Monster Hunter Wilds Review

These boots are made for huntin' (and also out of the bones of my enemies).

Seven full years after the massively successful Monster Hunter: World seemed to take the gaming world by storm, Monster Hunter Wilds arrives on consoles and PC, attempting to recapture that mainstream success. While Monster Hunter Rise released in-between the two on Nintendo Switch (and eventually PC) to great success in its own right, Wilds is unambiguously a spiritual successor to World, sharing many design similarities – sometimes to its detriment.

Publisher: CAPCOM Co., Ltd.

Developer: CAPCOM Co., Ltd.

Platform: Played on PC

Availability: Released on February 28, 2025 for PlayStation 5, Windows PC, and Xbox Series X/S

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Monster Hunter Wilds starts off with a very brief introduction — opening with a group of people fleeing from a then unnamed, unseen monster, taking refuge in a cave. It’s here that a child, Nata, is sent further into the cave alone, in order to give him a chance of escape. Nata is eventually free, and makes his way to the edge of the desert, where he is found by some hunters. A short explanation and monster attack later, and you’re off to the races. Riding a big dinosaur-bird-thing (Seikret), you’re chased by a horde of worm-like monsters and trying to save a little girl. While this first scene is an exciting introduction into our new world, it also shows us a bit about how the game will play out. See, despite the show of it all, and despite the tutorials introducing you to some mechanics as you go, nothing that happens here matters or is really under your control — you don’t have full control of the seikret and your attacks are meaningless.

It’s truly unfortunate that most of the story plays out in much the same fashion. Long sequences of forced walking through new environments are spent with the player unable to control their own direction or movement — slowly plodding along as your handler gives you the latest exposition dump. For a game with such large and lovingly-crafted maps, it sure spends an awful lot of time making sure you can’t play it. This seems to be a holdover from World, as it also forced these walking segments on you frequently, while Rise did away with them in favor of more read dialogue and cutscenes. The game does also have more traditional cutscenes, and they’re frankly so far beyond anything else the series has done, I’m almost shocked they were as sparse as they were. In some respects, that makes the moments sweeter — if you see a cutscene happening, you’re almost guaranteed to get something worthwhile.

Those walking segments aren’t the only regression, either. Scoutflies have made their return, serving as the most boring solution possible to the question, “what if a player got a bit lost in our big maps?” The answer, it seems, is to just have glowing lines and an auto-pilot to bring you to where you need to go. While Rise opened up the combat and movement through switch skills and wirebugs, respectively, Wilds goes back to more traditional Monster hunter roots and avoids the question of playstyle customization entirely. That’s not to say there is no evolution in gameplay from World; every weapon has new moves or combo routes, and new skills show up on decorations. The ability to swap weapons on the fly is also a nice change, but rarely seems to have any use case outside of niche elemental swaps during a fight or for swapping in a great sword to wake sleeping monsters.

The cutscenes in Wilds look amazing, and are by far the best they've ever been in the series.

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Some other changes have come to Wilds with varying degrees of success. Monster parts are now much more abundant due to the ‘wound’ system in place. Attacking a monster generates wounds that take more damage, which can then be manually burst through focus mode attacks, or repeatedly targeted with normal attacks for more damage. Once a wound has been destroyed, an additional monster part is generated, and the monster is often staggered. This has some broader implications on optimal play, but even at a cursory glance you could understand how this may affect weapon and armor crafting systems. This is compounded by the fact that, when compared to previous games, weapon trees are smaller and the required materials per craft appear to have been reduced. It's not unheard of to only have to fight a monster two or three times to craft an entire gearset, which is a substantial change from the loop the series is known for.

Despite any issues or annoyances I have with these changes, it is unquestionably true that Monster Hunter Wilds just fuckin’ rips, man. This game is just so much fun — it feels nearly impossible to put down, especially once you actually get through the story and you just get to play. It takes too long to get there, that much is true, but when you do, Wilds opens up in ways that none of the other games in the illustrious series could dream of. 

The environments are flush with interactables, collectibles, and monsters roaming around fighting each other — all while being engaging to explore due to twisting pathways and multi-tiered design. Varied weather patterns allow for different monster spawns or quest availability. Those same weather patterns also affect endemic life that appears throughout the land, what sort of collectibles you can gather, and can even change what type of drops you can collect from monsters in specific circumstances. World has some of this, but Wilds turns it up to 11, creating a more natural, lively world.

Wilds is visually breathtaking, but the real beauty lies in the deep gear customization.

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Equipment options are varied as usual, but the ease of getting decorations and charms makes building sets a much easier task, which in turn opens up a lot of room for equipment experimentation. Whether you’re suited up for comfort, style, or something in-between, there are more ways to get what you want, and it’s easier to do than ever before. Layered armor (equipped armor taking on the appearance of some other set of your choosing) returns and is available as soon as you make it to high rank quests, which is welcome as sets rarely visually mix and match particularly well in early ranks.

In some respects, the fashion aspect may be the endgame loop for many players. With the abundance of materials and ease with which decorations are obtained, there are very few things to chase long after you complete the main story. There is a semi-customizable weapon series, known as Artian weapons, that you can chase for optimization. The parts needed to craft the base version of each Artian weapon are plentiful, appearing as rewards in essentially every late game quest you’ll take on after the main story, so the only thing to do is get the materials for reinforcement. Unfortunately, getting those required materials is a bit slow-going as the trading options and collection aspect of it are time-gated, so it’s more a passive endeavor. Unless you are specifically looking to craft those weapons for every element of every weapon type, you’ll get what you need eventually. All of this is to say that the only things worth actively chasing are related to cosmetic items or to check everything off your list.

For some, this may be a negative, but for me, it allows me to just start or join quests to fight monsters for the sole purpose of ruining their life. I fight them because it is insanely fun to do. Learning their movesets, trying out new gear and weapons, playing with friends and hunting gold crowns — I found so much joy in just playing the game, unburdened by the chase of optimization. Because of this, fighting the monsters became the purpose versus the process, and boy do they deliver.

Monster hunts are intense and thrilling.

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The monster hunts are a spectacle to behold. From the protective veil of Uth Duna, to the flaming mantle of Nu Udra, each monster has a unique flair and moves to watch out for. I do feel like the roster is a bit small, but the different monster types and varied movesets between each enemy keep the fights fresh. Many foes have huge area attacks that light up the screen, or interact with the environments in interesting ways, such as the cephalopod Xu Wu using tiny holes in the environment to escape, or the aforementioned Uth Duna swimming in the water out of bounds to launch a large breaching attack at the player. New moves for the player are a nice treat, as well, with many being impressive-looking in their own right.

The combat is both showy and exhilarating in many ways, but I think it's a bit easy. This is the part that is hard to quantify or really parse for me, but I never carted until late into the story, and I have yet to fail a quest even though I’m now over HR 100. It’s hard for me to really say why this one feels easier than older titles. Sure, I now have 20 years of monster hunter under my belt, but that was true with Rise as well. I suspect it has something to do with the seikret providing invincibility in a pinch and wounds being extremely powerful tools in keeping up aggression on the monster. I’m looking forward to seeing how the fights evolve as the title updates drop in the future — they always come with a sharp up-tick in difficulty.

In the end, Monster Hunter Wilds is a delightful and worthy addition to the Monster Hunter franchise, only held back by its frequent insistence on not letting you actually play it for the first 20 hours or so. Is it the perfect starting point for newcomers? Hard to say — some mechanics may remain obtuse for starters, but it is certainly the most accessible the series has ever been. While I can’t imagine what the changes mean for new players, as a long-time veteran I am more than happy enough with what we have, and I can’t wait to hunt more monsters in the future.

Verdict

Monster Hunter Wilds starts slow but is worth the wait. Bombastic battles and diverse equipment ensure you’re always either working on something or enjoying the ride when you play. Wilds retains many of the quirks and systems that the series has been known for over the last two decades, but this is the most accessible the series has ever been. While many of the series’ edges have been sanded off, it still remains a rewarding experience, overall.

Image Credits: Taylor Rioux and Capcom.