Monster Hunter Generations

You’re out of potions, your weapon is worn down to a blunted toothpick, and poison is ticking at your depleted health. You attempt a last-ditch effort, running up the snowy mountaintop and diving into the massive mammoth with a smashing combination assault that you finish off with a flourish, changing into a powerful hunter-art skill with enough power to slay the beast and finish the quest. The prolonged encounter taxed you and your abilities, but the defiant, exhilarating victory is made even sweeter by harvesting the monster for resources. The next fight will be that much easier as you upgrade your arsenal with shells, bones, and claws.

Big battles are the essence of Monster Hunter Generations, a thriving loop of material acquisition, weapon enhancement and customization, and thrilling boss encounters. Sticking with the systems until you learn the delicate balance between timing and attack, and exploring combos (even using the new hunter arts to cap off or begin a combo) is rewarding. Players who don’t give up during their first bouts with challenging monsters will enjoy an addictive cycle of exploration and customization, with new weapons, new armor, and new zones to explore.

Those familiar with the Monster Hunter franchise will feel right at home in Generations, which adds a bevy of new options and tweaks to traditional elements. Players select from 14 main weapons, choose a hunter style and can master various hunter arts — special moves that need to be charged up before execution in battle. Along with a more robust Palico companion system and a ton of nostalgia-laden villages and environments to explore, these new options make this one of the most content-rich offerings in the entire franchise. The addition doesn’t substantially change the gameplay, but they are especially compelling for veteran players that want to show off their skills with some of the incredibly precise hunter styles.

When you become skilled with one weapon type, you have plenty of different ways to play with it, with styles and arts that facilitate beginners and masters. The difference between how weapons work is immense; it isn’t a simple “a sword is faster than a hammer” distinction. Each weapon has a signature playstyle that features different abilities, related support items, and techniques. This adds a lot to the longevity of the game, especially if you’ve played previous titles with one or two weapons and want experience something new.

The Palico system is the best it has ever been, giving the solo hunter more competent and more customizable companions than previous entries. For those who enjoy hunting in a group online, that gameplay remains one of the strongest hooks in the series, as nothing beats joining up with friends or random players and taking a behemoth to task as a unified (or chaotic, depending on the group) force.

While Monster Hunter can be distilled down into a basic loop of hunt, gather, upgrade, micromanage inventory and Palico perks, rinse and repeat, the process is quite satisfying as the “boss barrage” continues to serve up interesting encounters across snowfields, volcanos, and lush islands. Monster Hunter Generations offers some minor new tweaks to the franchise, but keeps the core completely intact, an easy winner for series veterans and the best point of entry for a new player looking to cut their teeth on some challenging creatures.

If I had to write a list of my 20 or more favorite Nintendo 3DS games, Monster Hunter Generations would have a strong chance of making that list. While Capcom themselves have said that they consider this game to be more of a spin-off than a main entry in the series, I think that it ticks all of the boxes of what you want and need in a game from this franchise. Granted, bigger and better games in the series would come along and make this one kind of irrelevant, but at the time, this was a fantastic game and in going back and playing it for this review, I feel that it holds up pretty well.

You Are A Hunter!

I think that they actually tried pretty hard to make a compelling story in Monster Hunter Generations. Yes, you play as a nameless hunter looking to kill and loot as many monsters as you can, but the reasoning behind it here I found to be pretty interesting.

You head to a village called Bherna and you will take on various missions and tasks as the story progresses, there are three other villages in the game to that have a part to play in how things unfold. Look, it is not amazing, but it certainly does a good job of fleshing out why you are hunting all these monsters.

Meeting Your Maker!

If you have played a game in the series or even read a little about one you know what to expect from Monster Hunter Generations. You will need to get weapons and gear and level up to make sure you are strong enough to fight more and more powerful monsters. It is a never ending cycle and to some people, I am sure this would get old fast, but to us who love Monster Hunter, it is so addictive, and when you start playing a new game or even go back and play an old one, that addiction sets in.

Keeping Things Fresh

For a portable game, Monster Hunter Generations did actually add in some pretty neat stuff to make things interesting. One of the coolest things for me was letting us actually play as the cat people (Felynes) who before were only ever companions. New special attacks and epic combat styles to play around with were added to the game and these do wonders in expanding the gameplay and making the combat even more fun.

What I think is extra great about this is that when you are playing with other people, there are more ways that you can fight and set up, making each party you are in feel far more unique. It is still fun to play on your own, but even with the limited chat option, there was something so very cool about standing with other players and getting ready to take down an epic beast.

Pros:

• This game is so addictive!
• For a Nintendo 3DS game, it looks great
• I love how deep the gear customization aspect is
• It was one of the best 3DS multiplayer experiences I had

Cons:

• I am not sure you can still play this online with the Nintendo 3DS
• The Nintendo Switch release has made the 3DS version kind of pointless