It feels like games swing wider every year, lower lows juxtaposed with higher highs. The live service graveyard will need an expansion soon, but the throne of the Game of the Moment is grander than ever. What will reign next? What will dominate conversations for weeks, months, or the rest of the year? The next Helldivers 2, the next Baldur's Gate 3. Marvel Rivals feels like the most recent Game of the Moment. And as 2025 warms up, it's hard to think of many upcoming games that are better positioned to grab millions of players than Monster Hunter Wilds, the most-anticipated entry in an action RPG series that's held onto the same lasting appeal for over 20 years.
A lot of this build up started with Monster Hunter World. I've mentioned it about a hundred times, and I'll keep mentioning it because I think the impact of this game is still underestimated. It feels like a canon event for our timeline. Monster Hunter World turned a long-niche series into a peak platinum seller for Capcom and informed a whole lot of people that the kind of game loop which so many grind-a-thons and RPGs are still chasing was mastered by Capcom ages ago, and that it comes paired with some of the best combat and boss design in video games and multiplayer that generates friendships and stories more reliably than almost anything else. Monster Hunter Wilds is a direct evolution of this breakout hit, and based on everything we've seen and played of it so far, it could well be even bigger.
The secret sauce
A new Monster Hunter always feels like an event. For longtime fans, each game is a fresh start in a new but familiar world, an adventure simultaneously nostalgic and surprising. It somehow captures the thrill of starting New Game Plus in a game you've learned front-to-back, and the satisfaction of using your experience to fly through it, but in something excitingly unfamiliar.
Your favorite weapon feels just right in your hands, but comes with new tricks that meaningfully shift how you play. Maybe you'll main a new weapon this time – the idea is especially tempting in Monster Hunter Wilds since you can bring two weapons on a hunt now – or maybe you'll just spend another 500+ hours with ol' reliable. Likewise, there's always a new village or hub with the same infectious soul – jovial characters and skittering Palicoes and irresistible food – but a vibe all its own. The maps, the monsters, the menus – everything feels like home, lived-in and comfy, but undeniably different.
"Your hunt times go down, your damage numbers go up, and soon your brain is sloshing around in all the fun chemicals."
For newcomers, a Monster Hunter launch is always the best time to jump in, not just because the community is sure to be white-hot for a good while after release, but because every new Monster Hunter builds on all the previous ones. "Just play the new one" is a golden rule of mine with games, and Monster Hunter is maybe the best series for it. Monster Hunter Wilds is the clearest iteration yet, with Capcom obviously hoping the Monster Hunter World lightning will strike again, but there are fragments of other games in the mix too, polished and refined.
And for everyone, a new Monster Hunter is a chance to get immersed up to your collarbone in a peerless loop of challenge and reward – and then up to your chin, and then your ears, and, screw it, let's go all the way under. Monster Hunter is an action RPG where you chase and battle dozens of monsters in boss fight-style showdowns that can run upwards of 20 minutes, all in massive, dynamic environments teeming with life. Each boss hunted yields new parts you can use to craft better gear to bring on harder hunts. That's the loop, and it's as compelling as another run of Balatro or another turn of Civilization.
But really, Monster Hunter is a game about setting goals and overcoming challenges, and it's one of the best in its space. Combat and crafting feed off each other in a way that keeps you chasing your next upgrade, and this motivates you to get better at fighting monsters. Your hunt times go down, your damage numbers go up, and soon your brain is sloshing around in all the fun chemicals.
Whole new World
We took a big look at Capcom's big beastie RPG already, so if you want more deep dives ensure you hunt down our Monster Hunter Wilds big preview hub!
Monster Hunter Wilds is more of this, obviously, but it's also the first Monster Hunter fully developed by a post-Monster Hunter World Capcom, as the more handheld-centric Monster Hunter Rise was already in production when it exploded in popularity. Wilds is the game that will show us what Capcom learned from World and how it will shepherd the series going forward. My first impression was that it has learned a lot, and consequently Monster Hunter Wilds could be the definitive Monster Hunter, balancing the grit of games like Monster Hunter World and Monster Hunter 4 Ultimate with the more out-there style of entries like Monster Hunter Rise and Monster Hunter Generations.
Crucially, Monster Hunter Wilds has a few key strengths going in. Firstly, there's been a calculated push for approachability. Capcom knows it needs to reach new players and get them up to speed, so it's put more resources into pacing and tutorializing. At the company's Osaka, Japan studio, one developer told GamesRadar+ that feedback from the first network test has been encouraging in this regard. My playthrough of the opening hours felt well-guided. It also felt more like a traditional RPG, complete with bespoke chapters and objectives, which isn't a coincidence.
For a long time, Monster Hunter games didn't really have well-defined storylines with serious stakes or motivations. (Ironically, spinoffs like Monster Hunter Stories are much bigger on this.) There was richness in the background, but the games mostly got by on a string of excuses to introduce new monsters and convince you to fight them. This was never a problem because combat and crafting always carried the experience, but I get the sense that Capcom has invested more in storytelling with Wilds, partly as a way to grab people who associate RPGs with deep stories.
The short version of Wilds is: you're hunting a monster thought to be extinct to help people living in a region thought to be uninhabited, so the whole hunter guild has been thrown for a loop. What's most exciting is the treatment and description of hunters as a whole. The role they play, the power they wield, and the difference they – you! – make in this world. We aren't just researching for the sake of knowledge. Wilds feels like a fuller narrative squeezed out of the world-building that Monster Hunter has always had, and as someone who also likes lots of other RPGs, it is doing something for me.
Setting the hook as the Game of the Moment will largely fall to multiplayer, I suspect, and Wilds has an advantage here as well: it's the first simultaneous multi-platform launch with crossplay in the history of Monster Hunter. This is a big deal; all of the sudden my real-life friends, Destiny 2 friends, and work friends can all group up and hunt together.
That's powerful, and combined with the more freeform lobbies that Wilds is seemingly pushing for, with individual teams of two to four splitting off from persistent open-world groups whenever they want, I'm picturing Discord hangout sessions the likes of which I haven't seen in years. Helping a friend catch up, sharing the same grinds, rotating who gets to pick the monster, ragging on the one friend who just can't get that rare gem to drop. It's gonna be a good time, and I can easily see this consuming a huge chunk of 2025 for a lot of people – maybe World's audience and then some.
Looking for more beasties? Check out our best Monster Hunter games list!
