Monster Hunter Generations Preview
I have a pretty strange relationship with the Monster Hunter series. While I’ve never spent significant time with Capcom’s popular action RPG, I’ve spent dozens of hours playing games inspired by it (such as Ragnarok Odyssey and Toukiden: The Age of Demons). Since Monster Hunter always had such a high learning curve, and was criticized for not explaining its systems in previous entries, I’ve stayed away from it.
Still, I couldn’t help but feel curious about the series that helped launch a whole new genre of games. That’s why I was excited to check out Monster Hunter Generations, the latest entry on 3DS which is all about combining new and old from the series’ past. After creating my character (which, thanks to the game’s pretty stellar customization tools, I was able to make him look a lot like Goku from Dragon Ball), I was immediately approached by a villager offering to train me.
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“It seems like Capcom finally understands that they were limiting the appeal of their series in North America and Europe by not having proper tutorials, as there is 7 tutorial missions that go over the basic structure of the game.”
It seems like Capcom finally understands that they were limiting the appeal of their series in North America and Europe by not having proper tutorials, as there is 7 tutorial missions that go over the basic structure of the game. These text-heavy tutorial levels do a great job of explaining the core gameplay, and will quickly teach players how to cook, combine items, go fishing, and capturing prey.
This has done a great job of introducing me to Monster Hunter’s signature systems, and I’m not having to dig through menu after menu to find out about them. I’m finally understanding why the series has such a following, and what differentiates Capcom’s original from its many (admittedly good) imitations on the market.
While I’ve spent several hours going on tutorial missions and low-level quests, I’ve only scratched the surface of what’s in Monster Hunter Generations. This is packed full of new features (including being able to play as a Felyne in the game’s Prowler mode), and I feel prepared to dive into them not that I finally understand Monster Hunter. My full review won’t be ready until July 12, but this certainly seems like a great entry for those that have been interested in the series yet intimidated by the stigma that surrounds it.
