Monster Hunter Wilds hype fuels Monster Hunter World to its highest Steam player count in 3 years

Monster Hunter World
(Image credit: Capcom)

Monster Hunter World has seen a giant player spike on Steam following Capcom's campaign to revive the game's online scene.

Last week, we reported on Capcom's new campaign for Monster Hunter World. Dubbed '#ReturnToWorld,' the initiative beckoned players back to the 2018 game in an attempt to revive the online scene, and basically give fans something to do until Monster Hunter Wilds rolls around in 2025.

The campaign looks to have been a massive success. According to SteamDB, Monster Hunter World is enjoying its highest player count on PC since October 2020, with 94,680 players marking the game's highest peak within the last 24 hours across the PC platform.

It's not just old players that are apparently flowing back to World on Steam. Steam has Monster Hunter World in its top-sellers chart at the time of writing, which means the huge 67% discount Capcom put on Steam for the #ReturnToWorld campaign must've prompted a lot of newcomers to dive in.

World seeing this huge player spike goes to show how players view Wilds as a follow-up to Monster Hunter World, and not Monster Hunter Rise. With what looks like a huge, sprawling map and photorealistic graphics, Wilds looks like it's taking after World in the huge MMO-like approach to the Monster Hunter franchise.

In fact, some sleuths think Monster Hunter Wilds might be the first fully open-world game in the series. This would be an absolutely monumental undertaking for Capcom's developers, as anyone who's played the series before will know, but there's still a lot of hope out there among fans that this game could be different in that regard.

Head over to our new games 2023 guide for a look ahead at all the new titles set to launch next year before Wilds releases.

Hirun Cryer

Hirun Cryer is a freelance reporter and writer with Gamesradar+ based out of U.K. After earning a degree in American History specializing in journalism, cinema, literature, and history, he stepped into the games writing world, with a focus on shooters, indie games, and RPGs, and has since been the recipient of the MCV 30 Under 30 award for 2021. In his spare time he freelances with other outlets around the industry, practices Japanese, and enjoys contemporary manga and anime.

Read more
Monster Hunter Wilds
Elden Ring, Cyberpunk 2077, and now Dota 2 fall to Monster Hunter Wilds as it crosses 1.3 million peak Steam players despite 49% positive reviews
Monster Hunter Wilds
Monster Hunter Wilds beat Monster Hunter World, Capcom's previous defining mega-hit, by 40% in US launch month sales
Monster Hunter Wilds
Capcom promises "this is just the start for the next generation of Monster Hunter" as Wilds shatters sales milestones: "The Guild authorizes this celebration!"
Monster Hunter Wilds
Monster Hunter Wilds breaks a Capcom record as the action RPG passes 8 million sales in 3 days, "the fastest a title has reached this milestone in the company's history"
Monster Hunter Wilds trailer screenshot showing a young woman with long blonde hair tied back into a ponytail smiling slightly, pumping her left fist in the air
Steam has doubled in size in just 5 years, as Monster Hunter Wilds' launch pushes it beyond 40 million concurrent users
Monster Hunter Wilds
Monster Hunter Wilds might be a bit too popular as one indie dev says their sales totally flatlined around the action RPG's launch: "We haven't sold a single game"
Latest in Action
Yasuke and Naoe ready to fight on the Assassin's Creed Shadows On The Radar thumbnail
On The Radar: Assassin's Creed Shadows coverage hub
Assassin's Creed Shadows Naoe assassinating target with Tanto skill
Assassin's Creed Shadows' first title update is a hotfix with three lines of patch notes and a download size up to 9GB
Assassin's Creed Shadows Nishinomiya Shrine
All Nishinomiya Shrine locations in Assassin's Creed Shadows
Assassin's Creed Shadows riddles Naoe answers
All Assassin's Creed Shadows riddle answers for NPC encounters
GTA 6 trailer screenshots showing lucia in an interview room
"GTA 6 is basically a huge meteor, and we will just stay clear of the blast zone": Publishers are in a frenzy over when to release their games to avoid Rockstar
Assassin's Creed Shadows
Assassin's Creed Shadows has been the series' best launch since Valhalla, but that was "a perfect storm we may never see again," says Ubisoft
Latest in News
Lunar Remastered Collection
"Will today’s players still enjoy a game from 30 years ago?": JRPG icon Kei Shigema says he was thrilled to see Lunar getting a remaster even after all this time
Nick Offerman as Bill and Murray Bartlett as Frank in The Last of Us episode 3
The Last of Us season 2 showrunners tease a "gorgeous" episode akin to season 1’s Emmy-nominated Bill and Frank story: "Just you wait"
The Witcher 4 screenshot with Ciri using sword and sorcery to fight an ancient monster
CD Projekt boss says "cutting-edge single-player games" – you know, like The Witcher 4 and Cyberpunk 2 – will "continue to enjoy great popularity" despite industry shifts
Cyberpunk 2077
Despite releasing exactly zero new games, CD Projekt bagged $120 million in profit for 2024 – the Witcher and Cyberpunk studio's third-best result ever
Muse
Daredevil: Born Again midseason trailer teases Matt Murdock’s violent fight with Muse, including a gory scene straight from the comics
Batman looking over the city during Batman: Arkham City, one of the best PS3 games.
The PS2 Batman Begins game was considered such a "disaster" that Christopher Nolan turned down a Dark Knight-inspired game