??? what? The game has massively different switch skills and the main point of the dlc is adding g rank and endgame goals. honestly a bizarre comment. Behavior of monsters??
G rank is basically that: new monster behaviours. The demo don’t demonstrate any. And the game seems to still basically be to chase a monster around the map at predetermined health drop.
I feel like you’re trolling us, if you’re like me I know you’ve chased Rathalos around the volcano map in GU for an infuriating amount of time :D
Tetranodon 100% had different moves, even Arzuros caught me off guard a couple times. Aknosom barfs up bouncy fireballs!
Astalos fight is absolutely solid in the demo, I think it’s very GU, and the new to rise island map is practically identical.
Anyway if you didn’t like rise you won’t like sunbreak. The switch skills add more inputs and complexity to something that’s already complex, more weapons got counters, and there’s more ways to evade super fast monsters (Malzeno gets basically a teleport!)
If there’s a decent endgame, a la Iceborne, I think this one will have some serious longevity.
I enjoyed Rise’s mid game, but found the endgame extremely weak: undying punchbags instead of challenge, and since ressources aren’t an issue at all anymore in this game, I failed to see the point of those endurance tests.
The Sunbreak demo was more of that same, and felt even easier than the Rise one — so many hundred hours of playing it might have helped, I know!
Feeling barely threatened every now and then by a monster that I encounter for the first time isn’t my idea of MH fun. I get that it must fuel the power fantasies of a lot of players, but , it isn’t why I play those games for, and enjoy them.
still seems a little early to be saying this… the best part of g rank is climbing back thru the “easy” monsters with end game gear. World also had a terrible endgame, until iceborne was released… I think they did a pretty decent job with the end game difficulty there. I think Sunbreak is off to a good start… they gave the player so many more tools, mobility, counter, healing and the monsters in base rise simply didn’t keep up. It seems like they’re trying to change that at least a bit with things like Astalos, which is generally a lot faster than most of the base monsters in rise.
I think nearly everyones problem with Rise was a) its too easy and b) there wasn’t enough of it. I’m pretty hopeful sunbreak can fix those things… and if not, well, very happy that pc monster hunter has modding!! and really, you found the Malzeno in the demo to be easy and no challenge at all? he’s got 27k health in the demo…
I found him to be ridiculous, as most “fast” bosses have been since the infamous Valtrax!
That’s exactly my issue with World (and probably would have been with Iceborne, from what I’ve read) and Rise: tons of health. Pounding, pounding, and pounding again with three other hunters at a slab of polygons, which hardly reacts to the damage you inflict. As I was playing Rise and the new weekly missions kept upping the health of the monsters, the sight of it felt more and more ridiculous to me.
It used to be quite rare for a good timed big sword swing not to stagger a non-elder beast, and that’s what I felt was rewarding.
Oh well, as you said, I probably should move on: they are not going to revisit their new game’s formula.
ohh. interesting… so you didn’t even play iceborne? All monster hunter g rank expansions are like this. They all add larger hp pools and force you to really optimize your build. I just find it REALLY interesting you think Rise has issues with high HP pools because I’ve been grinding out the hardest monsters and I just don’t see it. I killed Valtrax 4 times today in under 10 minutes in MP! I did Apex Ratholos 5 times and never had a hunt go over 15 minutes. Are you sure you are optimizing your builds and utilizing them effectively? This feels like by far the fastest endgame hunt times of any MH I’ve played. 4U was much worse in this regard (the last authentic “true” MH experience that a lot of vets call back to as the “old style”), I distinctly remember things like Kecha Wacha taking 25, 30 minutes to beat with full high rank maxed out gear, and getting good hitzones too.
It’s not common for Greatsword to stumble in one hit in high rank. You typically need a couple of combos for that to happen, depending on your gear… if you find its taking a long time i might suggest trying Bow or HBG, those are by far the most damaging weapons lol. I’ve got a little cheeky mod that tells me everyones damage, dps, highest dmg hit etc just to compare myself to others, and the people who know how to wield those are insane damage dealers
Interesting you said Valtrax is ridiculous too, I find it to be one of the most fun monsters in the game to fight. I only use lance so maybe this biases me a bit but I don’t find it to be too fast… it’s just straight fun. it feels more like the pace for MHR. It would be crazy in world, granted, but it’s not THAT ridiculous…
The beginning of expansions are always a bit of a slog because they’re trying to challenge the people who’ve got full slotted end game builds. It gets a LOT faster as you progress, just like the base game
oh, and also, the demo has intentionally inflated health pools! malzeno won’t have 27k hp in a solo hunt in the real game!
Edit: ps I think you should not listen to that criticism of Iceborne and try it lol. You can get the ICE Community Expansion mod, and I think you’d likely really enjoy it. It’s absolutely one of the best endgames monster hunter has ever had and this mod makes it even better… I’m very partial to the gunlance there. Haven’t tried GL in MHR yet
I knew nothing of this ICE Community mod. Holy crap. This is amazing.
What are some of the highlights? I haven’t heard of it.
It is pretty immense. Going to just point you at the readme because there is way more here than I would be able to really understand impact-wise. But it sure sounds good. I think the biggest limitation to it is that it effectively forks your savegame (ie., you have vanilla and ICE specific savegames - and the ICE saves can only play online with other ICE players). While that makes perfect sense, I suspect the ICE player pool is much smaller than vanilla.
I do like the QoL changes it appears to make, and the shortcutting of some of the grinding. Making lance useful again sounds quite exciting as well. I think the one thing it doesn’t (and probably can’t) do is make some of the monsters less spaztastic.
It doesn’t change monster ai. It’s mostly quality of life improvements, deco chance improvements, ability to skip cutscenes, weapon rebalancing, and they really modified the gunlance. I played thru the whole basegame and half of iceborne with it and it feels so freaking fun now because it’s got a guard point on the reload.
Just a breath of fresh air into an otherwise already great game, makes it really fun to replay if you ever get the hankering to play iceborne again
Here’s a video of Malzeno in the demo getting speedrun, makes me want to pick up the greatsword again. Weapon skill setup switching is going to be very fun
Reviews are starting to come out since it lands tomorrow:
Overall seems positive, though the one complaint I’ve heard in a few of the summaries is that early sunbreak is fighting the base monsters (but master rank versions), so it takes a bit to get to the new ones. I bought it but I might not play it immediately, cause I think I burned myself out of it in the last month, woops.
Unlocked now, for anyone who is actually going to play it. 22GB download. :)
It’ll be after work for me. It’s been a while since I played, and since I mainly played Switch version back then I’ve no doubt got a ways to go to hit Sunbreak content on PC!
I’ve been pretty hesitant to pick up Rise. I really enjoyed Monster Hunter World (the first in the series I had played) but by the time I was done I felt I was done. I had explored what I wanted to explore build-wise and I felt like I would need something new to get back into it. I wasn’t sure if Rise was going to be it, seeing it more of the same but on Switch this time around.
I ended up picking it up during the Steam summer sale but didn’t get around to playing it until last week. I’m happy that my concerns with it not offering enough new and shiny were misplaced. I’m really enjoying the hell out of this one and prefer it over World.
My experience with the Clutch Claw went from hate–>love–>hate as it became so core to the hunts and I was worried the wirebug was going to continue that trend. The clutch claw felt… I don’t know, forced is the word that comes to mind. It felt like a tacked on gimmick but one that was mandatory to really excel. It was like making a dish and adding too much of one flavor where it started overpowering everything else and making it unpleasant.
The wirebug feels so much more integrated into the weapons and combat than the clutch claw did for me. They moves feel like an extension of the weapons rather than something that is bolted on alongside them. The mobility also feels really great and I absolutely love the switch skills. For a gamer primarily motivated by tinkering with builds, those are a fantastic addition for me.
In World I started with Insect Glaive and then ended up playing most of HR and all of Iceborne with the Gunlance with a smattering of bowguns. In Rise I went back to IG and I just absolutely love what they’ve done with it. The Kinsects are so much cooler now and give so many awesome build options especially with Sunbreak. Sunbreak skills like Kinsect Slash feel friggin’ fantastic once I got the hang of it. Aerial combat has never felt so good, but now I’m playing around with Powder Vortex bugs and am feeling more like a mage. So many different varieties of playstyles all just within IG!
I’m up to MR4 now and am getting stomped by the urgent quest monster that I need to beat to progress to MR5. I can’t recall his name, but damn he’s whopped us hard in my two tries. With the IG I’ve been pretty good in terms of keeping alive but I’m struggling to apply good damage consistently. As the fight stretches a bit, the pubs cart multiple times. I might have to try solo (not that I’ll have any better luck!) or go with some friends and see if I can beat it that way. This is the first real obstacle I’ve encountered, so it’s fun getting stymied and being forced to tweak my build and/or git gud.
Now isn’t the time given that I’m facing a real tough fight for me, but I’m finally getting an itch to try other weapons out. Do i go back to my trusty Gunlance or save it for the next MH game? Maybe finally learn how to play the Charge Blade? Although weapons that require setup for your big hits frustrate me when MR monsters tend to act like a bunch of meth addicts zipping constantly from one end of the field to the other…
Sunbreak has also been a solid good iteration - definitely the best combat to date and the build diversity seems pretty deep so far, but I can’t help feeling the monster roster is (currently) a bit thin - I was a little upset to see so few new monsters when moving up the ranks. This is a little modulo the three title updates that are promised for this year so perhaps it’ll fill itself out in the end, but I was irrationally a little annoyed at not having the missing monsters from World/Iceborne (although it has been mentioned that they can’t port the monsters directly due to console limitations).
Finished the story - I ended up playing the super comfy Lance, and I’m happy to say that even though the weapon preview was a bit disappointing it actually all feels good in hand. Skyward thrust still looks a little silly but feels pretty satisfying to hit since monsters are often pretty tall and you multihit while thrusting downards - like a good street fighter uppercut in reverse actually. Wish they’d figured out a better animation to go with those hitboxes. And now with shield tackle I have a second Captain America short range charging star move (that doesn’t take stamina!) so I’m even more aggressive - my reflex is to charge into monster faces all the time. It’s undoubtedly not the right way but it’s hilarious when a monster charges you and you can just decide to charge them right back.
For me there’s been a lot of new monsters but I only started in MHW. So far I’ve found it a good mix of returning faces and new jerks but there’s been a few I’ve definitely missed thus far. Is the devil pickle guy around in Rise? Haven’t run into him yet. There was a flying monster I really liked to fight in World as well… Legaros or something along those lines? I’m butchering the names, sorry.
In any case, so far I’ve been having fun fighting new-to-me monsters while still seeing some familiar nemeses. I still hate Barioth and Tigrex as much as I did in World and Diablos still makes me angry so I feel right at home. If Raging Brachydios shows up I’m going to curl up in a ball and cry, though.
MHW was my first monster hunter, so it’s content is probably a bit near and dear to my heart so maybe it’s more I’m missing all the monsters that didn’t make it into Rise/Sunbreak - all those fights are like old friends who missed the party (I haven’t seen Deviljho, Legiana or Brachydios yet but I think there a couple new monsters on the way to MR100). I also think I’ve been missing the complexity of the maps - I do like not getting lost, but there was a little bit of the sense that every single one of the World maps was like three or four maps in one, and you’d often find yourself in a different quarter - with a different boss room - for each. Most of the time Rise monsters don’t go anywhere special - the last time I saw one of them go rest they fell asleep right off the side of a main road?!
I think I am now justified in thinking that the content was a bit sparse - sounds like Title Update 1 might be a little ways further away - they’ve announced a date for a trailer which probably means it’s not the actual release date - they’ve also confirmed there’s going to be Armour Augmentation - further upgrading stats and adding new (possibly random? maybe like the Safi system in Iceborne) armour skills and Weapon Augmentations. All endgame systems in Iceborne. So our current “endgame” is far from the actual endgame and I’m starting to suspect the “actual endgame” might not be clear for a while yet…might take all the title updates to fully piece it together. It’s weird to be both happy and annoyed that the game is not complete…
Edit: You can tune-in to the stream on Tuesday, August 9 at 7am PT/10am ET/3pm UK (on the Monster Hunter Twitch)
I’ve made it to about MR 120, and I think i can safely say this is the best incarnation of monster hunter yet. world was an amazing game, yes, but the sheer amount of variety in builds and skills in Sunbreak is staggering. World shoehorned a lot of weapons into clearly better options, while this is just simply not the case in Sunbreak at least for lance. There’s so many viable builds, so many options to go for. It does feel a little unfinished in terms of anomolys and such but I don’t really mind. When you really break it down, monster hunter endgame is mostly about either speed running or fashion building and this is better than world in both.
also have to remember that most of this stuff in world was not there on release of iceborne lol. They added a LOT to the endgame with updates