Monster Hunter Tri (Wii) - Review by Chris

Introduction

Having seen huge success on Sony's platforms, primarily in Japan but with relative success in other regions, Capcom decided to do something many would never have thought they'd do: bring the Monster Hunter franchise to Nintendo's home platform, the Wii, instead of the more powerful consoles. From the initial announcement, speculation was rife that Tri wouldn't be able to hold a candle to its forbearers but with Nintendo stepping in and working closely with Capcom on the game, as well as distributing the game in the Western markets, it was clear Nintendo believed in the quality of the game. With the game now available in stores, how does it hold up as an experience on the Wii and as a Monster Hunter title? Time to sharpen those blades and find out whether this can topple some of the greatest of beasts you'll ever encounter.

Gameplay

Starting off as a new recruit hunter, you travel to Moga Village looking for work. When you arrive, you're informed that the village has been hit with countless earthquakes recently, destroying much of the town's infrastructure and amenities. At the same time, much of the village's fishing fleet has been decimated at the hands of a giant sea dragon, known as Lagiacrus, and the village now live in constant fear of coming under a direct attack from the creature. As the town's new hunter, you're ultimate goal will be to confront the creature which has caused so much damage and rid the area of it once and for all.

After having created your character, you'll be given introduction to the basics of the village and the situation as it stands. But before they villagers will allow you to hunt monsters for them, you'll be tested with a variety of smaller tasks to help restore certain features of the village to usable states. Giving you some basic armour and weaponry, you'll step out into the field in these early days to collect resources and defeat lesser creatures to prove to the village's chief and his son that you are worthy of taking on more meaningful tasks. It is through these early days that you'll learn the games ropes, getting to grips with the various weapon types as well as gathering resources for use and how to generate resource points to fulfil villager requests. It can feel like a lot to take in but the game doesn't just throw you into the deep end, rather it carefully guides you through until you've grasped the basic concepts of the game and while these early tasks may not be the most exciting, it certainly helps your progression in the long run.

By the time these early tasks are completed, the village will nearly be fully operational, but as you progress further into the game, villager requests will alert you to certain areas which need improving and to fulfil these tasks, you'll have to spend resource points, gained from heading out into the free roaming Moga Woods and killing monsters, and give certain necessary resources. As such, behind the main game, you'll always have villager requests to see to meaning some downtime time in between the bigger, more difficult tasks to collect items for your own benefit as well as for the benefit of the village.

Through the village's guild master, you'll receive ranking quests which are unlocked progressively as you reach certain milestones and take down certain beasts. The initial tasks have you hunting smaller prey or collecting items but as you get deeper into the rankings, you'll be tasked with either taking down enormous beasts which dwarf your character in size, with the ultimate goal being to confront the Lagiacrus, or to capture these creatures using traps. It's a long road up to that point, with even some of the earlier beasts being incredibly tricky should you proceed with the wrong strategy but even when you get to that point, the game doesn't end providing further, more difficult quests against monsters that make the Lagiacrus look minute in scale.

As the hunter, you're given freedom of choice over which weapons you wish to invest time into and use in your quests. Each of the game's 7 available weapons, 2 of which don't become available until later in the game, bring with them their own attacks and techniques for use in battle and no two play out the same, providing a further layer of strategy to your monster battles as some weapons will be better placed for taking down certain monsters compared to others. Factor in a heavy upgrade system for each set, and an elemental system which you'll need to make note of for effective use against the bigger monsters, and your choice of weapon can ultimately decide the fate of your encounters. Running alongside this is the ability to create and upgrade your armour, in the same way as your weapons, using the resources you scavenge from the game's 5 main locations as well as those gained from monsters, with there being numerous sets requiring constant reruns of certain monsters just to be able to get some of the pieces. It's something you'll find yourself doing more and more as you progress as you hope to gain that sought after piece of armour or weapon to complete your characters look.

But Monster Hunter Tri isn't just about hunting monsters. A level of strategy is placed upon the inventory you head out into the field with, with the game giving you the ability to create potions, bombs and traps from items you gather. The game is as much about the upkeep of your inventory and weapons as it is about the questing, and you'll have to sharpen items often to prevent them from going dull and stock up on the necessary items before each quest to give yourself the best of chances.

In the offline elements, you can easily spend upwards of 40 hours making your way through the game's plethora of quests and trying to ascertain specific weapons and armour and through all of it, you'll be hooked. But a friend doesn't have to be left out as they can join in for some two player split screen arena action where monsters caught during the single player are presented as tasks that have to be defeated in an arena. It's a very nice touch which extends an already lengthy game and the inclusion of an exceptional online setup, mentioned later on, means that in terms of bang for your buck, you'll be hard pushed to find anything that gives you quite as much fun and content as Monster Hunter Tri.

Controls

With a game such as Monster Hunter, Capcom clearly knew that motion controls were not the way to go and thankfully, there are no meaningful inclusions of it in the game. While the game supports the Wii-mote and Nunchuk combo, controls stick firmly to a button based nature and although working well in a confined setup as that provided by the Wii-mote and Nunchuk, it doesn't quite feel as natural as it could be and feels slightly more cumbersome than experienced hunters would have hoped for. It still works, well enough to be able to enjoy every aspect of the game without much issue but it's not the true way the game was intended to be played.

Working closely with Nintendo to redesign the Classic Controller to make it a more suitable fit for the game, Monster Hunter Tri is one of the few games that utilises the Classic Controller setup as its main form of control. Both the old and the new Classic Controller Pro are compatible with the game, making for a much more traditional setup with fits the style of gameplay slightly better than the Wii-mote and Nunchuk. Those using the old Classic Controller won't be missing a whole lot with the new Pro version other than a more comfortable ergonomic design, which is great considering the amount of time you'll end up putting into the game, and the two Z buttons having been made into true shoulder buttons but the latter are rarely used at all in the game. There is a slight learning curve to the controls in both setups, and in the beginning you'll often find yourself pressing the wrong buttons but once it clicks, the game controls fantastically well in terms of gameplay and camera control, an issue that has plagued the series until now.

Graphics

Monster Hunter Tri is a visual delight for the eyes. Everything from the locations to the characters and armour to the monsters has been created with such a level of detail that it almost feels unbelievable that it's running on the Wii. The locations feel lively and natural, providing such environments as a forest with flooded sections, an icy tundra and a volcano as well as several others to explore and hunt within. While they aren't connected as one big map to explore, the sectioned nature of them allows for each to be presented in a high level of detail, with great environmental design and texture work. Perhaps the best bit of the locations are the often breathtaking vistas you'll be able to see from some of the higher points in each location, which really show the level of detail which has been put into the game. The underwater sections similarly look fantastic, with great use of advanced lighting techniques to give a sense of realism to these locations that surpasses nearly every other title on the console.

Character models and monsters show a great variety in their design, and although there are many instances of models having been carried over from previous games and redone for use here, they still look fantastic in their design. The human characters are perhaps the less appealing of what is on offer, taking a backseat to the various monster types but with a vast array of different armour sets and weapons, they more than bridge the gulf. And yet looking good isn't what makes the monsters the highlight of the game, rather it's the animation work which has gone into making them move so realistically that is truly remarkable. From limping as a result of damage to general movement, the monsters look and feel real and this really comes through when you see the sea monsters twisting and turning in the water. It all comes together to produce the best looking third party game and perhaps the best looking game on the console full stop.

Sound

The game does borrow slightly in the music department from other games but each tune has been recreated especially for inclusion into the game in an orchestrated fashion that sounds superb. When you step out into the field and see the sprawling vista, an orchestrated segment of music kicks into the create an incredible feeling of connectivity with the game's environments and the use of sound throughout builds upon this level of ambience to make a game worth exploring fully.

Special features

Another area where Capcom have worked closely with Nintendo is in the online department. Capcom knew friend codes would be too cumbersome an experience for playing Monster Hunter Tri online and clearly Nintendo felt the same as friend codes have been completely dropped in favour of a 6 digit Capcom code which you exchange with friends for playing. Yet, you don't need to exchange this code to play with friends as you can merely add their character name to your roster and can join up that way. It's a much simpler way of playing with friends and it really makes the online experience worthwhile and heading out and taking down a giant monster with 3 other friends is a truly satisfying moment.

At the same time, you have the ability to join up with anyone playing in your region, depending on the gate and servers you join to play, and play the exact same way here. The number of options for gates and servers as well as setting up your own password locked ones makes Monster Hunter Tri the most fleshed out online experience on the console and is a showing of exactly how the Wi-Fi Connection setup on the console should have been from the beginning. With its own set of quests, voice-chat and keyboard compatible communication as well as an incredibly smooth experience regardless of where your partners may be, anyone who steps into the online world will find it enormously hard to step away from because it's so well implemented.

Final comments

Monster Hunter Tri arrives on the Wii in a state of triumph giving Wii owners and fans of the series everything they could have hoped for. The same fantastic hunting from previous games retains all its grandeur here and is further improved by the incredible online options, bringing Nintendo's Wi-Fi Connection up to a standard that falls only slightly behind that implemented in the other consoles. It looks great, it plays great and is by far one of the best third party offerings on the console to date and is a definite must have for those beleaguered Wii owners craving some heavy action gameplay. Just be prepared to become truly absorbed in all departments.

Pro: Presentation is superb, offline questing is incredibly lengthy and at times truly epic, controls are great, the online experience is the best on the console and incredibly addictive
Con: Very time consuming, can be very difficult at times
Final score: 9.3

Share on Twitter or Facebook

Comments