One Life Left: Monster Hunter 3 Ultimate

I had tracked the dragon all the way to the outskirts of the Volcano, and now it was time for our final showdown. Sulfurous fumes blew into my eyes, and the heat of the air made me grateful for the Cool Drinks I had brought in my pack. I shifted my grip on my Gunlance, checking it for ammunition. Breathing heavily to calm my shaking hands, I stepped towards the beast. It spotted me, reared its head back, and roared. I felt a hand on my shoulder. “Dude, you have to write your article.” How could I write the article, I hadn’t played a new game in a couple of weeks. “Just review this one, you never shut up about the thing anyways.” Oh yeah. That is a good idea.

“This thing” is known as Monster Hunter 3 Ultimate (MH3U for those in the know). Released on December 10, 2011 for the Nintendo Wii U and the 3DS, it is not exactly a new game, but it has utterly consumed my time since I picked it up in December. At first glance, MH3U might seem like a fairly straightforward game: the player hunts monsters, carves their bodies up to make new weapons and armor, and then hunts stronger monsters. Simple, right? As the player continues to fight stronger and stronger monsters, they can increase their rank and progress the single-player story. If they want to play with friends, the player can head out to the online area to face even tougher challenges.

Once you actually get into the game, however, it is anything but simple. For one, there are twelve weapon types, all with unique styles and strategies. Now, when I say unique, I do mean unique. While some weapons are similar to one another, each one operates using different controls and combos and is useful for very different things. The aforementioned Gunlance, is a fairly fast hitting weapon that can be used to stab a monster and has short range gunfire built in for extra damage. The player moves very slowly while holding it and must block and dodge appropriately to keep up momentum. The Hammer on the other hand is a weapon without a block, but with fairly decent movement speed that is based around charging up attacks for one high damage smash.

Does the game explain any of this nuance? Not really. To figure out how to play I had to spend about 30 minutes watching a general tutorial on Youtube that taught me the basics of missions structure, crafting items and gear, and gameplay progression. From there, I had to watch another video to explain how the Gunlance worked, and then I felt just about ready to begin. The game starts the player off slowly by tasking them with gathering ingredients for items such as Potions, and then ramps it up with some easy monster fights. These fights give the player time to get a feel for their chosen weapon(s) and stock up on some much needed supplies. If all this makes MH3U sound like a fairly standard RPG, it is not. The player character does not level up, the only things that get better are the player’s skills and their gear.

This brings us to the main sticking point of MH3U: it is really hard and really time consuming. Each fight is tough and preparing for battle by gathering resources and crafting new gear will take a long time. Add that to the time it takes to master a given weapon and you can see how I have 150 hours logged in the game since December. The thing is though, I am not slowing down. If anything I feel like the game has only gotten more fun as time has gone on. I can feel myself getting better at it, and as I unlock more challenges and continue to hunt these giant beasts alongside my friends, I feel compelled to keep playing and to keep improving. MH3U is a game that epitomizes the ideal of “play”. The story is limited in text, and really comes down to what you do as a player. I never reminisce with my monster hunting buddies about characters in the game or prewritten cut scenes. We discuss how we took down the Brachydios for the first time, how the Stygian Zinogre almost brought us to our knees, and that one hilarious time we almost lost to a Great Jaggi. MH3U is a game about the player and their journey. It takes some work to get to that fun, but man oh man is it worth it.
This review can apply to pretty much any entry in the Monster Hunter series. This game is out on the Wii U and the 3DS right now, but if you want to grab one with online play on the 3DS you could wait for Monster Hunter 4, or you could harken back to games of old on a PS2 or PSP. The PlayStation Vita even has one of the old PSP games available on it if you happen to be one of the few folks that owns a Vita. Monster Hunter games are not for everyone. They are hard, they demand a lot of your time   and for some people the lack of meaningful story will be a turn off. But if you want to experience what is close to gaming perfection, MH3U might be a good place to start.