Monster Hunter Rise
Monster Hunter World
WithMonster Hunter Worldhitting record player numbers and itssteepest discount to date, there’s been a renewed interest in the Monster Hunter franchise. Newcomers looking for their first foray into this ridiculous creature-slaying universe should ask themselves which game they should start with, Monster Hunter World and its expansion Iceborne? Or the newest game in the franchise,Monster Hunter: Riseand its expansion Sunbreak?
Monster Hunter World: 10 Best PC Mods, Ranked
Check out these fantastic mods to enhance your Monster Hunter World experience.
Rise and World are two ofMonster Hunter’s best games, and since they’re both on sale, the lazy answer is just to buy both of them. But that’s not the best use of your money, especially if you’re not even sure you’ll like this franchise, let alone a single game. So if you have to choose one over the other, these are the points you should consider before you buy and which one we recommend overall.
What Monster Hunter World Did Right
What Monster Hunter Rise Did Right
Winner:Monster Hunter World
We’re starting with everyone’s first impression of any game - the graphics and presentation. Between these two games, World has more impressive graphics and a gorgeous overall look. From the towns to the biomes, everything looks like a believable place you could (and would want to) visit. Whether it’s fellow hunters walking around in the background or the lush greenery of a dense forest, World’s complex environments give it more opportunities to flex its graphical muscles more than Rise does,
In comparison, Rise has a simpler presentation. Part of this is the result of Rise’s origins as a Switch game first, but the lack of complexity within Rise’s environments and blocky environmental textures are what makes it feel bland. It should be noted that the monster textures in Rise’s PC launch look far more detailed than World, which helps but doesn’t put it over World’s overall presentation.
Playing with Friends
Winner: Monster Hunter Rise
If you’re playing with friends, Rise will offer a better experience in the beginning than World will. Rise’s cutscenes are skippable, and you may watch cutscenes with your friends as you both work through the story. On top of that, you won’t have to fuss very much about finding the monster. Just jump into the quest, and all of you can ride your Palamutes straight to the monster by following the map.
In comparison, World is held back by how miserable completing the story with friends is. If both you and your friend are at the same point in the story and want to hunt together, you both first have to watch the same cutscenes separately. While they’re fun cutscenes to watch the first time, these cutscenes are unskippable and no one can join your hunt until the cutscene is over. Once the cutscene ends, one of you needs to leave their hunt and join the other person’s hunt. This entire process is unnecessarily clunky in comparison to Rise where someone posts the quest, everyone joins, watches the cutscene together, and then you can immediately start hunting together.
World’s best counter-argument is its mechanically complex monster hunts like Safi’Jiiva and Fatalis, where hunters have to work together to slay extremely powerful dragons and take care of themselves to prevent team wipes. But these hunts are toward the endgame, and groups of friends still have to suffer through the clunky story cutscene system to even reach those hunts.
Winner: Monster Hunter World
World has more complexity in its biomes, which makes it feel alive. Flocks of birds fly around the map and can land on the herbivores softly grazing in front of the player. Dung beetles roll around balls of explosive volcanic rock, and a wide variety of small bugs, lizards, and amphibians crawl, swim, and glide around the player as they track their target. The geography itself also looks and feels like a natural habitat with distinct and unique geographical features that make each part of the map come to life.
Rise’s biomes are larger and have more vertical height to climb on top of, but these maps also feel more empty. In many ways, the long empty sections of the map make RIse’s biomes feel more like fleshed-out Mario Kart tracks than a natural world you’re able to step into. This isn’t necessarily a bad thing since it makes travel much faster, and encourages more travel with Palamutes, but it also makes the maps look more lifeless and barren.
Overall Hunting Experience
Winner: Both
The meat and potatoes of every Monster Hunter game is the hunt itself. In the beginning, Monster Hunter World will have you and your friends track the monster through the locale, gathering clues and tracks for where the creature could be before successfully finding it and starting the fight. Once the fight starts, knowing the monster’s pattern, and understanding when it’s safe and not safe to attack will take precedence over anything else. While this sounds boring, the later hunts reveal how rewarding this system is against more mechanically complex creatures like Safi’Jiiva and Fatalis.
In comparison, Rise will immediately show you where the monster is, so you’re able to ride your Palamute to the location, and hunt it. The fight itself is faster, with good management of Silkbound arts and Wirebugs becoming the stars of the show rather than just your weapon’s attacks. However, these powerful tools are also why later hunts in Rise are much more fast-paced and aggressive than World’s hunts. As a result, combat between these two games will come down to preference.
Online Multiplayer
If your friends aren’t available to play, that’s alright. Both World and RIse have an Online Multiplayer mode, so you don’t have to play through the game completely alone.
World’s SOS system is far more sophisticated and easier to navigate than Rise. This means it’s easier to jump into a hunt at almost any time and to help out the larger hunting community with practically any quest. Each SOS flare tells you who’s currently on the quest, what weapons they’re using, and how much time is left. More importantly, the system runs without too many problems and gives the player plenty of choices about what exactly they want to hunt and who they want to help.
In comparison, Rise’s “Respond to Join Request” system doesn’t tell the player very much about who’s already joined, who’s hosting, or if there are even other players looking for the same quest as you. One of the biggest gripes about this system is how it’ll sometimes throw you into a quest that’s practically over, or fail to load you into a quest, causing you to start the entire process over. “Respond to Join Request” is still faster than World’s SOS system because of its automatic matchmaking, but that speed comes at the steep cost of the player’s choice and a system free from loading failures.
Build Variety
Build variety won’t affect you until much later in the game’s story. But once you’re coming to the end of the game, figuring out the best ways to squeeze out every drop of damage from your build while also keeping skills that make hunting comfortable for you is a large part of the game.
In World, your end-game armor will be just Fatalis. Since the Fatalis update was meant to be a victory lap celebrating World’s years of content, every weapon is practically best served by using Fatalis armor and then either a relevant elemental weapon or just a Fatalis weapon. From there, usually building Agitator, Weakness Exploit, and Critical Eye will be the foundation for the majority of builds.
In Rise, builds can vary because of the random nature of Qurious Crafting, Switch Skill-based armor skills, and armor skills like Bloodlust or Berserk which have a significant downside and a significant upside. This leads to a large variety of builds because there are so many ways to achieve high damage in Rise besides just Weakness Exploit and Critical Eye.
Overall Winner: Monster Hunter World
Between the two, World is just a better recommendation than Rise. While Rise has some much-needed Quality of Life improvements and fast-paced combat, it’s hard to overtake the overall presentation and experience of Monster Hunter World. World’s large monster hunts, breathtaking landscape, and weighty combat make it a better overall experience than Rise.
The 15 Best Roguelikes For Under $20
These are the best roguelikes for under $20 right now so you don’t have to worry about taking out a small loan to pick them up!
