MONSTER HUNTER: WORLD

Developer/publisher Capcom Format PC, PS4, Xbox One

A lot of Monster Hunter fans were nervous about World, fearing that Capcom’s desire to have the series appeal to a wider audience would lead to a severe dumbing down of it; that, with all its rough edges sanded off, it would no longer be the same game. They needn’t have worried. At its core, Monster Hunter: World is still Monster Hunter – and the work that has been done on the structure that underpins it has resulted not just in a more accessible game, but a much better one, too.

The community’s chief concern was the new scoutflies, the luminous green swarm of glowing breadcrumbs that alert you to points or items of interest and, once you’ve picked up a monster’s scent, will follow its trail meticulously. Yet far from simplifying the fight, scoutflies are a revelation, allowing Capcom’s level designers to flex their muscles in ways the series has never seen before, and letting fights with the game’s wondrously animated bestiary span the entirety of these beguiling environments. There’s a real sense of drama to the hunts, climaxing in a brief moment of regret as you chase down a limping, desperate monster and put it down for its final nap. Then you load back to the start, and set off after the scoutflies once again. Those new trousers aren’t going to craft themselves, you know.

The result is a game which proves that streamlining something doesn’t necessarily mean making it smaller – just reshaping it in order to improve it. It has not entirely shed the arcane systems of Monster Hunters past: we still have nightmares about how the game administers the theoretically simple act of partnering up with three pals on a quest. But once you get out there there’s nothing else quite like it. Monster Hunter’s magic has always been there, certainly. But it has never been easier to find, or fall head over heels in love with.