Monster Hunter 3 Ultimate

Walking along the lush green plains of this new world, you spot a Wyvern. Do you fight or take flight? A real monster hunter stands their ground and slays any terrifying beast that wants to devour them whole. So, you decide to take on the mass of a creature. Snapping, charging jaws come at you. You chose to stay and fight, so ready your weapon and start earning the title of “monster hunter”.

The Monster Hunter series has a huge following in Japan, a constant heavy hitter in the games charts. Sadly, the series falls under the radar in the West. The first time I encountered a Monster Hunter was for the PSP back in 2006; Monster Hunter Freedom. Sadly I didn’t continue with the series. Consoles such as the XBox 360 demanded more of my attention. But of course the franchise continued to flourish in Japan and the PSP gained another 6 editions, along with versions for XBox and the Wii.

In Monster Hunter 3 Ultimate there is no epic plot that sees you taking down a tyrant of a villain, you don’t gain experience and you don’t level up. Instead you hunt monsters, gather resources and materials to advance onto bigger quests and beasties. The single player story is about helping out the small fishing village known as Moga after a monstrous earthquake has disturbed and shaken them up. You are called in to complete quests and help to get the towns resources up and running again.

The game can start off slow in the prologue with the tutorials, but once you completed this and moved onto the quests, then the game comes into its stride. Some people may initially be put off because there are a lot of running and fetching quests within a time limit, but to those people I say: Stick with it! The more quests you do, the more areas and monsters are unlocked. Which means cooler looking weapons and armor to show off. It’s all about seeing who has the bigger sword! Be careful when accepting quests as once you have taken one on, you are unable to return to your hut to store any unnecessary items. And if you cancel the quest there is a cancellation fee. So, before you talk to the Guild Sweetheart, think what weapon might be best for the job and any items that may come in handy. Make sure to save too. Then you can hop on a boat and start your chosen quest.

Your player character is built from the ground up and there are plenty of customisations for you to tinker about with in your hut at Moga Village should you want to. This is a fun element, but also wasted unless you are playing co-op or online where your character is seen by others. Here you can show off your wackiest amour and biggest weapons to fellow hunters from materials you have tracked down and crafted with actual monster parts. The awesome part of that feature is you get to see this in the finished result. Your sword, axe, hammer, bow, etc look like it has been pulled from the body of a monster and modified into a deadly weapon. It gives a sense of achievement when you look at your character knowing you took down a bad ass to fashion your equipment with.

There are 12 weapons you have access to right from the start. Some enemies can only be taken down with particular weapons, so it is nice to alternate between options. Enemies have no health bars, so you have to monitor and observe their behavior whilst attacking. Are they limping? Get those final attacks in now then! But make sure you have plenty of stamina (yellow bar) so you can land a good hard blow. And always remember to keep your weapon sharp. Below your health and stamina bars, there will be a weapon bar and each time you use your weapon of choice, the bar will show decay. You will also be told by a pop up message if a weapon is being used too much. When this happens, get to a safe spot and use a whetstone. Then get back into some hacking and slashing.

Camera angles are one thing you will get frustrating at early points in the game. The camera remains static in the village, but once you get out into the wild, you need to get adjusted to them as soon as possible. Before the game starts you are asked if you want to activate the Circle Pad Pro. This is an (ugly) add-on device from Nintendo which was released in order to make handheld gameplay more comfortable. With the CPP you can move, control camera, and attack or dodge at the same time. Without it, you can’t. And now you have the ability to go underwater in this installment, which means you REALLY need to get to grips with the camera controls. I just about mastered the underwater controls when I was 5 hours in! The control pad and analogue stick are used to move your character around as well as the camera. You do get use to it, it just takes a while.

Graphics wise, it seems Capcom have spent more time in making the big beasties have more detail then the actual scenery. Lazy Capcom? It almost looks like a GameCube game at times. Areas don’t look sharp and can look very blurry. Plus, common monsters are recycled over and over, but in different colours. Again, it seems lazy on Capcom’s part, but many games do similar and you can forgive them for focusing more on the actual big bads than the monster minions.

Playing such a large game on a handheld can become tiresome at times. Battery life has to be taken into consideration before playing and can become frustrating when you need to save before the red light flashes one last time. This is a problem with all handhelds of course and the only options are to make sure you have 100% battery power or to be close to a power source. Not being able to play online with other hunters around the world is disappointing. Local co-op has been made available, but not all of my friends have Monster Hunter 3 or a 3DS for that matter. So that detracts from the 3DS version.

Monster Hunter 3 Ultimate is a game that requires time and patience. But once you are roughly 5 hours in, the game pace picks up and you feel more comfortable with the controls and the game. Not being able to play online is very frustrating and being restricted to local play does not help much. Character gestures can be used, but seem pointless when you have no online features. If you do decide to part with your cash for it, I would strongly suggest doing so if you own a Wii U or an 3DS XL. Mainly as the screens are bigger and everything will look much smoother and clearer.

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