Monster Hunter Wilds: Open Beta Test - thoughts & Concerns

Much like a lot of gamers over the past weekend (October 31, 2024 to November 3, 2024), I hopped online to participate in the open beta for the newest entry in the Monster Hunter franchise, Monster Hunter Wilds. PlayStation Plus users on PlayStation 5 consoles had access to the beta since that Monday, October 28th, thus giving them almost a full week of playtime with it while users on Steam/PC and Xbox had to wait until the night of Halloween. I preloaded the game on my PC that night prior and updated the shaders in preparation since I planned not to get home until late that evening anyway following work and taking my youngest niece and nephew trick or treating. 

I played as much as wasting an hour in the character creation suite (see my hunter in the images above) before diving into the opening tutorial and cutscenes that evening before going to bed that evening since I was exhausted from the long day. I humbly regret not recording that introduction as I thought the cutscenes were beautifully done and blended seamlessly into the gameplay, something that previous games mostly separated with long loading screens before getting into the thick of the action. The story hook for this entry is interesting enough and definitely something I want to see peter out when the full retail release drops, despite the fact I don't have any plans in pre-ordering nor purchasing this at launch. 

On Friday, I played the beta entirely in single player, mostly practicing the in's and out's of combat and testing to see what is still in the game or removed from World and Rise. In a complete call back to my experience in the Monster Hunter: World open beta that kick started me getting into this franchise as a whole, I dabbled a little with Great Sword at the start, but after a hunt or two, I stopped kidding myself as I know I am not a Great Sword main whatsoever outside of playing the weapon for a handful of hunts in World. For what little did I play of it, I think the damage output is still there, but boy do those players are going to have to work for those TCS (True Charge Slashes) to hit (outside of Focus Mode) with how mobile and agile some of these monsters are in this entry. 

Those of you who know me personally or have hunted with me in multiplayer hunts know that I'm a hammer (primary) and gunlance (secondary) main. 

In terms of drawbacks, I feel that the sound effects and overall "weight" of the weapon have been drastically toned down or muted to an extent. I could barely tell the charges building up like in previous entries by both the pulses onscreen and the vibrations on the controller. This weapon is the infamous "king of BONKS" so I have come to expect more impact in terms of the hits registering. It was a minor gripe but something that Capcom could easily adjust in time for launch. I was disappointed that ledge hop spam isn't possible in this entry. I tried it to no avail at several opportunities of this beta and it doesn't work like it did in World. I know in Rise they nerfed it considerably but was still possible with some skills/builds, but to outright remove it was a lame choice. 

I played hammer for 90% of my playtime on the beta on Saturday, so I would like to think I have a good feel for it in terms of this sample in this beta. I don't flat out hate it like I did when I spent extensive time with Monster Hunter Rise, yet I'm not overly in love with it like I was in World. I think this is a fine compromise since hunters have the option of carrying a secondary weapon on their Seikrets in this entry.

In terms of pure shelling, I think this version of the Gunlance has a lot of damage potential, especially if shelling is still regarded has unscaled, non-elemental damage. It is easy to destroy multiple wounds at once with full bursts and Wyvern Fire - something that you can do TWICE back to back now (one long animation and another quick animation). In terms of mobility, I found it to be similar to World and Iceborne, with it will be highly dependent on whatever skills are equipped. There is a little of a workaround this in terms of using Focus Mode as your back hops are extended significantly and the Gunlance's Focus Attack is VERY easy to use maintain offensive pressure as well as maintaining your positioning too. Your Wyrmstake can be applied manually for extra shelling damage and is another avenue to deal significant damage to multiple wounds at once from the pending explosion. 

Defensively, I did notice some guard points during some of the Reload Cancels and there are some perfect guards with precise timing, so there are some things to experiment with in that front. 

I still miss Blast Dash and Bullet Barrage, but that is to be expected since Wilds doesn't use the skills/special moves like Rise used. I have to wonder how they are going to address a lot of these monsters being highly agile in this game when there are still instances where Gunlance has to disengage and run back up to reposition themselves. That was something that irked a lot of gunlance players in World. 

All of that being said, I feel that this iteration of Gunlance is more like the (base) World version without the bells and whistles added in the Iceborne expansion, but nowhere as fine tuned as its Rise and Sunbreak iteration(s). Much like the hammer, I'm looking forward to seeing more of it in the retail release, but it is in a state where I'm glad that I am able to wield two weapons in this entry instead of having to rely on one weapon type entirely.

A new feature for the Seikret is that it serves as a mobile camp (somewhat) in terms of allowing players to carry two weapons at once onto a hunt. This can be changed/set up at the main base camp, but a welcome new addition nonetheless. 

I highly suggest players toggling off the auto-ride controls if you want to freely roam around the locales. Otherwise, the Seikret feels highly irratic to control at times as it's always jerking away to get players back on the intended path/point of interest. The Seikret can glide in the air after jumping off elevated cliffs to safely descend down to the ground by merely pressing and holding the R2 button (RT on Xbox). 

I don't mind the "auto-ride" feature as that was essentially what your mounts did in Iceborne, but players do have the option of retaining control of where the Seikret is going or to explore off the intended path. I do agree with players' concerns on whether or not Seikrets will be abusable in the full retail release as you can call on them at any time to pick you up, allowing players to sharpen their weapons or heal while moving on the safety of their Seikret. Maybe there is some mechanic later in the game where they are scared off a certain distance or the hunter(s) and the monster are walled into a secluded locale and cannot escape until the hunt is done. Otherwise, I could see Seikret abuse being a possible option to make this game easier than it already is from the first impression that I got from this beta. 

In comparison to Palamutes, they don't support you in combat and exist primarily to transport hunters and get hunters out of hairy situations in the field. 

For me personally, it feels awkward and cumbersome, especially heat of battle. Every weapon type has a special attack that can be triggered while in Focus Mode by pressing the R1 (RB button on Xbox) button. The two that I personally experienced while playing both hammer and gunlance were interesting, I'll say that much. The one for Gunlance turns the weapon into a drill as your hunter charges into the monster dealing more damage while maintaining offensive pressure and close promixity positioning that gunlance players prefer. Meanwhile, the hammer's "earthquake" is insanely awkward. It looks like one of your typical charged swings with a few extra hits, but not something I see being a go-to option in terms of my typical playstyle. I see this being highly situational in terms of the weapon class and the monster you are hunting. 

When it seemed like it was limited to just merely providing players a bit more ease in terms of wielding their weapons, I noticed another layer to this debacle. If you observe monsters during certain animations of their attacks, they have weak points that are exposed that are only viewable while in Focus Mode. This seems troubling to me in a sense, especially when Capcom stated that Focus Mode was to be something meant only to aid newer players and NOT be something that veteran players would be required to use, much like the Silkbind attacks/skills in Rise/Sunbreak or your clutch claw in Iceborne - two tools that proved to be embedded into the core gameplay loop of the game. There were no means of getting around them. I sense that same thing happening here. If weak points are to be shown/exposed only in Focus Mode, then players are going to have to be in this state majority of the hunt to know when and where to apply optimal damage to the monster. 

If it's going to be that vital to gameplay, then I wish it wasn't so awkward and cumbersome to use. 

Monsters found in the Beta

Speaking of monsters, I will touch on those briefly. The beta features four big monsters: Chatacabra, Doshaguma, Balahara, and Rey Dau. Rey Dau is the apex predator of the region available to explore in the beta, providing hunters a significant challenge to defeat successfully. 

Chatacabra is the easiest monster to dispatch in this beta and the one I highly recommend fighting over and over to get your bearings against whether you are a returning veteran of the series or a newcomer. Great opponent to try out your options with your weapon(s) with and great to practice the in's and out's of the game with without much pressure. 

Doshaguma is a tad more difficult, with the first hurdle being the herd that he is surrounded by. Isolating him to fight alone will be most players first obstacle if they didn't bring dung pods with them for firing from their slinger to disperse the herd. Then you can pursue the alpha of the herd on his own. He's not to be taken lightly as a lot of his attacks hit like truck and have pretty weird hitboxes, with some of its attacks feeling like they have a delayed reaction. 

Balahara is easily the most annoying and least enjoyable fight out of the four in this beta. This highly elusive monster is always sliding around and slipping out of the range of your attacks and looking for the best angle to spray you with oil spit from its mouth. Fortunately, you can fire ammo from your slinger to knock it down from the perches it tries to crawl up to, dealing considerable damage to it with environmental hazards. 

Finally, Rey Dau is staged as the ultimate challenge of this beta that wonders aimlessly throughout the region until you provoke it into battle. It is always accompanied by a thunderstorm rolling into the region, putting the new weather effects of this game into full display. Its lightning-based attacks are extremely lethal, with its accompanying divebomb and wing slashes being just as problematic for overly aggressive hunters. If you take too much time fighting Rey Dau, he will leave the region unless you engage him in an optional quest/investigation, so keep that in mind. 

Multiplayer / Lobbies / Support Hunters

I'm going to be blunt when I say that the entire multiplayer setup in this beta was a mess. As soon as you load up the beta, you're dropped into the home base hub area, where up to 100 players can be assembled at once, looking to engage in hunts. Here's where one of the main problems with performance with this game during the beta occurred as the game is struggling to render all of these avatars at once. More often that not, I found myself racing over to Alma (the quest Handler in this entry) to setup a quest for I could be back into single player and offset the load of the game trying to render everyone in the lobby. 

I wanted to play with friends over the weekend of the beta, but I didn't see any means to invite friends nor to create my own lobby so that wasn't possible. It sucked as I wanted to try out the cross-play co-op play that was promised in this beta. 

The very few times that I was able to call players into my hunt/quest via SOS flares, it worked without a charm, but I was perfectly fine with the alternative to actual players - the support hunters. Support hunters are the same as the followers found in Monster Hunter Rise: Sunbreak where NPC hunters fill in the spots to aid you in a multiplayer hunt. They can be replaced by human players once more players join your hunt, but they are a great substitution for the real deal. As a fan of followers in Sunbreak, I'm VERY happy to see them return in this newest entry. Followers eliminated the need to rely on human players and/or the multiplayer component entirely for players who may want to play the game in single player for the most part without having to play online. I doubt it is going to work like that for the full retail release as a lot of these open world games tend to have an always online component. 

My Gameplay Experience

Please forgive me for recording this footage on low settings as I didn't want to bog down my machine more than it was running this game since it felt like the slightest thing running in the background would slow this game to crawl in terms of performance. I got two separate days worth of gameplay across these two videos with mostly hammer and gunlance gameplay during these hunts.  

I miss the little things, such as the rare mining/carve material acquisition animations. I appreciate that you can grab items while on the back of your Seikret, such as grabbing and loading slinger ammo or endemic life/materials.

The beta offers a lot of options to players willing to deep dive into exploring the region, especially for veteran players who know the ingredients for crafting high-end items and resources, along with new gameplay mechanics that aren't explained in the least. 

For example, players may run into additional camps on the mini-map but doesn't specify the means of how to build these "pop-up camps" or "camps" in general. In previous entries, your handler merely gave you a quest or simple list to hunt down the materials/resources needed to setup that camp. 

The new mounting mechanic seems like a callback to the style featured in Monster Hunter World, but offers a weapon finisher after applying and destroying a wound on the monster while the player navigates dealing with the monster thrashing about, trying to hang on before their stamina runs out and they fall off. I know that I'm in the minority when it comes to liking these the changes to the mounting mechanic when in comparison, the one in Rise/Sunbreak was insanely overpowered in terms of mounting and riding other monsters. 

I wanted to get more gameplay recorded when I first loaded up the open beta on Thursday evening/early Friday morning, but I ran into two different problems. The first being that it was so long since I have used Streamlabs that required an update before I could record anything, so I had already completed the introduction/tutorial and couldn't return to it, so that wasn't an option anymore. The second problem that I ran into was the random "Withdrawal from Quest" glitches I would get mid-hunt while engaging with a monster where the entire game would boot me out of any sort of control, yet leaving me hearing the sounds of my allies still in battle and the screen would be frozen on the sky or the surrounding environment. The only fix for this would be a hard exit out of the game by killing the active process altogether and rebooting the game. I ran into this constantly on Friday to the point it discouraged me from playing the game much that day. I was VERY familiar with the Capcom's Crash Report Tool popping up. 

On Saturday, the first thing I did after reading posts on Reddit about similar instances was adjust my settings in the System menus. For those wondering about the quality on the two recorded footage I uploaded to YouTube that is why the quality changed from one to the other. I lowered the visuals to the point where the game ran without issues at the cost of visuals not looking as "spectacular" as they would have on a much higher end machine than mine. It panned out for the better in the long haul as I was able to play for longer stretches without the game crashing left and right. I still say that Capcom really needs to optimize this game better than they have out of the box for PC users, especially when even console users were stating having similar issues in terms of the game stuttering and slowing down while textures weren't loading properly and the frame rate was all over the place. It's not a good look for a game that is set to release in less than four months. 

I'm personally expecting a disaster of a launch, much like Cyberpunk 2077, especially for this AAA title releasing simultaneously across multiplatforms. Let's not pretend like Monster Hunter World's initial PC release went off without a hitch either. I had already made up my mind to not pre-order after seeing the PC spec requirements for the retail release, but this open beta convinced me even more that this game wasn't going in a positive direction when we are less than four months prior to the release date and this game (at least what was presented in this beta) was in this state of piss poor optimization. 

I'm not going to pretend like I know the semantics and technical know-how in terms of understanding the in's and out's proper gaming optimization on PC. There's plenty of great in-depth breakdowns on the matter over on YouTube, testing and showing off the results of various settings on different PC setups and builds. They share their concerns as well, especially in the case of the CPU vs. GPU usage and optimization in terms of how well this game SHOULD be running with the recommended specs provided by Capcom versus the reality of how it is currently running across different builds. 

All of that being said, this will end up being another hit for Capcom if they could clean up the performance and optimization for this game not just on PC but across the board on all platforms. If Capcom hopes to repeat the success of Monster Hunter World several years ago, then they need to come out of the gate swinging and don't half-ass this in the least. Please, Capcom. Put your best foot forward and give players more reason to come back and draw in new players to this franchise for the first time. The gameplay is already fun and addictive as previous entries to hook and engage players for the long haul while providing a brand new world ripe and ready to be explored. They just have to make sure this doesn't run and perform like crap. Is that too much to ask? I don't think so, especially for any of these AAA releases for as much a new video game costs these days. I don't want to see this game launch at $69.99 to $79.99, only to filled with all of these bugs and problematic issues right off the bat like so many of these big budget releases. Capcom would then give out their apology and force players to wait on big post-launch patch to address all of these issues plaguing the launch and whatever else players run into across consoles and PC. Who knows, maybe there's nothing to be worried about, but as it stands, I'm keeping a wait and see attitude.