My first Monster Hunter

[Liberation]

Posted this already in Monster Hunter: Worlds discussion, but posting it here too for a bigger sample size and maybe negate some bias:

So a friend from another game put the new Monster Hunter open beta on my radar. I tried it and took a shine to it (eventually, in spite of its sometimes counter-intuitive controls and UI).
Now I'm thinking of picking up one of the older Monster Hunter games to try since the new one is still three months out (and 70 freaking bucks! ).

I'm leaning towards World since it's cheaper and only somewhat older than Rise.

I thought I'd post here to get a sense of the community's opinion: which Monster Hunter game do you think is the best entry point to the series these days? How well have World and Rise aged? Or would you recommend just waiting for Wilds?

[ChubbNutt]

Unless you are familiar with emulation, playing any Monhun game older than World or Rise would be difficult.

I would imagine Monhun games going forward would be more similar to World than Rise and I to prefer World to Rise. Both are good games but do have different strengths and weaknesses.

So I'd go with World.

[Freazer]

Both World and Rise though Monster hunter games feel different in the game loop. World has a bigger focus on like the name the world with a lot more details and interaction. Where as Rise is a lot smaller on scale but has more of a focus of going in and out quick hunts. The combat for World is a lot more grounded with focuses on bigger and more impactful moments where Rise with the introduction of the wirebug system is seen as more arcade like with Alot of movement and faster combat.

Personally i would recommend World as i feel its a lot similar to how Wilds is going to be compared to Rise. Both games have their positive and negatives but if i were to pick one it would 100% be world.

Side note, Although World is older then rise it looks 100x better as Rise was originally a Nintendo switch game that got ported over PC and Console. World started as Console game that got a PC release later that year. So if you do care about graphics world is going to be a much more worthwhile purchase.

[Crow]

Get Monster Hunter: World.

I love Rise and it's my favorite game in the series, but World is a great entry point especially with an eye on moving over to Wilds at a later point. Rise has some mechanics (Wirebug evades/moves/switchskills) which are unique to it and will not be in Worlds/Wilds and probably won't be in other entries in the series going forward.

They have both aged great.

[Trofogol]

For running through the game and getting good views, pick World or wait for Wilds (it feels like better version of World, but it likely won't be completed without DLC for at least one more year). Don't expect very different monster roster in World, as devs had issues with skeleton development, and it's not very various for weapon moves comparing to Rise or 4U. But it's beautiful, gives you a lot of interactions with environment and runs very smoothly for its level of graphics. Also, you'll be running through locations maybe too much.

For deeper fighting system and longer endgame content, pick Rise. It looks worse (takes way less of your disk space tho), but offers more combat mechanics, actions, and overall traversal, with way less interactions with environment. This one definitely has demo, so you can check it before deciding. I'm not sure about demo for World

If you're ready to check older ones, I've heard MH4U is the best and "ideal" MH game for many veteran players, but have never played it

[Midas]

World beats Rise, easily. Especially if you want to get Wilds later. They're mechancially a lot closer, while Rise goes off in the anime direction with faster more over-the-top combat, and more cartoony visuals.

[Tommy Wiseau]

Alot of people like world i think its the worst of the lot and ive played all the ones released in NA. I think rise was a big step in the right direction and it has the nice feature of hunting with AI partners if you dont want to hunt with others.

[Scorpio]

I think Rise is more oldschool in its art direction and gameplay loop, weapons here look much more unique and colorful than in World too. Sure the new mechanics might be controversial but every MH game had changes like that. In the end they are completly different experiences and if you have never played MH game before it might be better to go with World since Wilds seems much closer to it than Rise or MHGU. Ideally you can play both Rise, World and more since they are all great in own way.

Also: https://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=3076923478

[Midas]

Originally posted by Scorpio:

I think Rise is more oldschool in its art direction and gameplay loop, weapons here look much more unique and colorful than in World too. Sure the new mechanics might be controversial but every MH game had changes like that. In the end they are completly different experiences and if you have never played MH game before it might be better to go with World since Wilds seems much closer to it than Rise or MHGU. Ideally you can play both Rise, World and more since they are all great in own way.

Also: https://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=3076923478

This is one thing I will give Rise over World, is the art direction, while more cartoony, is more original. Weapons look more distinct, monsters look more interesting. A lot of World's early monsters and weapons look very generic, especially with World's whole system of basically taking the same weapon and just changing a patch of fur on it to represent a different monster.

[Scorpio]

Originally posted by Midas:

Originally posted by Scorpio:

I think Rise is more oldschool in its art direction and gameplay loop, weapons here look much more unique and colorful than in World too. Sure the new mechanics might be controversial but every MH game had changes like that. In the end they are completly different experiences and if you have never played MH game before it might be better to go with World since Wilds seems much closer to it than Rise or MHGU. Ideally you can play both Rise, World and more since they are all great in own way.

Also: https://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=3076923478

This is one thing I will give Rise over World, is the art direction, while more cartoony, is more original. Weapons look more distinct, monsters look more interesting. A lot of World's early monsters and weapons look very generic, especially with World's whole system of basically taking the same weapon and just changing a patch of fur on it to represent a different monster.

I feel like Rise is defined by "not gonna sugarcoat it" phrase, you go in no bull****, fight cool monsters and craft cool gear. Its a very snappy progression made perfectly for the Japanese portable market. I know Rise has been a much bigger success there on Switch than in the west, because its THE Monster Hunter by definition. Made by their original portable dev team too.

World on the other hand is the epic and slow journey, maps are HUUUUUUGE, environments are beautiful. Before you "unlock" the bossfights you need to discover monster tracks, there are buildups and you definitely need to sit down to that game for longer sessions I feel like. Of course after you unlock things it gets faster a bit. Its the more "grounded and realistic" game as realistic hunting giant dinosaurs can be.

I think both are hella awesome and can't go wrong with either of them, they are just both very different games, its like apples and oranges.

[Royner]

I started on this one and I like it, its faster, tried world but got bored, its too slow and probably more similar to wilds than this one

[wh_eriko]

Originally posted by Liberation:

Posted this already in Monster Hunter: Worlds discussion, but posting it here too for a bigger sample size and maybe negate some bias:

So a friend from another game put the new Monster Hunter open beta on my radar. I tried it and took a shine to it (eventually, in spite of its sometimes counter-intuitive controls and UI).
Now I'm thinking of picking up one of the older Monster Hunter games to try since the new one is still three months out (and 70 freaking bucks! ).

I'm leaning towards World since it's cheaper and only somewhat older than Rise.

I thought I'd post here to get a sense of the community's opinion: which Monster Hunter game do you think is the best entry point to the series these days? How well have World and Rise aged? Or would you recommend just waiting for Wilds?

I play both of them. If you need to try something familai with wild, world is your first choice. Similar enveralment and hard game play, rise is fun but it seem like portable game, smaller scope story and map, gameplay easy than world. I recomment buy world and iceborn both, DLC will let you fight hard monster and new HQ, room, canteen, gatheringhub are really cool, I play for my room cosmetic and handler costume plus pendance, that real nice!

[del_bosque_dol]

I have played MHWorld & Iceborne on PS and PC, Rise Sunbreak on PS, Switch and PC, and all what I can tell you that buy both games whenever on sale.

Counter based game style is more to do with Sunbreak than Iceborne, but Wilds is made mainly for people who used to play MHW Iceborne on PS. There will be a demo before Wilds will be released, so that you can check your PC's performance to see, if it will be a worthwhile purchase.

[Scorpio]

Originally posted by Liberation:

I'm leaning towards World since it's cheaper and only somewhat older than Rise.

Forgot to mention that both games are on great sales right now on Fanatical which is official Steam game distributor none of that gray market stuff

https://www.fanatical.com/game/monster-hunter-and-rise-sunbreak
https://www.fanatical.com/game/monster-hunter-world-iceborne-master-edition

Both with base + expansion

[Arthag]

If you are gonna play coop with a friend the whole story, rise is better, in world both of you need to look at the cinematic and then one needs to leave to enter the others mission over and over, otherwise just pick world, both are great games if you wait for a discount.

[IsolatedAbyss]

MH Worlds/Iceborne is still one of the best games ever in my opinion and you should definitely try it, especially since you can get it fairly cheap on sale nowadays.

I love both Rise/Sunbreak and Worlds/Iceborne. Unlike many people, even if I think Worlds is better, I don't see any reason to hate on Rise. It's gonna be difficult for anyone to get into some of the older titles in the series, especially when Wilds is just round the corner. Another one I would recommend trying is MHGU.