I took my time with Monster Hunter: World because you can’t write a decent review without actually playing it how it should. With friends or strangers killing impressive looking monsters.  When the news came out that a freaking Monster Hunter was coming for Xbox One I was beyond excited and happy. Who would have guessed that a few years ago? So, are you ready to conquer the New World? Ready to fight against some real tough monsters? Let us not waste any more time, check the review and go buy the game if you haven’t already done so. 

THE GOOD

• Strongest positive thing I can say about Monster Hunter: World is the impressive and varied monsters, of all sizes. From a design point, animations or visual. Each and every monster or creature is a remarkable accomplishment. From small adorable hummingbird-like things to massive monsters that have the size of buildings. Animations might be the most impressive stuff, seeing monster fight against each other or seeing them flee away limping is an almost painful thing to see. The process of learning the attacks and movement from enemies is important and an exciting thing to do.
• Exploring the vast and colorful New World is so much fun for several reasons. First of all, the game looks great visually. It is definitely not the most impressive looking game on the Xbox-console but you have many aw-moments. Secondly, the world is full with small and big life that makes all environments realistic. New discoveries are always right around the corner, from little ants, beautiful butterflies, dark caves, wide and open flower fields or massive buffed monsters.
• The narrative and story pretty much comes down to hunt this or that monster but the engagement feels great. It is a shame that not everything is voiced but the dialogue is top-notch and meaningful. Cutscenes are beautiful and never feel out-of-place, I thank the developer for allowing us to control mostly everything too. While other games show action filled cut scenes that you wanted to do yourself Monster Hunter: World actually allows YOU to do all the action.
• An industry leading combat system makes Monster Hunter: World an instant must buy. With lots of different weapons and play styles, even an inspired third person shooter play style (Bowgun) it is insane in how many ways you can take down a monster. Combine that with an array of items, status effects and the capture-a-monster-feature and you can write it down on paper that this game will leave a lasting impression and will contend in 2018 Game of the Year awards.
• Most cute and lovely award will go to the Palicos from Monster Hunter. Every player has this cat-like creature that you can customize, accepting someone’s guild card will allow other Palicos from friend to show up in your game. Seeing it all happen is heartwarming, palicos talk to each other and start gossiping about their master, pretty funny too! That is not the only cute thing in this game though, you can capture small wildlife as pets that show up in your headquarters. It may be a little useless but it is a cool thing to see and collect.

Mixed Feelings

• Arguably a game with over 80 hours of content is fantastic, but I do have to admit that the end game content is lacking in content. Going from MH50 to the maximum level is a drag, mainly because you have too few end game monsters.  The health scoping while playing single player doesn’t feel right either. Both will likely be solved pretty soon with the extra free content and patches.
• Even though this Monster Hunter is the most inviting and newcomers friendly in the franchise, it is still a difficult and hard to understand game. Learning how to fight with your weapon, learning how to upgrade your weapon and armor and making sure you harvest the right items, learning how the use the pretty complex control mechanics, learning the weaknesses from the big monsters, as you see the game isn’t like riding a fair mill. The grinding and harvesting nature from the game isn’t for everyone and the game could have used better and more ways of explaining things.  I’m serious though, this is a hard to understand and complicated game, even after 40 hours it is still possible that you still don’t understand how everything works.  It takes precious time to learn everything and to make yourself aware on what you need to do before hunting that monster.
• Level design is mostly positive but the increased use of vertical design (compared with previous Monster Hunters) causes some issues. It can be a little confusing to actually get around the map and some monsters glitch or get stuck too. The actual design remains impressive though, with realistic and natural design.

THE BAD

• Cutscenes look beautiful but come with an arrange of issues. First of all, none of them are skippable. So prepare to see the same cooking cut scenes over and over again. My main issue comes with the terrible English lip-syncing, noticeable on all story cut scenes. My advice is to play the game in Japanese anyway but I understand that the majority of the players will dislike that.
• (No score reduction for this) Actually something I would like to add about some people in the Monster Hunter community, some bad apples. People joining your game and suicide themselves so you fail the mission. It is unbelievable that people like this actually exist. Be sure to give them a negative reputation vote so other players won’t be bothered with this kind of assholes.
• (Online) PS4 players had exclusive beta moments, I will spare you what I think about lame exclusive content like that. However, I have the feeling that because Xbox didn’t have a beta we are now stuck with many online issues. It is utterly UNACCEPTABLE that because of this the online features for the Xbox One version have been terrible so far. It has been improved but it still doesn’t work how it should. For a 2018 game to have such bad and ancient online issues is really mind-boggling. Another issue while playing with friends is a big frustrating thing about Monster Hunter: World. You simply can’t start a quest with multiple people if you haven’t watched the cut scene from that quest, most of the times only launching halfway through. First you are forced to watch the cut scene before your friends can join your quest, whoever came up with this idea…

Monster Hunter: World [Score: 8.9/10] Available for the first time on Xbox and I’m jumping in joy because of it. This is a game that will be played for months and months alone or with friends. It is a massive and beautiful game that challenges every gamer. Please buy, okay? 

Dev: Capcom Publisher: Capcom
Played on: Xbox One X | LifeisXbox received a digital review code, provided by Koch media.