Capcom is in an interesting position with Monster Hunter Rise, his new title for the Nintendo Switch. 2018 Monster Hunter World was a huge triumph, bringing the series to a Western audience accustomed to home consoles and PCs and becoming one of the company’s best-selling games. But in doing so, he had to give up some of the main factors Monster hunterJapanese success: portability and local multiplayer.

Since Capcom started working on Monster Hunter WorldHowever, the Switch has become a worldwide hit, and on paper it looks like it should be a perfect system for the series. It is much more efficient than the PSP and 3DS hardware which made Monster hunter a social phenomenon in Japan, while still offering the flexibility to let you play on your TV or on the go. It’s there that ascend Between.

“We think that by releasing this on a portable console, we made it a lot more accessible, a lot easier to pick up and play,” says producer Ryōzō Tsujimoto. The edge. “It’s also obviously easier to play with people in your immediate environment. So it’s very well suited for playing at home with your family, and you can pick it up and play whenever you want – you can do a few quick quests before bed. So yeah, we think it might bring people back [who didn’t play World] because of its ease of access and ease of handling. “

But the Switch presents technical challenges for Monster Hunter Rise compared to World, which used more powerful PS4 and Xbox One hardware as the basis for development. Earlier Monster hunter the games were played in small numbered areas separated by loading screens, while World had complex multi-level stages that you could seamlessly explore. ascend manages to divide the difference – you won’t confuse environmental complexity with that of World, but the graphics fidelity is impressive for the Switch, and there’s no loading time once you’re in a level.

“At the very beginning of development, we were still playing around with the idea of ​​keeping the same map system as the old games, with separate areas divided by loading screens,” says director Yasunori Ichinose. “But during development, as we saw how World was doing, we basically got the request to make all environments open like in World. So it wasn’t something that we had planned from the start, but it is something that we are really happy to have done.

The scenes also have a much higher degree of verticality compared to previous games – Ichinose says that’s what the “Rise” in the title refers to – and the ability to roam environments with the new Wirebug or climb on the back of a companion Palamute canine offers other options for crossing. In fact, says Ichinose, this is why Capcom decided to put the locations of monsters on the map at the start of every quest, rather than forcing hunters to find them from scratch – in ascend, figuring out how to reach the monsters could be a challenge in itself.

Still, I wondered if Capcom had weighed the risk of losing some of their fans who had jumped on board with World and could expect another technical leap forward. Could the switch to Switch have an effect on ascendthe popularity of the West?

“We don’t particularly worry about that,” Tsujimoto said. “I mean, every time we do a Monster hunter game, we make sure it is a good new Monster hunter Game. It’s not that we’re less invested in our portable inputs or something like that. It’s just that Monster Hunter Rise is a game that just sits on a handheld console, so we’ve optimized it for that. But that doesn’t really change anything from a gameplay standpoint – it’s still a lot Monster hunter, so fans will always enjoy it.

Moreover, as confirmed by Tsujimoto at the end of our interview, Monster Hunter Rise Coming to PC as well, with Capcom aiming for an early 2022 release date. This should be a good option for anyone hesitant to give up Worldsmooth frame rates on modern hardware. If you’re planning on playing on Switch, however, there’s only a month left – Monster Hunter Rise will be released worldwide on March 26.

Capcom is in an interesting position with Monster Hunter Rise, his new title for the Nintendo Switch. 2018 Monster Hunter World was a huge triumph, bringing the series to a Western audience accustomed to home consoles and PCs and becoming one of the company’s best-selling games. But in doing so, he had to give up some of the main factors Monster hunterJapanese success: portability and local multiplayer.

Since Capcom started working on Monster Hunter WorldHowever, the Switch has become a worldwide hit, and on paper it looks like it should be a perfect system for the series. It is much more efficient than the PSP and 3DS hardware which made Monster hunter a social phenomenon in Japan, while still offering the flexibility to let you play on your TV or on the go. It’s there that ascend Between.

“We think that by releasing this on a portable console, we made it a lot more accessible, a lot easier to pick up and play,” says producer Ryōzō Tsujimoto. The edge. “It’s also obviously easier to play with people in your immediate environment. So it’s very well suited for playing at home with your family, and you can pick it up and play whenever you want – you can do a few quick quests before bed. So yeah, we think it might bring people back [who didn’t play World] because of its ease of access and ease of handling. “

But the Switch presents technical challenges for Monster Hunter Rise compared to World, which used more powerful PS4 and Xbox One hardware as the basis for development. Earlier Monster hunter the games were played in small numbered areas separated by loading screens, while World had complex multi-level stages that you could seamlessly explore. ascend manages to divide the difference – you won’t confuse environmental complexity with that of World, but the graphics fidelity is impressive for the Switch, and there’s no loading time once you’re in a level.

“At the very beginning of development, we were still playing around with the idea of ​​keeping the same map system as the old games, with separate areas divided by loading screens,” says director Yasunori Ichinose. “But during development, as we saw how World was doing, we basically got the request to make all environments open like in World. So it wasn’t something that we had planned from the start, but it is something that we are really happy to have done.

The scenes also have a much higher degree of verticality compared to previous games – Ichinose says that’s what the “Rise” in the title refers to – and the ability to roam environments with the new Wirebug or climb on the back of a companion Palamute canine offers other options for crossing. In fact, says Ichinose, this is why Capcom decided to put the locations of monsters on the map at the start of every quest, rather than forcing hunters to find them from scratch – in ascend, figuring out how to reach the monsters could be a challenge in itself.

Still, I wondered if Capcom had weighed the risk of losing some of their fans who had jumped on board with World and could expect another technical leap forward. Could the switch to Switch have an effect on ascendthe popularity of the West?

“We don’t particularly worry about that,” Tsujimoto said. “I mean, every time we do a Monster hunter game, we make sure it is a good new Monster hunter Game. It’s not that we’re less invested in our portable inputs or something like that. It’s just that Monster Hunter Rise is a game that just sits on a handheld console, so we’ve optimized it for that. But that doesn’t really change anything from a gameplay standpoint – it’s still a lot Monster hunter, so fans will always enjoy it.

Moreover, as confirmed by Tsujimoto at the end of our interview, Monster Hunter Rise Coming to PC as well, with Capcom aiming for an early 2022 release date. This should be a good option for anyone hesitant to give up Worldsmooth frame rates on modern hardware. If you’re planning on playing on Switch, however, there’s only a month left – Monster Hunter Rise will be released worldwide on March 26.