This past weekend the Monster Hunter World beta went live. Although the game plays more in line with what you’d expect from a Demo version of Monster Hunter World, there was enough included in the “Beta Demo” to glean an expectation of the launch version. MHW was a somewhat succinct taste of Monster Hunting gameplay, with three timed matches, and limited visual character customization options.
Multiplayer was available, but it seemed to have a few bugs in matchmaking that created some “ease of use” issues, primarily, that you either couldn’t connect to a match or it wouldn’t find any matches at all. Fifteen, well, technically sixteen, weapons were available to try in the demo, all of which with their own strengths and weaknesses, which did give a lot of potential variety for replayability for Monster Hunter fans, but with limited objectives and a strict time limit, seeing them in action takes a little more patience with the moderately long load times.
A highlight from our stream!
Monster Hunter World in a nutshell is a beautiful game, graphically pleasing at all turns, from the character models, to the environment, to the monsters themselves. The controls are quite cumbersome in some areas, and simplistic in others. For example, weapon combos generally utilize between two and three buttons, whereas managing your inventory to find, say, a healing potion could take several seconds with the D pad. They also have a quick access radial menu by pressing R1 and using the thumbstick, which I eventually started using, but again, the nature of the radial menu left me with dropping traps or using potions when I didn’t mean to during a fight, so it’s certainly something that may take some practice for the uninitiated.
There is a lot to like in this demo for Monster Hunter Fans, as well as those that may not be as familiar with this franchise. It’s a good jumping off point, but for me, I’d have to see a little more longevity in the gameplay aside from trying new weapons before I bite the bullet. That being said, I very much look forward to the release in January. Take it for a spin while you can and let us know what you think in the comments. Happy Hunting!
