Speaking to GamesRadar+ about how much the devs watch or play the beta, Monster Hunter Wilds director Yuya Tokuda says, "A lot," actually. Tokuda shares that the Wilds team spends a lot of time reviewing people's beta streams and videos to "see feedback that we can't really get internally" – something the chief designer of the Lance found useful especially.

Mind you, not all feedback gathering is done from afar. Tokuda says the devs play the beta for a closer look at how everyone gets on with the game.

"So on my own personal console, I took part in the beta," he shares. "You can't tell it's me from the username, but there are players out there who'd have no idea to this day that they were actually playing with the director of the game.

"I would go online and put an SOS flare up, and that would mean that a couple of players would join my party, and that gives me a chance to see – whenever staff play the game at the company together, there's a certain amount of 'we all know the game inside out' – getting a chance to see real players on how they react to the content is really important to me, to understand if it's working or not. That was a great opportunity for me as well."

It's not just Tokuda, either. Monster Hunter series producer Ryozo Tsujimoto says he'll return to the beta "straight away" after finishing some travel to promote the game. You'd better keep those monster-hunting skills sharp, pals, as Capcom is watching.

In good news for Tokuda and us, then, Capcom is extending the next Monster Hunter Wilds open beta for an extra day as the "test period was cut short."

Dr. Doot has provided the internet with some of the most entertaining Elden Ring content around, including a hitless run of the game using only an electric saxophone and a boss speedrun that even saw Malenia fall to the power of jazz in less than a minute. As for how it works, a pitch bend knob on the back of the instrument doubles as his left analog stick, while the notes he plays are mapped to a regular controller's buttons, meaning he has to doot and toot in a variety of ways to pull off even the most basic inputs.

Enter Monster Hunter Wilds, and Capcom has been cooking up a weapon that practically has Dr. Doot's name written all over it. Specifically, you can get your hands on a Hunting Horn weapon in the action RPG's open beta – the Hope Horn, to be exact – that's literally just a massive saxophone. The streamer first found out about its existence way back in August last year, when he responded: "OH MY GOD THERE'S AN ACTUAL SAXOPHONE WEAPON IN MONSTER HUNTER WILDS?"

Now though, his time has come. Last week, he expressed his excitement over the fact that "MONSTER HUNTER WILDS LETS ME HUNT MONSTERS WITH A GIANT SAXOPHONE," and thanked the devs for "CREATING DOOT-BASED GAMEPLAY," and now he's finally shared what we've all been waiting for – his controller in action.

"Everyone asked 'Will you use the giant saxophone weapon in Monster Hunter Wilds with [the] saxophone controller?'" he writes on Twitter. "The answer is yes (obviously) but no one told me it would be this much FUN." Attached is a short but sweet clip of his skills in action – taking out the beta's frog-like Chatacabra monster with a series of well-timed doots. I can't even begin to fathom how much practice goes into these sorts of challenges.

Hopefully, this won't be the last of the streamer's antics in Monster Hunter Wilds if his tweet is anything to go by. The action RPG's next beta session kicks off on February 14, and will run for an extra 24 hours to make up for last weekend's PlayStation Network outage. After that, we don't have too long to wait for its full launch on February 28.

20 years on, Monster Hunter Wilds' devs reflect on the series' co-op journey: "The world caught up with our vision."

Having gone hands-on with Monster Hunter Wilds previously, we noticed more of a traditional kind of RPG experience compared to previous games regarding the kind of front-facing story and structured chapters you get. Given the chance to speak to Tokuda lately, we ask if there was a push for this type of content to appeal to or help guide players unfamiliar with Monster Hunter to get into the game.

"The concept that I had from the start of the game was humanity as part of the ecosystem, and realizing that humans weren't something on the outside of it looking in, they were part of it, and they had an effect on it," Tokuda answers. "And that naturally led to an increased focus on story. Because, you know, the storytellers, the humans, are actually right in there amongst it.

"It just made sense to me to have the story more upfront than in past titles. So it was a natural evolution of that concept, and it spoke to all the other elements of the game, such as the learning curve of which monsters you face in which order as you get started in the game, and how they teach you the necessary skills to play the game, how that interacted with a chapter-based story structure of which one you were going to meet next.

"It all sort of flowed naturally from that original concept, rather than being the idea of, as you said, let's just make it more like an RPG on that basis."

As for the chapter structure, Tokuda says it makes a lot of sense as "it's easy to follow" and gives players a clear sense of how far along they are.

"The result was, it looked like, as you said, 'Oh, are you trying to go for RPG players by imitating that structure?' But really it was just a natural outcome of our other decisions that hopefully makes sense to players."

Monster Hunter Wilds is due to release later this month, on February 28. The good news, though, is that you don't have to wait that long to try it, as we're in the middle of the second Monster Hunter Wilds open beta test. While the first leg has come and gone, the second kicks off on February 13 at 7pm PT, with an extra 24 hours courtesy of the recent PSN outage, too.

Monster Hunter Wilds will give you one free character edit, which is great for Fashion Hunters, but frustrating for everyone who's sick of paywalled customization.

Ever since the very first Monster Hunter on PS2, joining forces has always been one of the series' most defining features. "It was a very early online game," says director Yuya Tokuda. But, PS2 internet requiring jumping through a lot of hoops to utilize, it was the series' handheld games that really made Monster Hunter the phenomena it is today. For many, it's these portable titles, getting together with friends, that got them into the series in the first place. "The subsequent PSP games kind of introduced in person local LAN, as it were – WLAN play – as a new feature, that was maybe more suitable for portable play. So whenever we kind of went online after that, we were kind of getting back to the series roots if anything," Tokuda continues.

Got no strings

Monster Hunter Wilds is the culmination of a long, storied legacy. Whether it's some of the earliest online gaming the PS2 offered or wireless handheld multiplayer, Monster Hunter's earlier titles were always ahead of the curve. "At the time Monster Hunter was released – we just had our 20th anniversary recently, so it's over 20 years ago now," reflects producer Ryozo Tsujumoto. "There weren't really that many online games like this, in the console space at least, so it was a relatively unique proposition, and I think the infrastructure wasn't really where it needed to be at the time."

To play online on PS2 on a base model, you needed to scoop up a PS2 Network Adapter to slot into the expansion bay, and a good enough internet connection for the era. In addition, publishers themselves would then have to run their own servers, support for which varied between regions (many years later, PlayStation Network and Xbox Live would provide their own glue to bring this together – greatly simplifying the proposition).

"So even if you wanted to play the game, having a sufficient broadband connection and equipment to connect your console to the internet was not necessarily a given back then for most consumers," says Tsujimoto. "In the meantime, while the infrastructure and the world caught up with our vision of playing the game online together on consoles, [we moved] to a portable approach" – a tactic he calls "bring your own network".

"It kind of helped us deal with that lack of infrastructure, and in the meantime infrastructure caught up," Tsujimoto continues. "The work we did on making the game work on portables with local networks really benefited the design of subsequent online games. So it definitely wasn't a diversion. It was more like just a realistic approach to catering to the needs of players given the limits of infrastructure at any given time."

Making sure Capcom is in tune with what players want, and how they expect to be able to connect, has been core to ensuring Monster Hunter remains enduring, and has helped inform Monster Hunter Wilds' goal of releasing globally across all platforms, while supporting crossplay between all of them. Essentially, removing barriers. "We worked very hard to achieve that this time around," says Tsujimoto, acknowledging that PC is a growing platform worldwide, including in Japan. "That means the choice is yours on which platform you want to play with, and then [you can just] go online and hunt with your friends."

Monster Hunter can be a complicated series with plenty of depth, but its values are as clear as day. I ask what, across the years, best defines a Monster Hunter. "It's an obvious answer given the series name," says Tokuda, "but I think hunting monsters, particularly large monsters, cooperatively with other players in an action context, is something that, if we ever compromise on any of those aspects, it's not really what we think of as a the core DNA of Monster Hunter anymore." Now, with Monster Hunter Wilds making it easier than ever for players to connect and slay those monsters together, no matter how they choose to game, that DNA is stronger than ever.

Want to jump in and can't wait? With so many games in the series, where should you begin? Perhaps our best Monster Hunter games list could be of assistance.

Due to kick off at 7pm PT on February 13 (3am GMT on February 14 if you're in the UK), you've now got more Monster Hunter goodness for an extra day across PS5, Xbox Series X|S, and Steam.

Original story: Capcom is thinking about extending the second Monster Hunter Wilds open beta because of the recent PSN outages.

The publisher acknowledged that the outages caused "inconvenience as you were unable to participate in the test" in a recent social media post. "Considering that a significant portion of the test period was cut short, we are currently examining the possibility of conducting an additional approximately 24-hour session next weekend or later."

The PlayStation Network was down for basically the entirety of yesterday, February 8, meaning it was impossible for most people to play online games, digitally-owned games, and connect to services like the PlayStation Store. The PSN outage also came at a particularly bad time for fans of slaying big beasts, though.

Monster Hunter Wilds' second open beta was set to take place across two weekends with the first running from February 6 to February 9. Of course, the outages meant that PS5 players couldn't access the beta or its online features for a essentially third of its runtime, but it seems like Capcom might be making up for it in the future.

Sony itself hasn't fully detailed what caused the issues, although it did state that "network services have fully recovered from an operational issue." To make up for blunder, it's automatically giving "all PlayStation Plus members" an "additional 5 days of service."

Elsewhere in the game, Monster Hunter Wilds fans were delighted to see the return of the nightmarish bug that turns everyone into a PS1-style blob. It didn't come as too much of a surprise since Capcom warned folks ahead of time that improvements made since the first beta wouldn't surface until the game's full release on February 28. However, even the developers were happy to see fans embracing the cursed bug.

Check out the best Monster Hunter Wilds weapons and tier list for the beta.

In the first beta, PC players found that, seemingly due to GPU bottlenecks or loading issues (depending on your rig), monsters and characters in Monster Hunter Wilds would occasionally end up lacking, well, dimensions. In most cases, there'd be missing textures or large details, but severe examples can cough up flailing oblong chimeras that make the Fighting Polygon Team from Super Smash Bros. look certifiably high-def.

These monstrosities were quickly nicknamed origami monsters and even spawned their own fanart, not to mention mods for other Monster Hunter games deliberately recreating the blocky look. This kind of issue wouldn't be nearly as funny in the full game, but some players have expressed hopes to see event quests in Wilds commemorating the beta's iconic origami mons.

Now seemed like a good time to share a fun anecdote from a previous exchange I had with Monster Hunter producer Ryozo Tsujimoto, Wilds art and executive director Kaname Fujioka, and Wilds director Yuya Tokuda. In a group interview, I asked if they'd seen all the players having fun with origami monster memes and mods, and how it feels to see the beta's brokenness celebrated in this way. I compared the low-poly beasts to the original PS2 Monster Hunter – if anything, they're much more retro – and as the question was relayed in Japanese by our interpreter, the group fell into laughter cut with just the tiniest bit of the resignation that's born from technical issues.

"They were aware of how people were experiencing some of the low polygons and having their fun with it," our interpreter explained, focusing on Fujioka's response to begin with. "It was a nice thing to see that people were enjoying it in a way that they were having fun with it."

Relaying Tsujimoto's response, the interpreter continued: "But obviously we would recommend people do play and get the full experience on the PC with the recommended PC specs that we have stated out there. Obviously, when you play on the PC, the specs vary widely depending on what kind of environment you have, so our suggestion is for people to please play on the recommended specs to get the full experience. But it's nice to know that some people are enjoying or having fun with Monster Hunter Wilds."

As it happens, those PC specs have been reduced slightly after some optimization on Capcom's end. Monster Hunter Wilds isn't a lightweight game by any means, and in early performance tests using the new benchmark tool, it seems to be CPU-limited just like Monster Hunter World was, but running it is now a slightly less daunting task. The PC performance of the full game remains to be seen, however. Again, don't let the outdated beta build throw you off, but don't put too much stock in the benchmark tool's limited scenarios either.

Monster Hunter Wilds saved some big surprises for the second beta: "online single player," Gore Magala, a new monster, and photo mode.

During the first open beta for Capcom's big beast-slaying, fast fashion-crafting blockbuster, players struggled with all types of technical issues, from performance dips and stuttering to a graphics bug that would turn the game's usually handsome characters into nightmarish, polygonal blobs that'd even scare N64 NPCs. Funnily enough, some monsters were also affected and became giant, non-descript blobs.

Well, that pesky bug has reared its head once again. It shouldn't be too much of a surprise, though. Even at the time, Capcom admitted the beta build was outdated and said the in-development game was "already in a more improved state." Since then, the developers have only continued to hammer away at known issues, though the publisher had already confirmed that such improvements wouldn't be present in the second beta as the team were busy on Monster Hunter Wilds' final release, coming in just a few weeks.

Still, I'm not-so-secretly happy that the cursed bug is back because, like, just look at some of the screenshots below. How many big-budgets games look like that anymore!? It's glorious and ugly and the icing on the cake is how damn grumpy the Palicos look.

I wanted to share the silly graphical issue from r/MHWilds

My game looks good from r/MHWilds

It's not just humans and our feline friends who are being transformed into unsightly shapes. The bug is also laying claim to the titular monsters. The one below is some kind of ominous entity, and I really hope Capcom actually releases a post-launch enemy with a similar design as some sort of homage.

Polygon hunter: Wilds from r/MHWilds

If the wonky textures are really getting on your nerves, don't worry too much. Capcom's improvements will be in Monster Hunter Wilds' retail release, coming to PC, PS5, and Xbox Series X|S on February 28.

Check out the best Monster Hunter Wilds weapons and tier list for the beta.

When is the Monster Hunter Wilds beta?

The second Monster Hunter Wilds beta will take place in two stages, although the first has concluded at the time of writing.

The previous beta was an exclusive PlayStation Plus Early Access Play period for PS5, followed by a full open beta period for PS5, Xbox Series, and PC players via Steam. However, the second Monster Hunter Wilds beta is open to everyone.

The dates and times for the second beta are as follows:

• February 6 - February 9, 2025 open beta [concluded]
  US: February 6 @ 7pm PST / 10pm EST - February 9 @ 6:59pm PST / 9:59pm EST
  UK: February 7 @ 3am GMT - February 10 @ 2:59am GMT
• February 13 - February 16, 2025 open beta
  US: February 13 @ 7pm PST / 10pm EST - February 16 @ 6:59pm PST / 9:59pm EST
  UK: February 14 @ 3am GMT - February 17 @ 2:59 GMT

Due to the extended period of PSN downtime during the first period of the second Monster Hunter Wilds beta, Capcom are considering running the open beta for an additional 24 hours at a future date to make up for the lost time. Details are still TBD, so it's not clear if this will be an extension of the next open beta period or an extra period added at a separate time.

How to access the Monster Hunter Wilds open beta

In order to access the Monster Hunter Wilds second open beta, you will need to head over to either your PC, PS5, or Xbox Series X. From there, you'll need to access your platform of choice's storefront and download the open beta client.

No sign-ups, pre-orders, or beta keys are required here. However, a pre-load will be available on all platforms 24 hours ahead of each of their respective start times. That means you can get as much time as possible with the open beta, so be sure to prepare ahead of your chosen platform's launch time.

What's included in the Monster Hunter Wilds beta?

You'll kick off the Monster Hunter Wilds beta with access to Character Creation, with all of the features that will be available in the final release of the game. You can use this to design your hunter and Palico, and are able to remake your character as often as you like during the beta to perfect your look. Furthermore, your Character Creation data carries over to the full game, so you can jump straight into your adventure when that launches.

With your character created, you can watch the opening cutscene and then play the tutorial which will guide you through a Chatacabra hunt, so you can get to grips with the weapons and mechanics. You can then move into the open world to take on a Doshaguma hunt, where you goal is to eliminate the alpha of the pack, while exploring the vast area riding your Seikret.

The new content in the second beta also includes the following:

• Flagship monster Arkveld and returning monster Gypceros
• The Training Area
• Private lobbies (allowing a maximum of 16 players)
• Online single player

Rewards for taking part in the second Monster Hunter Wilds beta

All players who take part in the Monster Hunter Wilds beta will receive the Open Beta Test Bonus Pendant pictured above, to attach to your hunter. They will also receive the Open Beta 2 Test Bonus Item Pack, which includes the following:

• Raw Meat x 10
• Shock Trap x 3
• Pitball Trap x 3
• Tranq Bomb x 10
• Large Barrel Bomb x 3
• Armor Sphere x 5
• Flash Pod x 10
• Large Dung Pod x 10

The good news is that you can get these rewards as soon as your character is created, so don't worry about any content being unlocked under playtime restrictions. Also, if you played the first open beta, you'll receive an extra item once the full game is released.

© GamesRadar+. Not to be reproduced without permission.

A quiet update to the Monster Hunter Wilds Steam page reveals that the game is now targeting an RTX 2060 or RX 6600 as a recommended spec, down from the previous recommendation of an RTX 2070 Super/RTX 4060 or RX 6700XT. Capcom suggests this will get you 60fps at 1080p medium settings with frame generation enabled.

The minimum GPU specs have seen the 1660 Super bumped down to a normal 1660 and the 5600 XT down to a 5500 XT. On the CPU side, we're down to an i5-10400/i3-12100/Ryzen 5 3600 processor across both minimum and recommended specs.

The benchmarking tool works pretty much as you'd expect once you grab it from Steam. After a 26GB download - and a relatively lengthy shader compilation process - you can choose your graphics settings and see how performance plays out over the course of an in-game cutscene and a handful of exploration sequences. For the record, I got an average of 59.37fps on my i9-9900K/RTX 3080 combo with high 1440p settings and no upscaling.

Capcom had previously hinted that lowered PC specs and a benchmarking tool were on the way, and it's good to see them both arrive nearly a full month before the game's final launch. You'll also be able to get a much bigger taste of the game with the second Monster Hunter Wilds beta kicking off on February 6.

Putting beta feedback into action, Monster Hunter Wilds devs show off improved hitstop and reworked weapons that feel how you remember them.

For the uninitiated, the second Monster Hunter Wilds beta starts at 7pm PT on Thursday, February 6 and runs until February 9 at 6:59 PT. If you miss that one, you'll have another chance to play ahead of launch the following weekend from February 13 to 16. And if somehow you manage to also miss that one, well, the game comes out on February 28. You can wait.

None of that is new, but what is new is the trailer you can watch below, which reveals the return of two fan-favorite monsters: the cute and cuddly Gore Magala from Monster Hunter 4 and the fun and friendly Nerscylla, also from Monster Hunter 4. Meanwhile, there's also a brand new, unannounced monster shown in the trailer. The snow-dwelling leviathan Hirabami can be found in the new Iceshard Cliffs locale, which is explored for the first time in the new trailer.

Capcom also revealed that Arkveld, the flagship monster of Monster Hunter Wilds, will be at the center of a new "advanced quest" available in the upcoming beta, giving players to fight it for the first time. Oh, and the beta will support online single-player, which should clean up some systems for people who don't wanna mess with stuff but may want backup via SOS flare.

The showcase also revealed customization options for your pop-up camp, a more feature-rich Hunter Profile replacing Guild Cards, and a training area for solo play.

I spent 5 hours with a new build of Monster Hunter Wilds and it solved basically every problem I had after playing the beta – now this really feels like Monster Hunter World 2.

Capcom's big beast blockbuster is stomping to release later next month on February 28, shortly after a second Monster Hunter Wilds open beta test. It's fast approaching, the first beta already pulled in monstrous numbers, and Monster Hunter Worlds has been a consistently massive deal, so it's no surprise to see the sequel top Steam's most-wishlisted games chart.

When Monster Hunter Wilds is finally out in the wild (sorry!) next month, Valve's Deadlock – the MOBA-shooter hybrid it didn't announce until it was already a big hit – will reclaim its top spot. Valve say it's still in "early development with lots of temporary art and experimental gameplay," meaning it might stay on this list for a while longer.

Hopefully it won't linger there for as quite long as Hollow Knight: Silksong, the side-scrolling Metroidvania that's taken and lost first place honors a couple times since its announcement in 2019. Developer Team Cherry has been so tight-lipped about the project, Silksong's garnered somewhat of a mythical reputation. The developer insists it's still "real, progressing and will release," however.

Sid Meier's Civilization 7, co-op spin-off Elden Ring Nightreign, ultra-realistic life sim rival Inzoi, No Man's Sky developer's fantasy open world Light No Fire, Vin Diesel's Ark 2, Kingdom Come: Deliverance 2, and underwater survival sequel Subnautica 2 all round out the top ten in that order.

That’s not all of what’s in the pipeline either – check out every other exciting release with our new games of 2025 and beyond.

In a new video shared by IGN, we get a good long look at the Nu Udra, a slimy, oily octopus-looking monster that can set itself on fire. It writhes as you attack it, pulses when it grabs you and moves, and has far too many orifices that open out of nowhere. Director Yuya Tokuda is very proud of it.

"When we saw the tests, we also thought to make it the apex predator of the Oilwell Basin," Tokuda tells IGN. "While there are countless proposals that I've had rejected due to technical reasons, it feels like I'm finally getting to attempt one of those this time around."

It's hard to overstate just how impressive the monster is. Getting a creature like that to interact with the terrain properly is not easy, especially when you add all the lighting effects to it once it's on fire. It also scurries off into a hole, a moment the animators want people to pay attention to.

"When we first implemented the movement of it going inside a hole, an animator told me, 'When you weaken it and it starts heading back to its nest, please wait here for a moment,'" Tokuda remembers. "They wanted me to see it going into its little hole, and I still remember replying, 'Oh, that really is amazing!' The animator looked so satisfied as well."

The cool thing here is that everyone's fight with Nu Udra will be different, so we may not all see the same animations. "It might not be easy to get the chance to see it, but the way it squirms around while wrapped around a pipe is so well made, too," Tokuda says. "Only games are able to depict things like that in real-time instead of as some premade scene. I'm incredibly proud of it as a crystallization of the staff's efforts."

While the creature is a marvel to look at, it'll be important not to get too engrossed in its grossness. "We've made it so that it has sensory organs at the tips of its tentacles that use light to indicate when and who it's going to attack," Tokuda explains. Also, "You can cut off so many tentacles," so you'll be able to whittle the creature down and turn it into fresh calamari in no time. That improved hitstop will feel so good as it cleaves through all those tentacles.

If you want to learn more about the game, check out our own Monster Hunter Wilds preview.

In Monster Hunter Wilds, hunters will be able to use Focus Mode to aim their attacks and guards, as well as unleash powerful Focus Strikes, which deal catastrophic damage to any wounds inflicted upon monsters (formed after they've been repeatedly attacked in the same spots). However, with this new inclusion, those looking for a challenge might be concerned that it'll be too easy to quickly burn through monsters' health bars, but it sounds like this won't be a problem. In an interview with IGN, director Yuya Tokuda confirms that – comparatively to World – monsters will have have more health. 

"It's not as if that was our intention from the start, but health did end up being a little bit higher than World once we thought about maintaining appropriate playtimes and player satisfaction, compared to past titles," the director explains, adding that "elements like flinch resistance are also higher, but this doesn't mean that hunts will be tedious."

It sounds like all these changes will ultimately balance out overall, as Tokuda  explains: "Part of the purpose of Focus Mode is to allow players to feel more accomplished through shorter loops. We tried to design it so that the time they spend hunting is even more concentrated than before."

Otherwise, Monster Hunter: World veterans will be pleased to know that the notorious decoration system has been reworked – instead of relying on RNG, you'll be able to craft the ones you want to complete your perfect build without being let down by stingy drops. 

Be sure to check out our Monster Hunter Wilds big preview hub to see more about the upcoming action RPG from our hands-on preview. 

Fujioka, with Wilds director Yuya Tokuda, spoke to IGN about the decoration system in Wilds. As we previously saw firsthand, Wilds largely splits offensive and defensive skills between weapons and armor respectively, so slotting in the right decorations to round out your setup will be even more important than in previous games.

"Decorations are currently similar to the system in World, with decorations having specific skill abilities," Tokuda explains. "These skills are still activated by placing them into weapon or armor slots (in Wilds, weapon and armor skills can each be activated separately). However, you can make single-skill decorations through something like alchemy. So in [Wilds], players won't have the issue of never being able to get a specific skill."

This will prevent a repeat of the relatable nightmare that Fujioka, a devout lance main who, like me, struggled to get a Guard Up decoration to drop in World. "I never ended up getting it once," Fujioka said. "My Shield Jewel 2... I ended up finishing the game without having completed my build."

The decoration grind in World was so painful that, once the game came to PC, a sizable group of players quickly turned to mods to cheat in the ones they wanted, either to match the collection they had on console or to save the time and headache of RNG. With this issue resolved for Wilds, the next question is how we'll get talismans or charms, which have historically bundled multiple skills and decoration slots into one special equipment slot. World had random decorations but craftable charms, while Monster Hunter Rise used the opposite setup, just as games like Monster Hunter 4 Ultimate did previously. Wilds may do the same, but charm power and acquisition is still unclear. However it shakes out, Wilds is already a step up from World's itemization.

Monster Hunter Wilds is already shaping up to be a multiplayer powerhouse that defines 2025.

A lot of this build up started with Monster Hunter World. I've mentioned it about a hundred times, and I'll keep mentioning it because I think the impact of this game is still underestimated. It feels like a canon event for our timeline. Monster Hunter World turned a long-niche series into a peak platinum seller for Capcom and informed a whole lot of people that the kind of game loop which so many grind-a-thons and RPGs are still chasing was mastered by Capcom ages ago, and that it comes paired with some of the best combat and boss design in video games and multiplayer that generates friendships and stories more reliably than almost anything else. Monster Hunter Wilds is a direct evolution of this breakout hit, and based on everything we've seen and played of it so far, it could well be even bigger.

The secret sauce

A new Monster Hunter always feels like an event. For longtime fans, each game is a fresh start in a new but familiar world, an adventure simultaneously nostalgic and surprising. It somehow captures the thrill of starting New Game Plus in a game you've learned front-to-back, and the satisfaction of using your experience to fly through it, but in something excitingly unfamiliar.

Your favorite weapon feels just right in your hands, but comes with new tricks that meaningfully shift how you play. Maybe you'll main a new weapon this time – the idea is especially tempting in Monster Hunter Wilds since you can bring two weapons on a hunt now – or maybe you'll just spend another 500+ hours with ol' reliable. Likewise, there's always a new village or hub with the same infectious soul – jovial characters and skittering Palicoes and irresistible food – but a vibe all its own. The maps, the monsters, the menus – everything feels like home, lived-in and comfy, but undeniably different.

For newcomers, a Monster Hunter launch is always the best time to jump in, not just because the community is sure to be white-hot for a good while after release, but because every new Monster Hunter builds on all the previous ones. "Just play the new one" is a golden rule of mine with games, and Monster Hunter is maybe the best series for it. Monster Hunter Wilds is the clearest iteration yet, with Capcom obviously hoping the Monster Hunter World lightning will strike again, but there are fragments of other games in the mix too, polished and refined.

And for everyone, a new Monster Hunter is a chance to get immersed up to your collarbone in a peerless loop of challenge and reward – and then up to your chin, and then your ears, and, screw it, let's go all the way under. Monster Hunter is an action RPG where you chase and battle dozens of monsters in boss fight-style showdowns that can run upwards of 20 minutes, all in massive, dynamic environments teeming with life. Each boss hunted yields new parts you can use to craft better gear to bring on harder hunts. That's the loop, and it's as compelling as another run of Balatro or another turn of Civilization.

But really, Monster Hunter is a game about setting goals and overcoming challenges, and it's one of the best in its space. Combat and crafting feed off each other in a way that keeps you chasing your next upgrade, and this motivates you to get better at fighting monsters. Your hunt times go down, your damage numbers go up, and soon your brain is sloshing around in all the fun chemicals.

Whole new World

Monster Hunter Wilds is more of this, obviously, but it's also the first Monster Hunter fully developed by a post-Monster Hunter World Capcom, as the more handheld-centric Monster Hunter Rise was already in production when it exploded in popularity. Wilds is the game that will show us what Capcom learned from World and how it will shepherd the series going forward. My first impression was that it has learned a lot, and consequently Monster Hunter Wilds could be the definitive Monster Hunter, balancing the grit of games like Monster Hunter World and Monster Hunter 4 Ultimate with the more out-there style of entries like Monster Hunter Rise and Monster Hunter Generations.

Crucially, Monster Hunter Wilds has a few key strengths going in. Firstly, there's been a calculated push for approachability. Capcom knows it needs to reach new players and get them up to speed, so it's put more resources into pacing and tutorializing. At the company's Osaka, Japan studio, one developer told GamesRadar+ that feedback from the first network test has been encouraging in this regard. My playthrough of the opening hours felt well-guided. It also felt more like a traditional RPG, complete with bespoke chapters and objectives, which isn't a coincidence.

For a long time, Monster Hunter games didn't really have well-defined storylines with serious stakes or motivations. (Ironically, spinoffs like Monster Hunter Stories are much bigger on this.) There was richness in the background, but the games mostly got by on a string of excuses to introduce new monsters and convince you to fight them. This was never a problem because combat and crafting always carried the experience, but I get the sense that Capcom has invested more in storytelling with Wilds, partly as a way to grab people who associate RPGs with deep stories.

The short version of Wilds is: you're hunting a monster thought to be extinct to help people living in a region thought to be uninhabited, so the whole hunter guild has been thrown for a loop. What's most exciting is the treatment and description of hunters as a whole. The role they play, the power they wield, and the difference they – you! – make in this world. We aren't just researching for the sake of knowledge. Wilds feels like a fuller narrative squeezed out of the world-building that Monster Hunter has always had, and as someone who also likes lots of other RPGs, it is doing something for me.

Setting the hook as the Game of the Moment will largely fall to multiplayer, I suspect, and Wilds has an advantage here as well: it's the first simultaneous multi-platform launch with crossplay in the history of Monster Hunter. This is a big deal; all of the sudden my real-life friends, Destiny 2 friends, and work friends can all group up and hunt together.

That's powerful, and combined with the more freeform lobbies that Wilds is seemingly pushing for, with individual teams of two to four splitting off from persistent open-world groups whenever they want, I'm picturing Discord hangout sessions the likes of which I haven't seen in years. Helping a friend catch up, sharing the same grinds, rotating who gets to pick the monster, ragging on the one friend who just can't get that rare gem to drop. It's gonna be a good time, and I can easily see this consuming a huge chunk of 2025 for a lot of people – maybe World's audience and then some.

Looking for more beasties? Check out our best Monster Hunter games list!

In the original tweet (with translations provided by DeepL), the account writes that there are plans to actually release "a standalone, free hardware benchmark tool." This would allow you to run a quick check to see if your PC could run the upcoming game, which would be very useful as you wouldn't have to buy the action RPG first and then request a refund if your machine couldn't handle it.

A follow-up quote tweet clarifies this original claim was a "translation error," but it does confirm that a free hardware benchmark tool is being looked into, so don't count it out just yet.

It seems that the part about Capcom "looking at lowering the recommended GPU requirements" is legitimate, however. Currently, the game's Steam page states you should have an Nvidia GTX 2070 Super or an RTX 4060. The 4060s start at around $299, so they're not cheap.

In the video of the PS5 performance mode test, the game does look absolutely stunning, so it's easy to see why Capcom recommends a powerful GPU for PC players, but the ability to play on an older GPU would help a lot of us save some money. Hopefully Capcom can figure it out ahead of the February 28 launch date.

In our preview of Monster Hunter Wilds, we note that "we're blown away not just by the scope of Monster Hunter Wilds' ambitions, but how readily Capcom is stepping up to the plate to meet it."

While you're here, check out some of the other video game release dates this year to see if there's anything else that catches your eye.

Humble Bundle's ongoing New Year Hunting Collection has some monster savings, pulling in Monster Hunter Wilds and its Iceborne expansion, Monster Hunter Rise and its Sunbreak expansion, deluxe kit items for both games, and a 20% off coupon for the series' cute, turn-based spin-offs Monster Hunter Stories and its sequel Monster Hunter Stories 2: Wings of Ruin - if you pay anything over $24.35 or £19.94, that is.

As always, you can customize the bundle to your liking. If you'd like a slimmed down four-item, six-item, or eight-item bundle, you can choose to pay less. And a portion of the proceeds will go to diabetes research charity Breakthrough T1D, though you can adjust how much money goes to the charity, Humble, and Capcom Japan with handy sliders. You might want to act fast since the offer ends on January 24, though.

Considering just how huge Monster Hunter games can be, the entire bundle could easily keep you occupied for over 700 hours if you've never dipped into the two recent mainline entries. There's pretty much no way you'd be able to see and do and hunt and make everything in time for Monster Hunter Wilds, coming February 28 on PC, PS5 and Xbox Series X|S.

Those looking for a newer, shinier take on the formula will be able to jump in again via Monster Hunter Wilds' second open beta test that's also kicking off next month. It's exactly the same as the first beta since improvements won't be ready until launch day, but this time you can fight Gypceros, too, a "returning monster" from the series.

Check out all the video game release dates of 2025 to see what else is coming out in February.

Fast forward roughly seven years and Aaron has now used the Hadoken, combined with a few other emotes, to beat Monster Hunter World in its entirety without swinging or firing a single weapon, which I would compare to assembling a bookshelf using only your mouth. He started seriously grinding the challenge in November. To put things into perspective, one of his Nergigante hunts took 41 minutes.

After months of work, Aaron shared his achievement with the Monster Hunter World Reddit community earlier this week, and I immediately reached out to talk through this long journey. From Great Jagras to Xeno'jiiva, the Monster Hunter World campaign lineup was powerless before the Hadoken, as evidenced by Aaron's extensive emote-only playthrough archive. There's also a handy explainer video to catch you up.

"I couldn't keep doing the challenge at the time due to life commitments, but fast forward to the end of the Monster Hunter Wilds beta, I had the idea return to my head," Aaron tells GamesRadar+. "I had the evening time more readily available and in turn returned to complete the challenge. The gesture/emote-only really just felt like something I knew I could do. While there's others that might've done no damage or other related challenges, I couldn't find anyone that seemed to have done what I did. It doesn't help I'm a stubborn kind of person, so when I set myself to a challenge I'll put the commitment in to see it through to the end."

The Hadoken was the lynchpin because it's a reliable ranged gesture that deals consistent critical damage – a whopping 13 on a clean hit – without eating all your stamina like the Shoryuken gesture does. Another tool was the Devil May Cry emote featuring Dante's guns, which deals about twice as much damage as the Hadoken, but much less reliably and in a wide spread. This made it tough to use, but still handy for small but welcome DPS boosts in the right situations.

Monster Hunter world Emotes only is possible. I've played the entire game using emotes as my only form of damage with my hunter. from great jagras to xenojiva. this dumb challenge run has been completed as of 06/01/2025. i believe i am the first person to of done this at this point of time. from r/MonsterHunter

"In the end the Hadoken really came out on top, giving a flat damage number that was constant but also allowed me enough time to learn the pattern when I needed to dodge," Aaron explains. There are other damaging gestures, but they have their hangups. "The other emotes I had mentioned, either they are more paid emotes or are locked behind certain requirements that meant already completing the game once to access the emotes. Witcher's Fire and FF14 Jump, both of which could provide some help against some monsters such as dodging their attack overall or using the elemental damage to my advantage. In the end it merely came down to situational actions against certain monsters."

The good news is that with no weapon skills to worry about, Aaron could build his Monster Hunter World loadouts around defensive and utility skills like Windproof, Earplugs, and Tremor Resistance. If it makes it easier to land Hadokens or it keeps you alive, it's useful. This mainly came into play later in the game with High Rank Elder Dragons, with Kushala Daora proving especially challenging. Luckily, flash bombs saved the day.

If you're wondering, Aaron did have a Palico along to help, but specced for healing and really not contributing much damage. One of the most impressive things about this run is Aaron's ability to fight these monsters for so long without getting whittled down. With a normal build, killing monsters faster reduces the damage you'll take in the long run and cuts down on opportunities to make mistakes, but Aaron was deliberately following the complete opposite strategy.

Another wall was Zorah Magdaros, a volcano-like beast with a lot of health that's normally chipped away with special environmental fixtures like cannons. Aaron's followers agreed that environmental damage was permissible here, lest Zorah kill the run, so cannons and ballistas – also not technically hunter weapons – were allowed.

Aaron's final fight with Xeno'jiiva is something to see – and about half as long as a film, at that. "The challenge is complete!" he says triumphantly. "It is possible to beat Monster Hunter World with emotes only!" For the cherry on top, he pulled a rare gem out of the monster's corpse. He says he's now "taking some much-needed time to think about this time I spent since November doing this challenge and how in a way it was rewarding to finally see it accomplished after six years."

Monster Hunter Wilds gets a second beta test with a "returning monster from the series," but improvements from the first round "won't be ready" in time.

Series producer Ryozo Tsujimoto announced the news via a cute video, embedded below, where he explains that the second Monster Hunter Wilds beta has all of the same content as the first, including the scarily realistic character creator, a slice of the game's story, and a quest to slay the furry cutie Doshaguma. But this time, Gypceros, "a returning monster from the series" that's swooped into multiple Monster Hunters, is also showing its face.

Monster Hunters Wilds' second open beta kicks off on February 6th at 7pm PT until February 9th, with another round the following week running from February 13th at 7pm to February 16th, available on PC, PS5, and Xbox Series X|S at the same time. And just like the first round, you won't need a PS Plus or Game Pass subscription to play.

The only slight downside is that all your potential complaints from the first open beta won't be fixed here. Tsujimoto explains that the team is hard at work putting the finishing touches on the game, but this also means your feedback and the developer's subsequent improvements "won't be ready to make it into the second beta test." That includes "performance, weapon changes, Hitstop, quality-of-life improvements, and more" - think of this second beta more as a fun teaser for us and a stress test for Capcom.

Either way, you won't need to wait long to see those changes as Monster Hunter Wilds comes out on February 28th and you'll be able to carry over whatever monstrous character you've constructed in the betas (but not your progress, so maybe don't spend 100s of hours grinding for the best leather pants imaginable.)

Check out all the video game release dates of 2025 to see what else is coming out in February. Spoiler: too much.

One of the biggest complaints following the open beta was the lack of proper hitstop. This is a common mechanic in fighting games where an attack animation will pause for a fraction of a second when you land a hit on an enemy. When done right, it creates a satisfying visual feedback. It's often paired with a sound so that you really know you've landed a strike.

I've never played Monster Hunter myself, but I watched my housemate play it for hours on his Switch, and I was always impressed by how viscerally kinetic the fights looked because of hitstop, so I understand why you were all upset it seemed so bad in the beta.

Thankfully, a new pre-launch community update video shows that it's back with a vengeance, alongside many weapon improvements.

Game director Yuya Tokuda says (via translator Patrick): "It's something we were aware of with the OBT [open beta test] build. When it comes to making those weapons feel more weighty and impactful in terms of hitstop and sound effects we are planning to make further adjustments in the full version of the game."

During our own preview of the game in Osaka earlier this month, Austin noted that the hitstop "is, simply put, back. Weapons cleave through weak spots with greater exaggeration and palpable impact, just as many fans wanted them to after the beta felt comparatively limp-wristed."

A short clip shows off the hitstop in action with the Great Sword's Charge Attacks, and you can really feel the heft of each impact.

"Even for moves where I haven't changed the damage output, I've heard you guys on things like hitstop, on sound effects, how the moves feel to actually use," Tokuda continues. "Those kinds of adjustments are being made not just on the Great Sword but across all weapon types."

It turns out Tokuda greatly appreciated all the feedback following the beta, and it turns out it was mostly players outside of Japan who influenced the original shift away from hitstop.

"Thinking back to Monster Hunter World, which I also worked on, back then there was a lot of player feedback, especially outside Japan, where players felt that the game was actually too weighty, the animations were too slow," he says. "That's completely the opposite of what we heard this time. I'm taking that as a positive where I feel like in the years between Monster Hunter World coming out and Monster Hunter Wilds OBT players around the world have gotten used to that meaty, weighty hitstop action that is one of the hallmarks of Monster Hunter. So knowing that they've accepted that and they wanted it back based on the OBT is something that's really interesting and really nice for me to hear."

We often don't realize how much we need something until it's gone. People in the comments are very happy with the communication and changes. "I think I'm gonna pre launch," jokes Darkfreed0m, and MelissaWhite-q2w writes, "This degree of openness is astounding. We appreciate your responses to all of our questions. I can't wait for Hitstop to be released and am thrilled to have it back!"

There are also a whole host of other weapon changes, such as damage buffs and systems that should make attacking much more fluid. The Vaulting Dance is back for the Insect Glaive, so all of you who main it should be happy to have such an iconic attack back. It does look spectacular seeing it in action.

While you wait for Wilds, you should return to some of the best Monster Hunter games of all time.

"There are many fans of the Monster Hunter series within the FF14 team, and I am one of them," lead battle content designer Masaki Nakagawa tells GamesRadar+. "If we were given the opportunity to do a crossover, we would love to do it, but with the release date for Monster Hunter Wilds almost upon us, we will do our best to enjoy the game first."

Final Fantasy 14 already hosts a Monster Hunter Worlds-themed crossover quest, which - unlike many of the MMO's special events - remains available to this day. It features a unique trial letting you battle Rathalos, which you can grind to craft a full set of Rathalos armor. It's one of the more substantial collabs we've seen in FF14, and the devs already have ideas for how to expand on the concept.

"The game designer who handled the battle content for our crossover with Monster Hunter: World has been really motivated even after they finished working on the crossover, saying that if there is a next time, they want to do this and that," Nakagawa continues. "So if we can do a crossover, I’m sure we could create something amazing with our overwhelming enthusiasm!"

Final Fantasy 14's lead battle content designer on returning to the series' first MMO for a new raid, difficulty, and his dream League of Legends collaboration.

In an interview with Screen Rant, art director Kaname Fujioka spoke about the process of creating a new monster, stating that, while different monsters may take different amounts of time to make, "each monster takes roughly a year from start to finish", though this can jump up significantly in the case of certain special monsters. "It obviously depends on the monster." he explains, before adding that "The flagship monster for Monster Hunter Wilds obviously took a very long time because it has to do with the story of the game".

Rather than making each monster one by one, Fujioka states that they are designed in parallel, which can make it hard to tell how long certain monsters took to be created, but estimates most will take roughly a year. "Typically an average from planning a monster, designing it, making a model, animation, it usually takes about one year for a monster. If you add adjusting to it, small, detailed adjustments, it'll obviously take longer. But that's a rough timeline."

Fujioka also notes that certain types of monsters are more challenging to design than others, noting that they had previously struggled to create "octopus-type monsters with those kinds of flexible arms", but that the team had managed to pull it off for Monster Hunter Wilds. 

For Fujioka, it's worth spending a lot of time creating every monster because he wants players to have a personal connection to them. "When creating monsters, we want to focus on how each person will be able to find their own favorite monster", before declaring Arkveld to be his own personal favorite because of how long it took to make, and because "it's a flashy monster." 

Be sure to check out our hands-on preview of Monster Hunter Wilds to see what we made of the game so far.

During a preview event for the upcoming title, director Yuya Tokuda spoke on the importance of weapon balance (via Automaton), with a few select weapons being particularly powerful in the current build. "Some weapons, like the long sword and bow, are too easy to use and overpowered", he explains. "We will be adjusting the damage range so that they are more balanced compared to the other weapons while making sure they still feel good to use."

Thankfully, this doesn't mean that those powerful weapons will be receiving nerfs, with the Capcom team instead opting to buff other weapons to bring them up to the same level. "Our policy is to increase the strength of weak weapons rather than to decrease the performance of strong weapons."

The prospective changes don't end at balancing, with Tokuda confirming that a few weapons, including the lance, switch axe, insect glaive and sword and shield, will all have "some significant differences in the finished game." This is in addition to changes that have already been made to certain weapons when compared to previous titles, such as the gun lance which has had its explosivity reduced. 

With a few months still to go until the release of Monster Hunter Wilds, these are unlikely to be the only changes to come to the game's balancing before then. That being said, this is equally unlikely to put a dampener on the hype for what is sure to be one of the biggest releases of 2025.

If you're excited for Wilds, check out our hands-on preview for a look at how the game is shaping up.

Second on my agenda was lance. My favorite weapon in Monster Hunter; my beloved pokey boy. The Monster Hunter Wilds beta made a good first impression, but its rendition of lance felt like running in shoes that are two sizes too small. Speaking of running: my plan to stay quiet and out of the way in Japan went right out the window when I left my capture card at the hotel and ended up sprinting through the streets to go collect it. The utterly innocuous 6'3" blue-eyed, red-bearded white dude running through Osaka in khakis and inexplicably hurting his thoroughly Bulgarian-split-squatted knees in the process? Of course I know him; he's me. I hope y'all appreciated that footage, that's all I'm saying.

Sorry, back to lance and the Wilds beta. The pokes, they were a-poking. But the counters felt counterintuitive. The damage just wasn't there, either. We lance mains are used to being on the bottom third of the speedrunning ladder, but lance was getting absolutely lapped in the beta. The strongest hit available to Wilds' lance is its charged counterattack, but it's locked behind a three-piece combo and a lengthy build-up animation, and the timing to get the double-hit is pretty punishing. I just couldn't string two wins together. You can instantly block after almost any move now and on hit the shield even does stun damage. Great! But the perfect-guard punishing strike barely does more damage than the weakest poke. Not great!

Then there are the control issues. Capcom has found the tech to animate and support octopus monsters like the Black Flame in Wilds, but I still only have two arms and two hands over here and they are struggling to press all these buttons and analog sticks. I played the 3DS Monster Hunters with a claw grip when needed, and for me just using that handheld normally already feels like massaging a live crab, and I still found this stuff fiddly in Wilds. It's curtains for the uninitiated. Press the attack button, two buttons for the swipe attack, guard, perfect guard, heavy guard without accidentally charging. Use focus mode to aim so all this stuff actually connects, and just will the analog stick into moving because I sure as hell don't have a free thumb. Counter, but not that counter you dingus, you buffoon, you absolute fool.

Jonesing for some answers, I had a lot on my mind as I stepped into Capcom's Osaka headquarters. One of those things was abject panic after the studio's security rightly flagged me for being suspicious as I strolled back into the studio, capture card retrieved, with only a temporary namecard to prove my identity. Luckily one of our PR shepherds kept me out of the dungeon that I assume they have under the studio to hold all the monsters when they aren't performing motion capture. I was really hoping to meet Rathalos, but must've missed him. More importantly, a question was burning a hole in my plane-addled brain: what happened to lance, man?

Getting some answers

I must have been visibly exuding dissatisfaction, because I was thrown a bone before I even got my hands on the game. It was a rough start, though. To my horror, I was advised not to hunt with a lance during the five-hour preview. The nerve! This has to be targeted harassment. Is this about the security thing? But wait: only because lance and switch axe are getting big upgrades in the full game, so it's pointless to get a feel for them now. In particular, Capcom said that weapon actions will be updated. Sword and shield and insect glaive are getting tweaks, too, albeit seemingly more minor ones compared to the version in the build we had access to. But forget about them, tell me more about this lance overhaul – or so I pleaded.

Having worked as a game journalist for 12 years, I know how to prioritize topics during limited interview time, so obviously the first thing I asked about was my personal favorite weapon that nobody plays. (Pearls before swine!) In a group interview with the game's lead developers, noted lance main (and executive and art director) Kaname Fujioka was quiet, but game director Yuya Tokuda had good news for me. "The things we thought might be difficult really became evident when users got their hands on it during the [beta]," he said. "For example, guarding at different angles and reacting accordingly. Those edits will be implemented in the [final] version."

It is me, I am users. Later in the visit, another Capcom staffer told me that the team was still acting on feedback from the Monster Hunter Wilds Gamescom demo when the open beta test rolled around, so a lot of fixes and improvements that were already planned couldn't be added in time. It's a fascinating inevitability of game development: devs may need to get a beta build out there to get feedback to improve the game, and with enough time before launch to act on that feedback, even if that means knowingly showing players an outdated version of their game and then cradling their head in their hands afterward. There was a degree of 'I thought they'd say that, yep, put that on the list or push it up the list' as beta players were piping up – few louder than me, at least in the lance club. We meet every third Thursday of the month, mostly to rant about how broken the longsword is.

The build I did end up playing during my Japan visit was much better in many ways already, so I have my hopes. Between Capcom's existing plans, the beta-informed changes, and – I can only assume – Fujioka putting pressure on Tokuda to buff his favorite weapon, it sounds like they know what wasn't working. Capcom has put out banger versions of lance for the past few games so I reckon it can do so again. World is my favorite but Rise is close, and Generations Ultimate gave lance some real flair. To my 11 fellow lance mains, un-batten the hatches and lower the alarm. I was fully prepared to barricade myself in a corner of the Capcom office and demand motion value buffs – that's why I packed so many granola bars in my bag – but the studio's already working on it, and the outlook is promising.

Capcom wanted to do more with Monster Hunter: World and "didn't give up" on those ideas – now "Monster Hunter Wilds made it possible" to try again.

Speaking during the PC Gaming Show Most Wanted, Fujio said "it's true, [Monster Hunter] World has reached quite a lot of people. Seeing people become fans of the game means a lot to us, because through Monster Hunter, we're able to express the game design and creativity that we value so much. And for people around the world to really understand it has really given us a lot of confidence."

"As for Wilds," he continues, "within that, we're really expanding on the parts that were appreciated in Worlds and taking it even further into that world. We wanted to make sure that those who become interested in Worlds can now truly become fans of the franchise."

Austin recently headed to Japan for our Monster Hunter Wilds big preview, where he said that Capcom had solved almost all of the issues he had with the recent Monster Hunter Wilds beta - including the infamous hitstop changes - and that it now truly feels like a sequel to Monster Hunter World. Since its release at the start of 2018, Monster Hunter World has sold more than 25 million copies, becoming the best-selling game in Capcom history, and helping transform the future of the series. For Fujio, that new future seems extremely gratifying.  

I spent 5 hours with a new build of Monster Hunter Wilds and it solved basically every problem I had after playing the beta – now this really feels like Monster Hunter World 2.

'This was improved,' 'that was added in,' 'we got the equipment for this,' and so on. Development had, on a foundational level, changed. Above all else, a quote from Monster Hunter series producer Ryozo Tsujimo – who I'd spoken to (via interpreter) in a group interview earlier that day along with art and executive director Kaname Fujioka and Wilds game director Yuya Tokuda – was stuck in my mind: "Monster Hunter Wilds made it possible."

Exploring the forbidden lands

Monster Hunter Wilds is poised to be one of the biggest new games of 2025 and the biggest Monster Hunter ever made. This series of combat-and-crafting action RPGs was too good to stay niche forever, so it was in a sense unsurprising to see Monster Hunter: World achieve massive global popularity. But the scale of its success is hard to overstate. World alone represents over 25% of the total sales for this 20-year series. Monster Hunter Rise helped preserve that momentum, but it's Monster Hunter Wilds, with its overtly World-like look and feel, wholly distinct from the brighter and more animated style of the initially Switch-exclusive Rise, that's truly following it up.

Monster Hunter: World was an unprecedented spike, and for a while Capcom was rushing to figure out how to accommodate and appeal to its massively expanded audience. Monster Hunter Wilds is the answer. Previously, Tsujimoto commented on the things you have to have in place to make and maintain a "global level hit," a game of a caliber that Monster Hunter just had not been before. In a small white meeting room in Osaka, where we spoke alongside two other journalists, I put the question to him again: does Capcom have those things in place now?

"We're making Monster Hunter Wilds a global title," Tsujimoto begins. "Some of the things that we couldn't do in Monster Hunter: World and we didn't want to give up on, we've really implemented those into Monster Hunter Wilds. We feel like Monster Hunter Wilds made it possible. We were happy to be able to do the [open beta test] in the timing last month to see what we need to work on in order to have this game successfully launch for the [final] version. We're obviously still working on it, still making adjustments to deliver the best experience to users, and we're confident that Monster Hunter Wilds is able to deliver that to everybody."

Tokuda touches on specific improvements made post-beta. Some were already planned and couldn't make it into the build – separately, a Capcom staffer told me that they were expecting a certain degree of criticism given the rough and dated state of the beta build – and some are based on what beta players have been saying. A few weapons are due for big changes, for example, and some ornery bugs were squashed. Hitstop is back in force. In response to another question, Tsujimoto discussed higher-level changes that were made in and for development.

"Monster Hunter became globally popular and very big starting from Monster Hunter: World," he says. "And when Monster Hunter: World's development started to calm down, that is when we began the development for Monster Hunter Wilds. It was around the same time of the year, right now, and what we felt that we needed to do was, first off, the engine that Monster Hunter: World was working on was a customized version of the MT Framework game engine, and we needed to change that to RE Engine. And there were a lot of new things that we wanted to do technically because of the advancement in technology. So we wanted to create a new way of depicting the world of Monster Hunter and we wanted to find a way that really incorporated the advancement that game was able to do for Monster Hunter Wilds."

Don't you dare sing a whole new World

I heard earlier this year, and have now seen firsthand, how Wilds seeks to build on the seamlessness of World and dive deeper into organic and naturalistic themes. Tsujimoto points to whole herds and packs of monsters working and moving together, a quest system woven into locales rather than offset in menus, and smarter AI. On a technical level, monster body types are more diverse, with newcomers like the cephalopodic Black Flame taking an axe – eight axes, even – to the quadruped wyvern template. We have never seen monsters like this in Monster Hunter because they simply couldn't be animated before.

Wilds' overall structure seems the most RPG-like that Monster Hunter has ever been. This doesn't strike me as a coincidence as Capcom seeks to grab more people than ever. The story, too, clearly has more to say. Wilds brings us to forbidden lands to investigate a monster that was thought to be extinct until a boy from a previously unknown tribe saw it wreck his village. Even in the opening hours, our interactions with the people of these lands totally eclipse the standard Monster Hunter formula of a bunch of researchers researching research in the name of research, occasionally doing favors for the locals along the way.

"Coexisting in the same world and having nature and people living together is a big focus of Monster Hunter," Fujioka adds, "Especially for Monster Hunter: World, the ecology of monsters was a big focus, where we have vegetation, plants, small and large monsters, and also endemic life. Nature was a very big focus. For Monster Hunter Wilds, we want to see how humans obviously played a big role in the ecology, and within that ecology, how do people live in that world? How do they act? What did they do? That was a big focus we [wanted] to highlight."

Another Capcom staffer explained that, now more than ever, they've made an extra effort to convey what's fun about Monster Hunter and consider how to make it all understandable, to help players break through the series' notorious wall of techniques and items and menus. So far, it seems to be working. Where an alarming number of Monster Hunter: World players apparently dropped the game before even beating the beginner punching bag Great Jagras, data from the Wilds beta suggests more people are sticking with it and playing through the core content.

World: But More is my current read of Wilds. In all the years I've played Monster Hunter – only starting with 4 Ultimate, admittedly – I've never seen two entries with such clear and intentional overlap. And if that's all Wilds is, honestly, I'll be perfectly happy. But it does feel like more than more, too. Just as there have been fundamental changes at Capcom, my time with Wilds suggests there's been a change in kind since the release of World and Rise. To the folks holding the reins of the series, however, some things will and should never change.

"Monster Hunter is not truly ever over," Tsujimoto concludes. "We always want people to play for a very long time, and that has been a focus for all the titles that we had in the past. And it's obviously something that Monster Hunter Wilds has in mind as well."

Our ever-growing Big Preview: Monster Hunter Wilds hub has all the interviews, hands-on impressions, and key details you'll want and need for this enormous game.

Back when the beta was live, the developer stated that the full version of the action RPG was "already in a more improved state" compared to the demo everyone could get their hands on. From our recent hands-on preview with the game at Capcom's headquarters in Japan, we can vouch that the updated build ran great on PS5, but how about on PC, which seemed to struggle more than the console versions during the beta? During a group interview, our friends at PC Gamer asked about what improvements and optimizations that have been put in place, and thankfully, yes, PC players can expect things to be more polished at launch. 

"What we can say is that, for the [open beta test] version that was out there, there were obviously some issues with the depiction of the monster hair and their fur, so it wasn't very pretty," Monster Hunter Wilds director Yuya Tokuda admits. "We've obviously had improvements there. For the PS5 version that you all are playing right now, it's different from the [beta] version and we feel like you can really feel the difference, for example, in the frame rate that's been improved. The same level of frame rate improvement will also be implemented on PC for the final product."

The frame rate improvements won't be the only changes made to the action RPG – we also found out that four weapons – the switch axe, lance, sword and shield, and insect glaive – will see "big improvements or changes" following feedback from the beta. Capcom has clearly been taking care to bring fans' thoughts on board, which bodes well for its full release in less than three months. 

Be sure to check out our Monster Hunter Wilds Big Preview hub for even more fresh details about Capcom's upcoming action RPG.

From our latest hands-on preview of Monster Hunter Wilds, we already noticed a significant difference between the beta test version and the updated build in the form of hitstop (which is much more noticeable now), but that's not the only improvement Capcom has been cooking up. During the session, we were told that the lance and switch axe will feel different in the final release, and that's not all.

"[Open beta test] user sentiment is something that the development team is closely looking at and listening to. Some of the adjustments for the [final] version we are definitely working on," Monster Hunter series producer Ryozo Tsujimoto tells us. "Some things were definitely planned for the [final] version but not added into the [beta]. Those things exist and those will be implemented, but those details, we want to notify users of on a different occasion, so we hope you keep an eye out for the news." 

Elaborating on this, Monster Hunter Wilds director Yuya Tokuda adds: "For example, for the lance, the controls were a little bit difficult. The things we thought might be difficult really became evident when users got their hands on it during the [beta]. For example, guarding at different angles and reacting accordingly. Those edits will be implemented in the [final] version. 

"Other edits that we plan on having – adjustments for the weapons – include the [switch axe], insect glaive, and sword and shield," Tokuda continues. "Those are weapons that will have big improvements or changes in the [final] version." 

The Monster Hunter Wilds open beta was already a huge hit, so any further improvements like this are likely to be the icing on the cake of what's already shaping up to be a very promising action RPG. As its release date of February 28 draws closer and closer, it seems that veteran fans and newbies alike have plenty to look forward to as Capcom continues to add that extra polish. 

Be sure to check out our Monster Hunter Wilds Big Preview hub for all the latest coverage from our hands-on time with the game. 

Lala Barina is an elegant spider-ish boss that twirls like a ballerina but will ensnare you in webs all the same, and we now know more about how to defeat the creature ahead of Monster Hunter Wilds' February release date.

Speaking to Automaton, Monster Hunter Wilds' executive director and art lead Kaname Fujioka explains that the ballerina comparisons were intentional from the get-go with the creature's "long, thin arms and legs" and the "voluminous" rose bush on its backside - both of which can be seen in the clip below. But it's also that same beautiful red fluff that'll cause trouble for co-op teams.

Lala Barina apparently shoots the red fuzz to paralyze nearby players, leaving them vulnerable to massive attacks once the boss closes in on you. As a result, co-op parties won't be able to simply gang up on the beast mindlessly without becoming immobilized. "We hope that it will lead to new ways of playing the game," Fujioka says. Instead, some players might need to stay behind to shoot down Lala Barina's paralyzing rose fluff while another subunit weaves their way toward the beast, for example.

Rosey discharge isn't the only thing you'll need to contend with, though. Monster Hunter Wilds' arachnophobia mode turns smaller critters into moving piles of goo, but director Yuya Tokuda confirms that it won't affect the appearance of bosses like Lala Barina "as it would negatively affect the hitbox and other aspects." Maybe just squint hard until the beast looks like a dancing dandelion.

Check out our Monster Hunter Wilds Big Preview hub to learn everything you need to know about Capcom's upcoming blockbuster.

As VGC reports, Monster Hunter Wilds director Yuya Tokuda discussed the beta at a recent press event. "The open beta test was an earlier version that actually had some bugs in it, and one of them was that the monsters were moving more often than intended," he confirmed.

"It wasn’t actually a design intention to have them be so rapidly moving, it was just that every X amount of seconds they just were moving on, and it wasn’t something we were planning for. So we’ve gone ahead and fixed that bug, so we’ve now seen since the beta test lots of feedback, and that and many other things are being improved for the final game, and also just the general processing of how monsters decide where to go next and what to do – that’s being refined towards the full game."

I was in a separate session during this same press event at Capcom's Osaka, Japan headquarters, and as noted in my big Monster Hunter Wilds hands-on preview, the improved monster behavior in an updated build stood out to me. Monsters ran away noticeably less frequently than in the beta, and I was able to kill most of them within just one or two areas.

At the time, I wasn't sure if this was caused by the maps having fewer large monsters or just my weapons being stronger. Those were both likely factors, but it turns out this was also the result of a good old-fashioned bug fix, which is a relief. My friends and were I pretty peeved by how frequently monsters skipped town in the beta, so it's nice to have confirmation on this detail.

Monsters running away all the freakin' time can go on the list of huge post-beta improvements right below dramatically enhanced weapon hitstop. Check out our Monster Hunter Wilds Big Preview hub for more details on this huge action RPG.

My colleague Lincoln Carpenter from PC Gamer beat me to the question and asked why the hitstop was toned down in the Monster Hunter Wilds beta. Tokuda explained that "some of the changes in the hitstop were obviously intentional, and some were not implemented due to the settings of the game. When Monster Hunter World was released, many of the users from overseas commented that the hitstop was way too hard and it made it difficult for them to play. So it's very positive feedback seeing the users who experienced the [Wilds open beta test] this time saying that they missed the hitstop that they were experiencing in past titles.

"It's a very unique Monster Hunter experience being able to experience that hitstop," he continued. "So it's very positive feedback from my perspective. In the current version that I think you guys had hands-on gameplay with, there was obviously a little bit of adjustment compared to the [open beta]. And for the full product version, there will be adjustments. For example, the finishing moves will have adjustments to hitstop as well."

Weapons definitely felt a lot better in the newer build. I mostly played hammer and greatsword, two slower weapons with hard-hitting charged attacks that benefit immensely from the added hitstop. Monster skulls ring like bells under the hammer's heft, and the greatsword slows just briefly to sell the force of your swings. I'm still looking forward to the added finishing oomph that Tokuda alluded to, but if you were worried about how weapons feel after the Wilds beta, put those worries to rest. We are so back.

Monster Hunter Wilds isn't the only upcoming Capcom action RPG, as it reveals Monster Hunter Outlanders – a mobile title with a "massive open world."

More than ever, Monster Hunter Wilds seems ready to take on its greatest challenge: following up Monster Hunter World, a breakout hit that brought a long-simmering cult classic to a roiling boil. The bones are the same but the presentation is sharper, modernized but still undeniably Monster Hunter. By all accounts, Monster Hunter Wilds feels like the year-devouring behemoth I want it to be, which means five hours simply wasn't enough. I reckon I'm gonna need another 500.

That's it, I'm gettin' me mallet 

The core game obviously hasn't changed dramatically since the beta. As a hunter sent to investigate reports of an extinct species in mysterious lands thought to be uninhabited, you strike out to take down some monsters, using their horns and hides to craft increasingly powerful weapons and armor to take on stronger and stronger targets – a familiar spin on a watertight, boss-loaded formula that's still unmatched after over 20 years.

Even so, playing Monster Hunter Wilds in this setting felt fresh. There was no technical obfuscation this time, no painfully short leash around my neck. This was just the (subject-to-change) opening hours of the game, meaning I had access to more monsters as well as the all-important crafting system. The new and returning monsters are fantastic – one of my new all-time favorites among them – and I'm rapidly warming up to the revised armor skill system. The food, especially the cheesy garlic naan, looks dive-right-in good. Like dolphin Duolingo, everything is clicking.

I spent most of my session bashing skulls with a hammer because my true love, lance, was one of two weapons I was advised not to use since they're due for "substantial" changes ahead of Monster Hunter Wilds' release in February. Capcom is promising big upgrades for lance and switch axe, and Tokuda added insect glaive and sword and shield to that list when I asked about it in a roundtable interview. He emphasized control issues and focus mode fiddliness, with many changes informed by beta test feedback. (To the delight of hammer main and Monster Hunter producer Ryozo Tsujimoto, a lot of the people visiting the studio used a hammer.)

As I blitzed through the story quests, a greatsword made short work of creatures with smaller, less hammer-friendly heads, most notably the new spider monster Lala Barina, whose balletic movements and rose theming have quickly won it a place in my heart. Lala Barina was the monster I hunted the most – not to grind materials, but because mastering fights and watching my hunt times go down is a big part of enjoying Monster Hunter for me. This spiny thing moves like nothing else in Monster Hunter, pawing at you with obsidian claws and pirouetting away to launch volleys of paralyzing spores. At once freaky and mesmerizing, it's an instant classic.

Other newcomers include the fire-breathing Quematrice, who feels like a goth, less-dopey version of the similarly birdlike Yian Kut-Ku. My fellow hammer appreciators will be pleased to hear that it stops just short of presenting its skull on a silver platter, prime for a cracking. Returning crowd favorite Congalala, a big pink monkey that farts on you, is in prime condition too. He's pink. He farts. He's perfect.

The pinnacle fight for my session was Uth Duna, a gargantuan leviathan that flops around like a whale that took up sumo wrestling after beaching in Japan. Uth Duna echoes the oceanic beauty of Monster Hunter World's Elder Dragon Namielle, crimson scales draped in pearlescent fins. It gave me more trouble than anything I've encountered in Wilds, including Rey Dau in the beta. It moves like a water bed with legs and many of its attacks send disruptive waves splashing around the arena – a fun way to handle AoE attacks that makes World's Lunastra look even worse by comparison. It slams and bops and belly flops with quaking impact, the soundtrack swelling perfectly to really sell it. I thought this would be a forgettable 'walking hitbox' type of monster, but it ended up being my second-favorite after Lala Barina.

A new-fangled gear system  

All of my hunts felt better than the Monster Hunter Wilds beta for a few reasons, even without the performance bump. For one, hit-stop is back, baby. I could sense those charged swings in my palms. It's not Monster Hunter 4 Ultimate levels of oomph, but it's there and that's what matters. Tokuda said they were actually encouraged by all the Wilds beta players clamoring for more hit-stop feedback after Monster Hunter World's audience apparently hated it, and finishers will be even juicier in the full game.

It felt like monsters didn't run away as often as they did in the beta, either, perhaps due to the map having fewer large monsters in town to cause turf wars and clashes. I was able to kill most monsters in one or two areas, which is about what I'd expect. The fact that I could actually craft gear to hunt monsters more efficiently helped, and this ended up eating a sizable chunk of my session. The process of crafting or upgrading a weapon is pretty much unchanged from World or Rise so far – a tree of options with material requirements – but I get the impression that there's much more customization to come. The headliner here is how skills are now split between your armor and weapons, with weapons themselves carrying more offensive and specific skills. Here are a few combinations that stood out to me:

• Attack boost and guard on a lance
• Charge Up on a hammer, and Slugger on another hammer
• Rapid Morph on a charge blade
• Focus on a greatsword

One goal here, Tokuda tells me, is to support the two-weapon system, which lets you change weapons during a hunt by briefly mounting your Seikret bird, by tying some skills to your weapons and letting your armor bring the more generalist and defensive skills. "You can also add decorations and customize it to your liking so that you find your favorite way of hunting," he says.

I specifically asked if our end-game loadouts will match the setups we had in World or Rise in terms of skill quantity and level. Tokuda said they've added new skills, preserved some iconic ones, and adjusted or compressed a few others (from five ranks down to three, for instance), but didn't share what a maxed loadout may look like, presumably for spoiler reasons. More needs to be seen here – early-game builds don't allow for much depth – but so far I like the idea. It's different, it gives weapons more vectors than attack and sharpness and slots, and it lets overlooked but comfy defensive skills shine a bit brighter. I just hope the grind to upgrade weapons is a rewarding one, and that maxed loadouts don't feel neutered. This needs to be more than a way to justify the two-weapon system.

Onward to 2025 

I'm looking over my post-beta Monster Hunter Wilds wishlist and having a hard time coming up with anything that wasn't noticeably improved in this updated build. The UI is still cluttered by unnecessary information and the item pouch feels a bit worse than it did in recent games. If those are the only negatives I can come up with at this point, we're sitting pretty. Several elements have also improved on World, the closest direct comparison for Monster Hunter Wilds, and Rise, the most recent mainline game.

Monster Hunter Wilds' story is starting to come into focus, and it seems surprisingly strong for games that typically handle narratives by handing you a sword and a guild card then pointing at the nearest monster and saying "kill that, for research." So far, Wilds does a much better job communicating the importance and purpose of hunters, the danger some out-of-control monsters present, and the motivations and personalities of your allies. It's all ultimately set dressing for a game where you'll inevitably research a monster into hamburger meat so you can research its offspring into a nice hat, but it is decently compelling set dressing, with cutscenes aplenty.

For a notoriously dense series, Wilds paces and explains itself pretty well, too, which in Monster Hunter terms means it'll probably only be kind of confusing for newer players. Key quests are teed up a bit more like a traditional RPG in bespoke chapters, new areas and mechanics are introduced gradually, and side quests are clearly labeled in your periphery. "Hey hunter," they seem to say, "if you're on the ass end of the ass-kicking, try upgrading your gear a bit!" The soul and flow of Monster Hunter are unmistakable, but you can tell Capcom has been working on ways to make Wilds more appealing and approachable to a massively broadened audience post-World.

I have played Monster Hunter Wilds for 20 hours at this point, but exclusively in the worst ways possible. The magic of Monster Hunter is setting your own goals, taking your sweet time getting there, experimenting with weapons and builds, and messing around with friends at every opportunity. Rushing through five early hours to see and record as much as possible at a press event is not the way to play, and five hours is nothing. That is a snack. That's exactly 1% of my Monster Hunter World play time. Even so, I left this five-hour preview with renewed hunger and impatience. February 28, 2025 can't come soon enough. Monster Hunter Wilds continues to look and feel great, and now it actually runs encouragingly well, at least on PS5. The PC version still has a big check to cash.

Monster Hunter Wilds is set to release for PC, PS5, and Xbox Series X as one of our most anticipated new games of 2025. We'll have more to share on the game from our time at the studio this week, so keep coming back to GR+ for more.

Its name is Monster Hunter Outlanders, and it's set to feature a "massive open world," complete with "the community and social systems players are looking for today," according to TiMi Studio Group producer Dong Huang. The reveal trailer showcases a bit of what we can expect from the world, and it really does look pretty – with lush, green plains, an expansive desert area, as well as what look like lakes and ponds, all full of monsters to hunt either alone or alongside a party of four.

Exploring those environments looks like a ton of fun, as we can see options to swim, glide through the sky after catapulting yourself up, slide down slopes, swing through trees, and climb on cliffs. Seeing it like this also demonstrates how huge it's going to be – it's almost hard to imagine it squashed down on a mobile screen.

As for the developers, TiMi Studio Group is owned by Tencent Games, and you might recognize the studio from its work on the likes of Call of Duty Mobile and MOBA game Pokemon Unite. Needless to say, the team knows its stuff when it comes to mobile, which bodes very well for Outlanders, especially when Capcom is directly involved, too. 

There's no release date for Monster Hunter Outlanders yet, so it's not clear if it'll arrive before or after Monster Hunter Wilds on February 28. Either way, Monster Hunter fans clearly have a lot to look forward to, especially with the promise of Outlanders playtests prior to its own release, which we'll just have to stay tuned for. 

Capcom wants to know what Monster Hunter Wilds players thought of the beta – Here are 11 things I want fixed before launch.

NahricNovak told me about Sparky, the Australian Shepherd pictured above. "I named him when I was super young," they say. "He ran so fast sparks flew behind him." Sparky was notorious for briefly running away in his young years, but he eventually "retired" and stuck around full-time, eventually helping to oversee another family dog named May'ah and "show her how to act." He was here for Monster Hunter World but has since passed away. Now he'll live on as NahricNovak's trusty Palico. 

See ya again soon, bud. from r/MHWilds

"My brother picked him out and he was technically a gift for my birthday," NahricNovak recalls. "I think I was around 4 or 5. He lived for 18 years, finally passing after a series of health issues starting when he was 17. We don't really know what happened to his left eye. One day it was just hurt in a way that couldn't be saved. Knowing how he'd chase animals I can't help but think something finally fought back."

"It's a mix of emotions," they say of their Palico. "I teared up recreating him. It made me think of everything. From braving the dark after a nightmare to get him to help me sleep, sneaking him into hotels on family trips, to feeling his heart stop as I held him in his last moments. During a long 18-year life a dog stops being a pet and becomes a brother, a son, a member of the family. I usually don't make my character in Monster Hunter look like me. I couldn't help putting a little more of myself into my character this time though. I know he'd want me beside him as well." 

Thank you capcom. from r/MonsterHunter

Khimsince86 shared one of the first tributes I saw – a gorgeous white Palico based on their cat Loki, who they describe as "a massive softy" and a "LARGE cat to say the least," but one without "a bad bone in his body." Wilds isn't Loki's first Monster Hunter game, but it does probably have the best character and Palico customization yet.

"I got Loki in 2014," Khimsince tells me. "It was while I was off work after destroying my left knee by getting out of bed of all things, and after a couple of weeks being housebound and being lonely while my other half was at work, I was looking at getting a cat after having one nearly my whole time growing up at home. I was able to get Loki and from the moment I got him home he never seemed to leave my side until I was leaving the room and had left a cup of tea unguarded for him to drink." 

"On how it feels to bring Loki along with me in each [Monster Hunter] game and now Wilds when it drops next year, it's a great feeling that Capcom have given us the ability to immortalize our beloved pets so that they can accompany us into a whole new world and allow us to still spend time with them, and never let our memories fade of them because we will still be making new ones in the game over the years to come!" 

My best friend of 19 years passed this year from r/MHWilds

Monster Hunter is uniquely positioned for tributes like this. The series has been going for over 20 years and Palicoes have long been a mainstay as hunting companions and supporting units. They've gained new functionality and customization over the years, and in Monster Hunter Generations Ultimate were even playable via the Prowler fighting style. With Monster Hunter Wilds, Palicoes have received standard voice acting for the first time, though you can default to the normal meowing dialogue if you want.

I also spoke to BluLilyx, whose cat Lincoln, or Link, passed away this year. "Me and Lincoln grew up together and I suppose you could even say he was my emotional support animal but most importantly my best friend," they say. "He would chase me around when I was a kid and I would chase him back. He was a lot like a dog in the sense that he always wanted to be around you and loved affection. Lincoln loved every person he came across. He was well-known for being a gentle giant who loved to receive pets and lay in the sun ... He passed at the old age of 19 and enjoyed his last day in the sun." 

"I started playing Monster Hunter Freedom Unite on my PSP Go around the same time we got Lincoln," BluLilyx continues. "I loved the Palicoes so much and throughout the years I named and customized my Palicoes as Link. It became a tradition for me, as it's the only game series where I could bring my IRL best friend with me. I usually prefer my Palicoes to be more defensive, providing me health and support, and even putting the monster to sleep for me. To me, that is exactly how Lincoln was in real life. He was my support and he lifted me up in dire times."

"It feels very bittersweet bringing him to Wilds as this is the first time I’m bringing him with me where he can’t be with me in real life," BluLilyx adds. "I have shed tears multiple times but I also feel happy that I can still fight monsters with my buddy. Monster Hunter is my favorite game series and it helped grow my immense love for cats. Now it will continue that love and the remembrance of my loving childhood pet and best friend for life." 

As Monster Hunter Wilds PC players fight horrible polygons and struggle to hit 60 FPS, Capcom says the game is "already in a more improved state compared to the beta."

That said, a few things are looking not-so-good. Compared to Monster Hunter World and Rise, some details are looking quite bad, actually. This beta was a fun free sample, but I'll be more than a little disappointed if several elements aren't noticeably improved by the time Monster Hunter Wilds launches on February 28, 2025. That said, Monster Hunter betas have been hugely beneficial in the past, so I have no doubt the final game will be more polished thanks to beta data. But Capcom is explicitly looking for feedback, so if I can't play Monster Hunter Wilds I'll just have to write about it. Here are 11 issues that stood out to me in my 15 hours of beta testing.

Performance, obviously 

Let's get the big one out of the way. The Monster Hunter Wilds beta did not run very well on most PCs. I wasn't over-the-moon with the PS5 version either, and I've heard horror stories about the Xbox Series S. On PS5, performance mode was noticeably smudged, and graphics mode didn't have the frame rate that an action game like this really needs. This is probably the biggest problem facing Wilds right now, but it's also the one with the most obvious fix: just optimize it better. Easy for me to say! The devs have assured players that the full game is already in better shape, so here's hoping the inevitable second beta looks and runs much better. 

Monsters running away all the time 

I lied. This is the biggest problem in Wilds right now. When bosses just skip town all the time, it wastes the player's time, kills the rhythm of the fight, and throws any time-limited buffs into a big ol' dumpster. This problem isn't new to Monster Hunter, but it feels especially egregious in Wilds, with monsters changing areas at one- or two-minute intervals at times, and often running hundreds of meters away in an instant. This is exaggerated by how long hunts can take due to the beta gear being weak, but if the driving motivation to get stronger and play better is to curtail infuriating monster AI, something has gone wrong. I want Capcom to leash these things to an area for at least four or five minutes at a time. 

Too many monsters at once

I should not have to pull out dung pods several times in a single hunt just to tell unwelcome invaders to go away. Multiple large monsters appear in the same area too often and hang around each other too long. If I didn't come here to hunt it, it can get in the aforementioned big ol' dumpster. It doesn't even make sense; surely everything would flee from the apex predator of an environment. And if another monster is going to crash my Rey Dau hunt, it could at least have the common decency to deal some damage to the thing before I quite literally tell it to eat shit. Instead, they have the nerve to attack me, as if I just killed 17 of their closest friends and am now wearing their skin. That doesn't sound a thing like me. 

Too many buttons at once

More than once, Monster Hunter Wilds reminded me of the PlayStation 6 meme controller mockups with 20 buttons and four analog sticks. It feels like Wilds might be overcomplicating some weapons, or at least mapping commands poorly. Multiple attacks rely on three simultaneous inputs. It's just plain uncomfortable to hit triangle and circle while also aiming with L2 and the right stick and guarding with R2, but it honestly wouldn't be that big of an issue if the game's input buffering didn't consistently misread commands. 

Clunky item pouch 

After the item loadouts in World and Rise basically solved Monster Hunter's restocking issues and streamlined the inventory UI, Wilds seems to have gone back to fiddly, multi-step processes for replenishing your potions and ammo. What we need is a one- or two-button solution that refills our inventory with all the stuff we need, preferably paired with an interface that doesn't have more steps than a charge blade. 

Constant UI disruptions 

In a similar vein, I cannot begin to express how little I care about the notifications that regularly pop up on the right side of Wilds. I've turned off all the blurbs and boxes I can but they keep coming back like invasive web ads. Did you know that your flash bomb was effective? Yes, Capcom, because I saw the monster fall out of the sky. Did you know these other monsters are having a turf war somewhere? No, and why do I need to? What about this environmental update that we're going to put over the button that opens the map? Could I just have my map, please? 

Weather instantly changing all the time 

Environments update a little too frequently, as it happens, and probably too quickly at that. Dynamic weather is all well and good, but the storm conditions in the beta absolutely tank visibility and framerate, and it's blatantly unnatural the way an eclipse-like storm just consumes the entire desert in two seconds. And then, bam, it's right back to sunshine and rainbows minutes later. This makes even Georgia weather look tame, and it feels like a classic case of aesthetics conflicting with gameplay.

Uneven level design hurts combat 

While we – by which I do mean I – are on the subject, I would like to see the hunting experience prioritized over making levels pretty and varied. The sand dunes in the beta are the worst offender, constantly forcing your character to slide and causing monsters to move erratically when they crest a hill. In my ideal world, every area in every Monster Hunter game would be a largely flat arena with some minor decorations to gussy it up. That's never going to happen, and admittedly it probably shouldn't because it would get boring, but Wilds covering levels in fixtures and shapes that completely break movement feels like an unhealthy extreme of its own. 

Limp-wristed weapon hit stop 

If players are busting out frame counters to explain why weapons don't have that same oomph anymore, there is a problem. Big hits just don't feel big in Wilds, and I miss my juicy critical attacks. I've gotten more satisfaction from chopping pork loin with a chef knife. The lack of hit stop on meaty blows is not offset by those shiny, one-decimal damage numbers. Crank the hit stop back up a little, please. Give me a few frames of pain. Put some stank on it. 

Focus Mode jank 

Focus Mode, which lets you land wound-destroying special attacks and aim normal attacks with greater precision, actually feels like a healthy addition to Monster Hunter combat overall, but it makes some weapons feel downright unwieldy. How am I supposed to move my character and the reticle while holding the charge button on my insect glaive? I only have so many digits, Capcom, and that's coming from someone who used a claw grip on a Nintendo 3DS for 500 hours of Monster Hunter 4 Ultimate. And after another 500 hours in Monster Hunter World, mostly spent maining lance, why does it suddenly feel impossible to land some attacks without using Focus Mode? 

Weapon imbalance 

Hello, this is me officially ditching the thin disguise and getting on my soapbox to summon my 11 fellow lance mains. Why does the perfect guard counterattack, which absolutely slapped in Monster Hunter Rise and Generations, deal roughly 20% more damage than a normal poke? This is a travesty, and it cannot stand.  

In seriousness, it's not just lance. A lot of motion values feel bizarrely skewed, hurting the competitiveness of some weapons and warping their playstyle in un-fun ways. Sure, you control the buttons you press and the weapons you use, but feeling powerful is fun. This shouldn't be as bad in the full game when we have access to more weapons and armor skills, but some numbers definitely need to be tweaked. There will always be a worst weapon, but the gap should not be as big as Monster Hunter's speedrunning community has come to believe after the Wilds beta.

Monster Hunter Wilds players use the beta character creator to recreate their hunters from Monster Hunter World, aged for good measure, and also their real cats.

Over on Twitter, user Axelayer has explained that, no, "it's not just you" who thought that "the combat in the MHWilds beta felt 'off,'" and when you compare footage side by side from previous games like Monster Hunter: World, you can see why that's the case. Namely, it looks like it's partially down to the reduction (and sometimes outright removal) of hitstop –  that short pause that happens after a big attack connects with an opponent, which helps emphasize the power or heaviness of a hit. It seems that Capcom has "reduced hitstop on most (if not all) weapon types in Wilds, leading to some weapons feeling worse than they did in prior games," Axelayer points out.

And you don't just have to take their word for it, because they've compiled the evidence into a handy video. Take the Switch Axe, for example. Its Overhead Chop attack had noticeable hitstop in Monster Hunter Generations Ultimate, lasting around a fourth of a second, and this was about the same in Monster Hunter Rise. It felt a bit shorter in World, at around a fifth of a second, but that's still way more than in Wilds, where there's precisely no hitstop at all. 

As Axelayer explains, hitstop plays a major role in adding that extra feeling of 'oomph' to a strike. Seeing a significant pause after a satisfying swing of a sword really hammers home that the foe on the receiving end just took a huge blow, and seeing that happen in the middle of combat can make you feel like your attacks are more effective. Without that, things can feel a bit lackluster. "Without hitstop, many weapons feel more limp and less impactful than in prior entries because the animations don't emphasize their impact nearly as strongly," Axelayer adds.

Not everyone thinks that these changes are bad, it should be pointed out – one player comments that "it's a good change overall, especially since the flow of combat is better now." Regardless, it's worth keeping in mind that this is all from Wilds' beta, so things could change between now and the full release – Capcom already promises that the whole thing is "in a more improved state" compared to what we've experienced so far.

After 500 hours in Monster Hunter World, the Monster Hunter Wilds beta feels like a new pair of shoes: fresh and stylish, but a little uncomfortable.

The Monster Hunter Wilds beta is well underway and everyone plus their parents seems to be playing it, judging by the half a million concurrent users it managed to pull in on Steam alone. Mentions of Capcom's early teaser even invaded an official Final Fantasy 14 broadcast, too.

In the latest Final Fantasy 14 Letter From the Producer episode, the MMO's frontman Yoshi-P was reading through comments in chat (around the 2 hour, 25 minute mark in the video) where one fan congratulated him on his appearance in the upcoming Monster Hunter, which obviously left him confused until fellow Square Enix producer Toshio Murouchi told him that fans have been sculpting his likeness in-game.

"I haven't checked social media, but apparently they made me into a character, and I look tired?" Yoshi-P asked, according to translations from twitterer AitaikiMochi. "I have to apologize to the Monster Hunter team for my unseemly presence then."

I think Yoshi-P has nothing to apologize for, based off some of the badass action poses he (or his in-game doppelgangers) pulls off above. Plus, the man seemingly hasn't taken a big break ever since the MMO's revival and massive comeback more than a decade ago - if anyone has the right to be tired, it's probably him.

Want Yoshi-P in your game, too? Check out how to change your appearance in the Monster Hunter Wilds beta.

Black screen fix in Monster Hunter Wilds

If you have the black screen after character creation in Monster Hunter Wilds, you need to turn off upscaling on your PC, as mentioned. Upscaling is supposed to use super-resolution imaging to improve performance without compromising on image quality, but at time of writing, the beta for Monster Hunter Wilds doesn't seem to play along well with it.

To turn off upscaling, before you start the game properly, go into the settings menu on the main screen, and to the "Graphics" tab. Once there, scroll down to the option marked "Upscaling (Super-Resolution Imaging)", and disable it. 

Once this is done, the glitch should be sorted, and completing character creation should let you go into the main game without the black screen cutting you off. It's not clear at the time of writing why upscaling is causing this, but that is arguably the purpose of a beta - to find errors like these and identify them before the full release in February.

© GamesRadar+. Not to be reproduced without permission

This comes as no great surprise given the terrifying Monster Hunter Wilds system requirements that Capcom previously released, though I didn't have nightmarish texture-breaking models on my bingo card. The good news is that this nightmare seems to be bug- and not performance-related, and Capcom says the full game is already in better shape, plus it has some decent troubleshooting options for struggling players. 

"The issue of afterimage noise occurring in certain environments when Frame Generation is enabled will be fixed in the full game, which is already in a more improved state compared to the beta test," the official Monster Hunter Twitter account says, linking to a list of workarounds and known issues for Steam players. 

There's also a much more in-depth post outlining some common troubleshooting options step-by-step. Standouts include adding the game to anti-virus exceptions, giving it and Steam admin privileges, updating your graphics drivers or operating system or DirectX, and verifying the game's Steam cache. 

A few other specific solutions are also worth noting. "If you are experiencing issues with game stability, delete your shader cache files," Capcom advises. Much less helpfully, "if you are experiencing crashes caused by insufficient VRAM while performing shader warming, please contact Intel Corporation or the PC vendor." More helpfully, Capcom adds that "if Frame Generation option is grayed out and cannot be enabled, please turn on 'GPU scheduling.'"

Speaking of frame generation: "When using NVIDIA DLSS and repeatedly changing the Upscaling Mode, VRAM usage may increase, causing the framerate to drop or the game to crash on certain PCs. If this happens, please restart the game." Turn it off and turn it back on is a classic PC gaming fix, but with how many DLSS and VRAM reports I'm seeing on forums, this feels worth mentioning. 

Finally, Capcom addresses the players who've said the beta won't even start. "If this is not resolved by updating your graphics card driver to the latest version, please try a clean reinstallation of the driver," it advises. 

This comes alongside wide-ranging reports of performance issues, from graphical hitches to framerate woes, and let's not forget the Nintendo 64 polygons. Data is scattered and anecdotal at the moment, but multiple threads across Reddit and Steam forums suggest that many players can't reliably maintain or even hit 60 FPS at 1080p or 1440p on any settings if their PC is even slightly outdated. 

There seems to be a huge reliance on frame gen and upscaling to even get by, which is quickly becoming the norm for taxing PC releases. By and large, the reports of 60+ FPS that I've seen have come from users with an RTX 3080 or 4070 GPU or equivalent. Your CPU may also be a severe limiting factor, just as it was in Monster Hunter World. The frequent weather effects in Monster Hunter Wilds appear to be especially top-heavy. 

I've personally been hovering around 40 - 50 FPS on medium-low settings at 1440p with DLSS set to performance, but I recognize that my PC ain't no spring chicken with a 2080 Super, Intel i7 9700k, and 16GB of RAM. After five years of faithful service, I was already eyeing this year's Black Friday gaming deals for a new PC build after games like Baldur's Gate 3 and Space Marine 2 pushed mine to its limits. Wilds is only plunging me deeper into the abyss that is building your dream PC in a shopping cart, one "if it's discounted enough" at a time  

Beta builds are always outdated and Capcom still has four months to optimize the game, so there's no reason to sound the alarm just yet. Monster Hunter World chugged at launch but perked up quite a bit after a few patches, though good performance at launch should be the expectation. Monster Hunter Rise, the series' most recent release, ran pretty perfectly on PC from the get-go, but it notably started as a less demanding Nintendo Switch game (which ran poorly on Switch, for the record). 

Just as it did with Monster Hunter World, we can safely expect Capcom to host a second beta test in December or January, and that should give us a better idea of where the game stands. For the time being, follow the troubleshooting advice above where applicable, fill out the beta feedback survey, and make sure that lowering some graphics settings actually improves your framerate before cranking everything down. You may find that some added details don't actually hurt your FPS, so a less-ugly experience may be feasible. 

After 500 hours in Monster Hunter World, the Monster Hunter Wilds beta feels like a new pair of shoes: fresh and stylish, but a little uncomfortable. 

While the action RPG's open beta kicked off for PS Plus subscribers on PS5 earlier this week, over the last few hours, it finally became available for players on Xbox Series X|S and PC too. It was already obvious that it was going to be popular – yesterday, before it was even possible to play, around 23,000 concurrent users had the game open on PC, presumably just staring hungrily at the title screen. However, now that it's possible to do a fair bit more than that, that peak player count has shot up massively, and according to SteamDB, now stands at 463,798 – a record set seven hours ago, around an hour after it went (properly) live. There's a good chance that number will rise even more over the weekend, too, given that for many timezones, that record was set overnight. 

Needless to say, that's a huge win for Capcom, but not everything has been smooth sailing. The likes of Reddit and Twitter are currently full of screenshots and clips showing both people and monsters transformed into low-poly blobs that stick out like sore thumbs compared to the usual beautiful visuals – they almost look like they could belong in a PS1 game. The huge frog-like monster Chatacabra doesn't look quite as intimidating when it's a barely-recognizable green and brown lump with a flailing tongue, and the models of the humans sometimes appear as borderline nightmare fuel with what look like flattened faces and tightly shut eyes. You can check out some of the horrors below.

Peak graphics, puts world to shame from r/MHWilds

Gemma The Chosen One from r/MHWilds

LMAO what am I even fighting?? from r/MHWilds

Alas, for anyone experiencing this, there doesn't seem to be an obvious fix available right now. One of the Reddit users above, Qettt, notes: "Unfortunately, nothing I do actually affects the broken textures. Verifying files, reinstalling game, recompiling shaders, nothing really worked. The textures were partially fixed when I turned up all the model/mesh/graphic settings to high, but character models (aside from Gemma) were still missing limbs or were still generally broken." They later add that "reinstalling drivers temporarily fixed the issue," but after restarting the game, "everything broke again."

Hopefully, whatever's causing this will be ironed out by the end of the beta period. Even if not, at least it's been flagged now rather than at the action RPG's actual launch. 

After 500 hours in Monster Hunter World, the Monster Hunter Wilds beta feels like a new pair of shoes: fresh and stylish, but a little uncomfortable.

Weapons and myriad systems are sure to be retouched by the time Monster Hunter Wilds actually launches, but you can bring your beta custom character directly into the full game, so now's a great time to obsess over sliders and lighting. One of the cooler trends among players mirrors the evolution of the Monster Hunter franchise by aging up custom characters from previous games – often Monster Hunter World, which Wilds is pretty directly iterating on, but also several older entries. 

Evolution of my character from r/MonsterHunter

Brought back my vets from World, but with more experience from r/MonsterHunter

Other players have turned to the Palico creator, then turned to their real-life pet cats, and then turned back to the Palico creator with a creative flame burning within them. It's a Monster Hunter tradition at this point: bringing your real cat along for the ride so they can save you in-game too, not through invaluable companionship, but by healing you or knocking you away right before a monster knocks you flat. 

Thank you capcom. from r/MonsterHunter

Other eye-catching creations include Pikachu, the One Piece cast, Jack Sparrow, and Lucy from Cyberpunk Edgerunners. If you're looking for inspiration or, like me, a solid base to build on because you suck with character creation sliders, I'd point you to the inventive MHSliders Reddit community. From wild cosplays to beautiful and believable people, Monster Hunter Wilds is already churning out some of the best custom characters of any recent action RPG, and it's not even out until February 28, 2025. 

Pro tip: look at your character in-game, not just in the editor, because you might be surprised or horrified by what a difference the lighting makes. Also, try not to worry about the sour grimace your character apparently puts on whenever you put up a shield.  

There is currently a bug(?) that cause character to become ugly when they hold a shield. from r/MonsterHunter

The Monster Hunter Wilds beta isn't even live yet, but over 23,000 fans on Steam gathered to stare at its start-up screen. 

I've played the early PS5 beta for about six hours, which feels like rating a whole sandwich after picking off and eating the bread. Still, it is good bread. Four new monsters and 14 revamped weapons? Yeah, that'll kill another dozen hours once the beta is on all platforms. A new Monster Hunter game always feels like an occasion, and Monster Hunter Wilds is an especially energetic one so far. The beta feels good, often great, with the foundations of Monster Hunter World – far more than Monster Hunter Rise – weaving in changes and features that take the reins and steer this thing in exciting new directions. 

The world after World  

First impressions, then. The beta environment, the Windward Plains, is ginormous, and stuffed with environmental tools that I habitually ignore in favor of just stabbing monsters. Vine traps, falling boulders, healing bugs and plants, resources galore – you know the drill. The 3D map is a big upgrade and makes navigation much smoother, as does the Google Maps-equipped bird mount called a Seikret, which will just auto-taxi you to whatever monster you're after. 

The stalking and tracking part of the hunter side of Monster Hunter has definitely been streamlined even more. I know that will bum some people out, but as someone who's mainly just here for boss fights and a peerless crafting grind, I'm not complaining. Seikret, take me to this Chatacabra, on the double. And don't go anywhere; I need you to scrape me off the pavement the next time a monster curb-stomps me because I got greedy with my combos. The Seikret pick-me-up is incredibly strong, almost rivaling the Wirebug recovery in Rise for letting you quickly get some distance and heal in relative safety. 

The mobility and aggression in monster AI feels pretty comparable to World so far, with some design cues from Rise as well. The armored gorilla toad Chatacabra is a fun punching bag with heavily telegraphed attacks and plenty of staggers to exploit. Doshaguma, especially the larger alpha variant, feels like a much tamer version of Rise's Goss Harag – bear-like and prone to just smothering you with its mass between swipes of its claws. The ink-spitting leviathan Balahara is my pick for the most frustrating monster in the beta. It just will not hold still, and it constantly whips its head around as it seems to attack the ground behind you.  

The top predator of the Windward Plains, the lightning wyvern Rey Dau, is the peak of the beta. Capcom nails the sound design once again. This thing is an alien railgun with wings, so it's only right that it sounds like God slamming a car door. It's a shame the quest itself is such a hassle. You initially have to find Rey Dau during intermittent lightning storms, one of the environment's many fluctuating weather conditions, whereas other monsters spawn all the time. 

The standout in all of these fights is Focus Mode, a new means of aiming your attacks and destroying wounds that appear as you damage monsters. I like Focus Mode a lot more than I thought I would and it's quickly becoming embedded in my muscle memory, but I have found it's much more important for some weapons than others. Just hold the button to pull up a reticle, with no resource or time limit attached, and precisely aim your strikes. You can also briefly enter Focus to launch a unique attack that deals extra damage to wounds and triggers a slick follow-up animation for even more hits. You can pop wounds just by hitting them normally, but using Focus mode efficiently will make a big difference in your hunt times. It also makes tons of attacks easier to land, from lance counters to charge blade axe swings. 

Beta pains  

I've spent my beta time opening the map, surveying the monsters that are in town, and marking my next victim with a Seikret-guiding waypoint. I've done this instead of creating dedicated quests to reduce the chance of random players jumping in and, just to pull an example out of thin air, sabotaging my Rey Dau hunt by dying to the railgun attack and wiping the quest, forcing me to wait for another lightning storm for the umpteenth time. The normal hub quest flow isn't available to sample, sadly, and you're stuck in a recommended lobby with a bunch of other players. I guess it is a network test, after all. 

That said, the seamlessness of these freeform expeditions is nice. Quests only start once you've hit your target monster, and you can just keep exploring after the hunt's over. This makes speed runs easier to track and it reduces downtime between hunts, at least in a back-to-back setting like this. It's like the aimless excursions in World but with a little more direction, and more loot from the looks of it. A quick trip to the nearest base camp, including several handy temporary ones, and I'm ready to go. I do miss the one-button item restock, though; if Wilds has one, I haven't found it. The UI is a bit messy altogether, which is one of my biggest problems so far. Unhelpful pop-ups clutter the screen and delay essential inputs like opening the freakin' map, while important details like weapon-specific bars and resources seem oddly tiny.  

On PS5, Monster Hunter Wilds is treading a fine line between looking quite pretty on fidelity mode and being a bit flat and smeared on performance mode, which I still advise using to maintain a better frame rate. It is never ugly, but it is often less than gorgeous. I recommend bumping the saturation up a little; by default, it has a bit of the washed-out look that World did. We'll see how the PC beta looks and runs. I am not feeling optimistic given the ridiculous system requirements. The character models, at least, are the best in the series, with stunning detail put into the character creator as well as every NPC. But in all my setting scouring, I haven't found a way to make the UI less unwieldy. 

The good, the bad, and the insect glaive  

Some 1,100 words in, it's finally time to nerd out over the weapons. I've focused on my darlings – lance, hammer, charge blade, and insect glaive – but I've been keeping tabs on all 14. I'm hungry to try greatsword, which got an honest-to-goodness parry, and longsword, the perennial favorite. All of the ranged weapons seem absurdly imbalanced, as is Monster Hunter tradition. Sword and shield feels mostly unchanged from World, and strictly better if anything. Dual blades do be blading dually. Switch axe I probably know the least about, but everything I've seen is encouraging. Gunlance might be the biggest winner of all the weapons, with huge buffs to shelling and powerful additions to its normal attacks and guard options. 

Most of my play time has been on lance, which feels strong but a touch unfamiliar. Thrust combos now lead into either a triple-thrust follow-up or a charged thrust which does double damage when you time it with a monster attack. The normal counter stance is gone, fully replaced by the heavy guard, but you can do a normal guard almost instantly after basically every attack, letting you weave in perfect guards that deal damage(!), apply stun value for decent KOs, and allow for ripostes. 

As a diehard lance main, this counterattack is by far my biggest issue, and yes I'm giving it a whole paragraph. Capcom, if you're listening, you need to roughly quadruple the motion value on this thing. Just a straight-up 300% damage buff, and I'm not kidding. I think you forgot a zero in the scaling or something because my perfect guard riposte should not be dealing 24 measly damage when a normal attack does 18. This feels like when Elden Ring: Shadow of the Erdtree added the Rain of Fire spell and it dealt like 11 damage to a deer. 

I am, however, delighted to report that Wilds might have the best hammer ever. All of the staple attacks are back and now we have a Wirebug-esque dash that lets us dodge while preserving our charge. Stuns come pretty easy and every last bonk feels fantastic and probably has more follow-up options. Much the same is true of charge blade, which has a more rounded toolbox that's less reliant on ultra spam. Axe and sword mode feel a little less intertwined, but that's offset by more fluid axe combos, a much better phial economy, and quality-of-life buffs like a phial load that goes right into a shield charge. 

Finally, the bad news: I don't like the new insect glaive at all. It's still early days, but the gameplay loop that I loved in Rise is just gone. The thrust opener is slower and weaker, aerial attacks were gutted, and the divebomb thrust is much harder to use and aim. Almost all of the weapon's power budget has been funneled into a whirlwind attack that pushes you to collect and burn all three kinsect buffs as quickly as possible, which is extremely boring to me. I don't play the famously nimble insect glaive to use stationary charged attacks. It just feels pigeonholed, so while I may be missing something, I'm hoping it gets significant changes before launch or I may drop it entirely.  

As the first bite of a more direct follow-up to the breakout success that was Monster Hunter World, the first beta for Monster Hunter Wilds is promising. But it's by design too limited to really blow me away. It is Monster Hunter – this in and of itself is great news. Capcom would have to go out of its way to ruin the series' ironclad formula. Instead, Wilds looks to have meaningfully added to it. It just needs some breaking in. But after playing the beta, I'm even more desperate to play the full game, which is about the best takeaway possible for such a thin vertical slice. 

The Monster Hunter Wilds beta isn't even live yet, but over 23,000 fans on Steam gathered to stare at its start-up screen.

If you're struggling to kill Rey Dau in MH Wilds, we can help you out, with a stategy based on evasion, special items that exploit its weaknesses, and surviving for the long term, as this enemy has a health bar that just seems to go on forever. If you need help beating this formidable foe, we'll explain how to beat the Monster Hunter Wilds Rey Dau, and bring this prey down.

How to beat Rey Dau in Monster Hunter Wilds beta

The Rey Dau is a three star difficulty hunt target in Monster Hunter Wilds, and the most difficult monster that you can fight in the Beta. To beat it, you'll need a mixture of speed, long-term survivability, and an understanding of how to de-power its electrical state in which it channels its most powerful attacks. Rey Dau represents the "final boss" of the beta, and a good way to truly test your skills against what looks to be one of the toughest creatures in Monster Hunter Wilds so far. 

With that in mind, here's some tips, tricks and exploitable weaknesses to use against Rey Dau, so you can formulate a proper strategy.

• The main Rey Dau weakness is Grounding Pods. These can be found in the environment and serve as special Slinger Ammo - when you shoot an electrified section of Rey Dau's body with a Grounding Pod, it removes the electrical power and stops it from using its most effective attacks for a time.
• Play for time and survivability. The Rey Dau has a massive health pool, so you can't breeze in and deal with it quickly. Equip yourself with lots of health potions and prepare for a long fight. Have health rations and steak to replenish your max HP and stamina, and make a habit of using your slinger hook to grab resources along the way.
• Target the head and tail. No matter which of the many Monster Hunter Wilds weapons you have equipped, focus on the head and tail. The head takes extra damage, and the tail can cut off - not only providing more rewards when you carve it, but reducing the range of its tail attacks accordingly.

• If it charges energy around its mouth, run to the side! The Rey Dau's most powerful attack is a beam of electricity fired from its mouth that explodes in a large radius when it hits a target. If you're caught in it, you have to be close to full health to survive. For the best chance at avoiding it, strafe to the left or right to circle around the big wyvern and roll at the last second.
• Rey Dau is vulnerable to flash attacks. While these won't hurt it, use the brief period of stun to heal, sharpen your weapon, or prepare a high damage attack to the face.
• When in danger, stay underneath it. There's no section of the Rey Dau that's safe to be around, but the easier, weakest attacks are generally targeted at foes standing between its legs. Simple stomps and constant repositioning mean that standing underneath its groin is, sadly, the safest option.
• Thunderblight is a peril to take seriously. Rey Dau's attacks can inflict Thunderblight, which is cured either by a Nulberry, or rapidly evading until it wears off. Thunderblight leaves the player more vulnerable to being stunned - which is very dangerous in circumstances like these.
• Bring in friends! Rey Dau is a potent threat, so firing off an SOS Flare is a very good idea if you're having trouble. Whether you're working with random players or hooking up with friends in the Monster Hunter Wilds crossplay system, having allies distracting and impeding it is far more effective than going at it with a Palico sidekick.

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Monster Hunter Wilds' beta officially kicks off on November 1 and runs through November 3 - PS5 players had a brief early access period, which is over now. That hasn't stopped so, so many hopeful PC players from downloading the taste test early and jumping in to... wait around? Since the servers haven't gone live just yet, all you can currently do with the beta is change the language settings and pre-load the game itself.

According to SteamDB, almost 23,000 people are running the beta client right this second. I've had to update that number twice while writing this very paragraph, so that already bonkers crowd should balloon to an even more absurd size in the hours leading up to its release. Monster Hunter is, ahem, monstrously popular, after all. 

The hack-and-looting series' popularity shouldn't really be too surprising anymore, however. Slaying big beasts in search of increasingly stronger loot was already a hit formula on handheld consoles back in the day, but Capcom's action series hit new heights with Monster Hunter World and Rise, which together contribute to nearly half of the franchise's 100 million sales record. Even in the last six months, the series lured in three million newbies with the sweet scent of monster leather, so Monster Hunter Wilds will probably pull in even more wild numbers. I told you: monstrous. 

Prepare by checking out the best Monster Hunter weapons available in the beta and how to change your appearance. 

With that in mind, we'll discuss the best ways to handle these issues if you're playing the beta, how you can connect to servers and what the particular causes might be - so you can then connect your Insect Glaive with a Rey Dau's skull.

What to do if you're unable to connect to server in Monster Hunter Wilds Beta

If you're unable to connect to a server in Monster Hunter Wilds Beta, here are all the fixes we know of so far that can help you.

• Check the Monster Hunter Wilds Beta and servers are currently live! Our attached guide has all the info you need on the different times for when it's live, but if it's not, the servers will be shut down accordingly. You can also check the Official Monster Hunter Twitter channel to see if they've reported errors or issues with the service.
• Test your internet connection, firewalls, and reset if needed. If the issue is at your end, see if other online features on your console/PC are still working. If not, try resetting your router and internet connection, or following the recommended guidelines laid out by your provider.
• Check you have required memberships and subscriptions to play online for your platform. Whether it's Xbox Game Pass or PS Plus, double check you meet the conditions for online gaming.

Of course, once you do get into MH Wilds, whether the Beta or the full game, we have guides to help you! If you want to pick out all the best weapon in Monster Hunter Wilds, we've got a full tier list to lay them out, as well as a guide on how to beat the Chatacabra in Monster Hunter Wilds, the amphibian brute who marks the game's first major challenge

© GamesRadar+. Not to be reproduced without permission

How to beat Chatacabra in Monster Hunter Wilds

The Chatacabra in Monster Hunter Wilds has several qualities that players can exploit. Elemental attacks on the player's behalf aren't really a thing in the beta, as the only Monster Hunter Wilds weapons available are the most standard, default models. Still though, there are methods, techniques and weaknesses you can exploit.

• Chatacabra is a largely front-facing melee focused enemy, with little in the way of long-ranged attacks. Ranged fighters will have an advantage, and those in melee should try and stay behind it where possible.
• Chatacabra's attacks are highly-telegraphed, but also wide-ranging. It doesn't jab, it sweeps the battlefield with its claws and tongue, so use the warning to back away to a safe distance.
• The forearms of Chatacabra are something that it periodically covers in stone to protect them, and enhance its melee attacks. However, you can break the stone with continuous targeted attacks, reducing its attack power by doing so.
• The tongue is a weakness, but also something that Chatacabra uses as a whip-like melee weapon. One attack has the tongue droop on the floor for a few seconds afterwards - hit it with a Focus Strike to do massive damage and stun the beast.
• Chatacabra is vulnerable to flash effects, falling boulders and more - all the environmental factors. If the world around you offers a chance to hurt it, it should be effective on one of MH Wilds' most basic beasts.

Chatacabra has all sorts of drops - but at the time of the beta, most of them are useless, as weapon and armor crafting isn't currently an included feature. Still, killing this beast will let you move on to the next step of the beta, and you can find more of these monsters throughout.

© GamesRadar+. Not to be reproduced without permission

Monster Hunter Wilds crossplay explained

Crossplay in the Monster Hunter Wilds beta is a pretty simple process that's activated by default. Multiplayer in MH Wilds is done through a lobby system, where players are automatically dropped into servers, even if they're planning on playing alone.

To join friends and lobbies on other servers, you need to go through the main menu when you're selecting your hunter, which is the same section of the menu that comes up when working out how to change appearance in Monster Hunter Wilds. Here you can set the conditions for joining lobbies accordingly - either finding lobbies that match certain criteria (play level, etc), or by entering the Hunter ID of a particular friend you want to join. A player's Hunter ID is a serial code found on the "Hunter Profile" section of the pause menu, and when picking their character.

Of course, if you're on the same platform, simply pause the game and choose to "invite a friend", which will bring you to the in-console user interface and allow you to invite an ally in accordingly. If you're wondering what equipment you should be using in your team-ups, we've got a tier list for all the best Monster Hunter Wilds weapons here!

© GamesRadar+. Not to be reproduced without permission

How to change your character appearance in Monster Hunter Wilds

To change appearance in Monster Hunter Wilds beta, you do so from the main menu when you start the game, as follows.

1. Select "start game".
2. Select the character/save file you wish to change the appearance of.
3. Press "Edit Character" (Square on PS5 controller).
4. Choose whether you want to edit your Hunter or your Palico's appearance.
5. You'll then be brought to the character creation screen to redo the experience as you did at the start of the game.

The beta gives players infinite "Character Edit Vouchers" and "Palico Edit Vouchers" as a default, and mentions that "Edits can be made at any time during the beta test period". 

This seems to confirm the same system as last time: in Monster Hunter Rise, changing character appearance in any meaningful way required one of these vouchers, which were consumable microtransactions and used up each time. It seems as though the full release of MH Wilds will have the same paid system, but the beta gives players free reign to tweak and customise at their leisure - and considering that players can import their characters from the beta to the main game, that makes it all the more important that you make sure your playable hunter and Palico are just right, perhaps even more so than mastering all the best Monster Hunter Wilds weapons.

How to change appearance without vouchers

If you want to change the appearance of your character in Monster Hunter Wilds beyond swapping out armor, and without spending money on vouchers, this is how you do so:

1. Go inside the Main Tent in the Hunter's Base Camp
2. Scroll to the right-most tab in the menu
3. There'll be an option to "change appearance."

While this technically does what it says, it is nonetheless an inferior - but free - version of character creation that does not require a voucher. Here players can't edit facial or body features, instead tweaking certain cosmetic elements such as:

• Hair, Eyebrows and Facial hair
• Voice pitch
• Eye Color
• Bearing (aka walking animations)
• Voice Pitch (but not the voice itself)
• Clothing and Underclothes
• Makeup and face paint
• Palico cosmetics and fur

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The report offers a temperature check of the first half of Capcom's ongoing fiscal year, and the data that grabs me most is on page eight of the company's financial presentation. The top four best-selling Capcom titles of the past six months are all Monster Hunter, beating other contenders like Resident Evil 4, Street Fighter 6, Devil May Cry 5 oddly enough, and Dragon's Dogma 2. Here's the full breakdown:

• Monster Hunter World - 1.764 million copies
• Monster Hunter World: Iceborne - 1.444 million copies
• Monster Hunter Rise - 1.365 million copies
• Monster Hunter Rise: Sunbreak - 1.152 million copies 

In total, that's just over 5.7 million copies of Monster Hunter sold, and that's only looking at these four titles. You do of course need the base games to play the Iceborne or Sunbreak expansions, so if we're just focusing on unique purchases, the total would be closer to 3.1 million players between World and Rise. 

There's no good way for us to account for outliers like double-dip multi-platform purchases, but these numbers collectively demonstrate that a whole lot of people have been hunting monsters – most, likely for the first time in these games – in the past six months. Some were doubtlessly attracted by plentiful discounts across all platforms as well as Capcom's promotional events.  

"Regarding catalog titles, sales of Monster Hunter World: Iceborne and Monster Hunter Rise continued to grow, contributing to the improvement of the brand, with cumulative sales of the series surpassing 100 million units worldwide," Capcom says in a separate writeup. World and Rise collectively chipped in nearly half of that volume despite being just a few years old. 

With the Monster Hunter Wilds beta upon us, in PlayStation Plus early access at least, the reality of a new entry in the series is finally starting to set in. As a more direct follow-up to Monster Hunter World and the first multi-platform crossplay launch in the series, Wilds is at least poised to set some monstrous records when it launches February 28, 2025.

Monster Hunter Wilds' arachnophobia mode that turns spiders into crawling piles of goo "might be creepier" than the bugs themselves, so fans will take their chances 

With that in mind, we've got all the best Monster Hunter Rise weapons laid out below, with info about how each one works, and information about how the best weapons work and what makes them so good. Not only that, but we've also got a section about what weapons will work well for beginners - not every killing tool is as intuitive as every other one, of course.

Best weapons in Monster Hunter Wilds

After playing the beta for Monster Hunter Wilds, these are the best weapons we've put to use so far:

• Long Sword: The Long Sword is legendary in the Monster Hunter community for getting a certain amount of preferential treatment from the devs, and very little has changed in Monster Hunter Wilds. By charging up the Spirit Gauge, players can do truly astoundingly damaging attacks - and with the Wound system, landing a Focus Strike charges it to red very easily. It's also pretty easy to use in comparison to some of the more complex weapons out there, with less of a learning curve.
• Bow: The bow is another easier one to learn, and its powerful ranged shots mean you can do heavy damage at distance - a surprising amount of damage, in fact. This is effectively a sniper build, but a decent amount of evasion abilities and some allies to play distraction mean that an archer can devastate monsters from range.
• Heavy Bowgun: This massive piece of artillery fires all sorts of powerful bolts, and a smart player can use the incredibly heavy firepower while not letting the decreases mobility limit them. Though more complex than the other two weapons, the Heavy Bowgun rewards aggressive play, unleashing a barrage of attacks that stun or compromise enemies before they reach you. And of course, having melee allies hold back the enemy gives you even more of an advantage, letting them tank the blows while you rain ranged pain down on them.

Monster Hunter Wilds weapon tier list and rankings

In the wake of the Monster Hunter Wilds beta, our current tier list for the best weapons in the game is as follows:

• S-tier weapons
  • Long Sword
  • Bow
  • Heavy Bowgun
• A-tier weapons
  • Dual Blades
  • Hammer
  • Sword & Shield
  • Great Sword
  • Insect Glaive
  • Charge Blade
  • Light Bowgun
• B-tier weapons
  • Switch Axe
  • Gunlance
  • Lance
  • Hunting Horn

Keep in mind that this is only within the beta, and this is almost certainly not going to be the way things land in the full game, as new gear, equipment, builds and simple fixes and balances made in the meantime will almost completely change the meta and change what weapons are best. Still, for those who are enjoying the beta as much as we are, this should help you make the maximum impact along the way.

Best weapons for beginners and new players in Monster Hunter Wilds

If you're starting a Monster Hunter game for the first time in MH Wilds, we recommend picking either the Dual Blades, Long Sword, Great Sword, Hammer or Sword & Shield. These weapons are alternately simple to use (like the Blades) or have built-in defensive abilities that allow players some margin of error (like the Sword and Shield). 

The game gives you a little pop quiz when it starts off to try and see what's right for you, but it doesn't really take into account ease of use and how intuitive (or not) certain weapons are, which can make for a difficult learning curve. Of course, any weapon can be learned by new players, it's just the options above are far simpler and more accessible to newcomers than - say - the Hunting Horn or Insect Glaive. 

Once you've picked out a new weapon, read its guide in the menu so you understand it completely, and try a few easy hunts on low level monsters or even endemic wildlife for practice. You won't master anything straight away - and that's OK, as you're not supposed to! These are skillsets that you build over time, and very few players keep practice with more than two or three weapons at a time.

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