After getting my fill of the Rider Village in Monster Hunter Festa’s Monster Hunter Stories demo, I decided to head off to the Trial Dungeon with my newly befriended Yian Kut-Ku. Leaving the gates of the town, I entered the absolutely stunning Starting Field. Running through the starting field with my Yian Kut-Ku while watching the Aptanoth graze on wild grass felt like a scene right out of Ōkami.
And just like Ōkami, small monsters appear on the overworld and trigger battles when touched. Aggressive monsters like Ioprey and Bullfango will charge you at you. Other peaceful monsters like Aptanoth will ignore you until you’ve given them a reason not to. This was a nice bit of flavor taken from flagship Monster Hunter titles, building their personality directly into the gameplay.
Now, let’s talk about battles!
1. There are three types or normal attacks – Power, Speed, and Technique. Each monster, small and large, has a tendency to use one of these types over the other – you will come to understand their preferences as you become more familiar with them. In this triangle, Power beats Technique, Technique beats Speed, and Speed beats Power.
2. If you select a normal attack, your Monstie will use one of these three types at random. If you happen to attack with the same type as your Monstie, you perform a powerful Double Attack on the creature. If you and an enemy creature use the same type of attack, you will both deal damage to one another.
3. Alternatively, you and your Monsties have Skills you can use, sort of like moves from Pokémon. In the case of Yian Kut-Ku, it had a Peck Attack, Dash Attack, and Tackle Attack. My main character, using a Great Sword, had a Wide Slash and Uppercut attack – taken directly from weapon combos in the main Monster Hunter games. Each skill can only be used a number of times and do not produce Double Attacks.
4. Every battle will give you both experience points and monster materials – so gathering monster materials is still a vital part of the game! In fact, hunting still seems like a vital part of the game…but we’ll touch on that another time. Oh, and you can gather materials while riding your Monstie!
Like Skills, every Monstie you befriend has a unique latent ability that enables different kinds of exploration. In my demo, the Trial Dungeon was behind a wall of rocks that only the strong beak of a Yian Kut-Ku could break. If you hatched Velocidrome, you could jump over a chasm to explore a Jungle; while hatching a Congolala let you climb up vines to explore a canyon. In any case, I crushed those rocks and entered the cave.
One thing of note here is how creatively the small monsters are worked into an RPG world. Konchu, infamous among hunters for their thick shells heavy defense, actually provide defensive stat boosts to enemies in battle. Bullfangos relentlessly attack you, but can also raise their allies attack. Reflections of the flagship Monster Hunter titles also made it into boss fights, which brings us to the demo’s boss, Rathalos.
The battle with Rathalos showed off the Bond Attacks you can perform with your monstie – each cleverly referencing the monster’s signature moves in Monster Hunter. To perform these attacks, you must land successful hits on the monster until your Bond Meter is charged. Tapping the Bond Stone will have you hope on your monster and choose a Bond Attack. Yian Kut-Ku’s is “Reverse Ball,” where it swallows Three Konchu and is punched by the rider to release them as fireballs.
With Rathalos out of the way, the demo ended. Monster Hunter Stories feels like a game that will attract all ages and genders to it – and indeed it did! In fact, Monster Hunter Festa was equal parts women as it was men. Stay tuned for some more Monster Hunter Stories coverage here on Siliconera.
