively kept me on my toes more so than any other game on the switch.

Gameplay: THERE ARE SO MANY WAYS TO PLAY THIS GAME. 14 different weapons, each weapon have different growth trees which you need to grind materials and have status elements to play with to suit your personal needs. We got fire, water, electric, ice, poison, blast, dragon and sleep. Pick ya type, this is Pokémon but with lesser steps because guess what? You feel like you want more than one type?

Just give the rest of the typings to your pet dog and pet cat called palamutes and palicoes who are amazing support creatures. So the game isnt really rocket science but it is science. You see a monster, blip blap boom whack it, sack it, hit it, beat it, pierce it, sing to it (there is a musical instrument as a weapon, dont ask me ask japan). You dont like getting up close? Shoot it from a distance like a coward, who gonna judge you? It’s really fun to try out all the different weapons and combination to see what is your type. I went for the sword and shield because I am a noob and the guide told me it was easy.

There are a lot of different monsters whose difficulty amps up the more you progress throughout the game. It’s a simple but effective difficulty climb as you slowly learn what to do. I do gotta admit that the game really shows you what to do pretty well. The only time i had to check guides was when i was looking for mining nodes. You can kill monsters or put them to sleep to defeat them and their designs are just voila, beautiful. We got dinosaurs, bears, dragons, bulls, monkeys, monkey bulls, dragon dinosaurs, super saiyan bears, super saiyan dragons the list goes on. You love animals? Too bad they die here and you will love comboing your way through them. The multiplayer isn’t anything too complicated, unga bunga your way through the opponents with your allies. Try not to be that one guy who dies.

Oh but it isnt just attacking monsters, you gotta defend your village from monsters. They implemented a tower defense kind of game where you set up traps and defenses against hordes and hordes of monsters called rampage quests. It is done masterfully as there are so many mechanics into it and learning while you panic is just another part of the fun.
You feeling lazy and dont want to do the all the work? Hop onto multiplayer and be the lazy degenerate you were meant to be and watch your teammates do all the work. Heck you can even troll by destroying all installments and ruin your teammates experience which I have totally not done.

If I had one complaint I would say that if you arent a very flexible player who is willing to experiment with all the different kinds of weapons you will get burnt out real fast. The monsters get kinda predictable in the sense they charge you, bash you, jump on you and worst of all tail slam you. You know what? Ignore this problem, this is for pansies. Did you know you can ride on a frikkin monster and use it to fight another one? Yeah thats how crazy this game is
8.5/10

Visuals: Often times I am not usually bothered with attaching my switch to the television. It looks just fine on handheld although it does looks spectacular on the tv. I guess it does dip in performance whenever a lot of things are going on in the screen but for the most part I cannot complain. The cut scenes were absolutely beautiful and detailed. Before every monster hunt they play a short movie with a poem to describe the monster which is just fuel for my soul. Every monster has been drawn in acnient Japanese fashion which makes for some pretty dope artwork. 9/10 for me.

It’s been 2 months since the release of the game. It already has become one of my favorite video games of the nintendo switch. Of course when it comes to the question whether it’s a 60 dollar I would say not yet. The updates keep rolling out and it will be a very smooth experience because more monsters just means more content. Overall rating 8/10 great game, pc users should be able to get it next year and switch users I encourage yall to get it.