Between Monster Hunter: World and Monster Hunter: Rise you would think that World, the much older title, wouldn’t have such a resurgence. And yet, here may be why Monster Hunter: World is currently 4x more popular than Rise.
Monster Hunter: Rise is the currently latest released game in the Monster Hunter series. As a Monster Hunter game that was designed for the Switch, it doesn’t have the graphical quality of Worlds or Iceborn but what it lacked in fidelity it had in style. However, Rise elevated the classic Monster Hunter gameplay through several quality-of-life updates. New ways to play like the Palamute ridable dog, wire-bugs, wyvern riding, and the Rampage mode were mostly appreciated new features.
Meanwhile, Rise’s single expansion, Sunbreak, overhauled the wire-bug system, giving even more ability choices and gameplay flexibility to players. On top of a revamped companion system that allowed you to bring some of the game’s NPC characters with you during hunts. So why is it then that after the announcement of Monster Hunter: Wilds that Rise peaks at 25k players while World has grown to peak at 110k?
There are a few reasons that come to mind, but the biggest I feel is that Wilds is more likely to represent World than it is Rise. This is because of World’s intentionally slower pace and bigger size is something the MH community enjoys more on a whole over Rise’s quicker, more arcade-esque Monster encounters.
This is punctuated by the fact that in Monster Hunter: World you are actually hunting the monster through a process of finding its tracks and pinning down its location on the map. Which many find more involved and immersive to Monster Hunter: Rise’s streamlined “hunting” process of seeing the monster on the map and quickly traversing to it. Thankfully, it seems some aspects of Rise are making their way to Wilds, like how the Wilds trailer showcased a ridable mount very much like Rise’s Palamute.
Then, there are the visuals of World that are leaps and bounds ahead of the newer, released Rise. Even with expanded visuals for the PC port, the way the game was made for the Nintendo Switch’s aging hardware made Rise already visually dated on release. Wilds looks to be a return to graphical form for the Monster Hunter series with wide open expanses of traversable land that looks more open world than ever before.
Many players also found the wire bug mechanic of Rise to be too forgiving in the ways that the mechanic could help you immediately get out of harm’s way. This had the likely unintended consequence of making Rise one of the easiest Monster Hunter titles. And what is Monster Hunter without difficulty after all? The players have spoken, and they want the less forgiving, more punishing gameplay of World.
However, even I am surprised at how most prefer World when its co-op multiplayer was significantly less accessible. This is because World had cutscenes and missions that could only be experienced by yourself. So, if you had a friend who wasn’t as experienced with the game, and you wanted to help them, they had to get fairly deep into the overall story where these solo missions largely vanished. Luckily, I would bet that a lot of World’s returning players have already gotten far past those points of co-op limitation.
Ultimately, Monster Hunter: World exhibits more of what players want from a mainline Monster Hunter title. Capcom would be wise to notice this trend and develop Monster Hunter: Wilds to better cater to the majority of players who have shown what’s important to them with their collective time spent.