Players prepare themselves each time a new Monster Hunter is released, wondering how their favorite weapon will feel in their hands in the upcoming game.
Each of the 14 weapon types displays its own unique characteristics while still changing to fit the design of each new title. Monster Hunter: World did away with segmenting off each area during a quest, while Monster Hunter Rise is notable for its Wirebug action. The weapons that feel at home in the hunters' hands show a new side of themselves in line with a game's design. So, what kinds of concepts guided the tuning of each weapon in Monster Hunter Wilds, a game that aims to create a seamless hunting experience?
To hear about these weapon details that act as determining gameplay factors, we spoke with the Monster Hunter Wilds art director and executive director, Kaname Fujioka, and Wilds director, Yuya Tokuda. Fujioka was also the director of the first Monster Hunter game, while Tokuda has had a hand in the series since Monster Hunter Freedom.
In the interview, we heard about the concept and development process for various weapons, garnering new details on weapons that players have been particularly interested in, as well as the kinds of adjustments made for the release version of the game after the feedback they received from the November 2024 Open Beta Test.
Adjustments for a Seamless World
Tokuda starts by saying that significant changes needed to be made to how a number of weapons are used due to major shifts in the gameplay loop, affected by Wilds’ seamless map and changing weather conditions.
"There are a number of large changes to the Light and Heavy Bowgun, as well as the Bow," he says.
While previous Monster Hunter titles featured a routine of returning to your base to replenish your resources after each quest, Wilds aims to offer seamless play, making this process no longer required. Ranged weapons in Monster Hunter historically use consumable ammo and coatings, so there was a possibility that they would be more of a burden to use in Wilds without an established time to restock these items.
"That's why we designed it so that basic damage sources can be used without expending resources,” says Tokuda. “We balanced it around the idea that things like normal, pierce and spread ammo for Bowguns and coatings for Bows can fire unlimited times while managing your gauge. But we still wanted it to be possible to use what you’ve prepared ahead of time or what you find in the field on top of that, and so our balancing took into account the presence of design that allows you to create powerful ammo with attributes from gathered materials."
One change after the next was made to each of the weapons while considering the new elements found in Wilds and the game's concept, with ranged weapon changes being the most notable. Fujioka says that this goes beyond playstyle and mechanics, even stretching into design.
"We had the idea of wanting to properly show the movement of charging a Bowgun for a special shot,” he says. “Shots that cancel out a monster's attack look properly convincing as they perform that canceling. Ever since the previous game in the series, we've put a lot of work into making it visually clear to the player what they're doing in the moment."
He says that advances in technology increasing the ability to create such depictions also play a major role in these animation changes. Players can swing weapons, put them away, and switch between them. Tokuda says that adding more fine detail to the transitionary animations that connect each action changed even what hunters can do.
"One common concept shared by all weapons is that we made sure it's possible for hunters to use them in a natural way given the situation at the moment,” he says. “Our goal was to do this particularly when you can't make any inputs."
For example, in previous games, you needed to stow your weapon and stop moving before using a healing item. The greater ability to depict actions through animations played a role in changing that.
Fujioka continues: "The Focus Mode that we added to [Wilds] is something we put a lot of work into when it comes to action. You can move while facing a specified direction, making continuous attacks possible while on the move but slightly off-center from your target. Players can properly go in the direction they want. We wanted to make a game that made possible the image players have in their minds about how they want to play.
“There have been incredible technical leaps for the development environment in recent years, such as in managing animations, and there have been even greater changes in how games themselves are played. For action games, in particular, the question of how you meet the players’ desires to play in a certain way in the moment they actively want to make a movement is an important one. During development, we're always conscious about not being left behind by changes in the times."
Focus Strikes
One major change in Wilds is the new system that allows you to wound a monster if you continuously attack a specific spot on its body. Whether or not a wound is formed is generally determined by the amount of damage dealt to that area. Some acts wound a monster more easily, such as attacks that use environmental elements like falling rocks or battles between monsters. When it comes to attacks from player weapons, though, they generally form due to accumulated damage, which is why there aren't any differences between weapon types in this regard.
Hunters can deal massive damage to wounded monsters by using Focus Strikes while in Focus Mode. Completely different animations were prepared for each weapon type, such as acrobatically flying all around a monster with the dual blades, making it appear at first glance like there are differences in abilities here. So do different weapons have different Focus Strike effects aside from the visuals? Tokuda gives us an answer.
"For Focus Strikes, we wanted to have animations that show each weapon's uniqueness,” he says. “But I admit that this also created a variation between weapons during the open beta test where some were far too strong, while feeling the strengths of others was difficult. Though we do allow differences between weapons in order to give them personality, we don't want the disparity between weapons to be too extreme, and so we're tuning them to be more standardized for the official release of the game."
The wound system gives hunters a new option when hunting. For example, if you're attacking the head while using a hammer to flinch a monster, the accumulated damage can create a wound there. You're then able to deal a large amount of damage by then hitting it with a Focus Strike, but that wound will turn into a scar, meaning that you can no longer create a new head wound. You can of course continue to focus on the head, or you can target another body part that can be wounded. Once players are in the latter half of the game, they will learn that there are ways to use the environment that lead to unexpected scars. Tokuda says that, like flinching and part breaking, the wound system acts as a new option for players, where they may expect to create a wound on a monster by hitting it just one more time in a certain location.
"Monsters are unwounded when a quest begins, but you can hunt monsters as you explore the locale in Wilds, so as the situation in the locale changes, monsters can have turf wars even without a hunter's involvement,” he says. “This means that a monster may already have multiple wounds by the time it interacts with the player. You can think yourself lucky and hunt a monster when it's in that state. There may also be special additional rewards for felling monsters wandering the locale. In some cases, there are even monsters that give gems as additional rewards."
In this game, the use of Focus Mode and wounds has made it easier than before to land dramatically damaging attacks, like the Great Sword's Charged Slash. So were changes made to monster health and toughness to go along with the addition of these features?
"It's not as if that was our intention from the start, but health did end up being a little bit higher than World once we thought about maintaining appropriate playtimes and player satisfaction, compared to past titles,” says Tokuda. “Elements like flinch resistance are also higher, but this doesn't mean that hunts will be tedious. Part of the purpose of Focus Mode is to allow players to feel more accomplished through shorter loops. We tried to design it so that the time they spend hunting is even more concentrated than before."
The Tempo of the Great Sword
You can imagine that tuning each of the 14 weapon types requires quite a lot of development work. We asked Tokuda if each weapon type had a dedicated director or designer.
"There are some staff members who oversee multiple weapon types, which ultimately makes for about six individual planners, who are responsible for player experience,” he replies. “We don't just have game designers, of course. We include artists and animation designers to discuss details like what kinds of movements would be good and how that may mean a weapon could be better off used in a different way as we polish the weapons. We didn't have staff members assigned to weapons from the start; their number grows as development progresses. We generally begin by developing the Great Sword as a prototype, then verify weapons like the Sword and Shield and Heavy Bowgun, applying the knowledge we get from there to the other weapons as we create them."
Designers and artists work together to create a weapon's action as they think about how much fun it is to use along with how good it feels to look at. It seems that Focus Strikes were an inspiring idea for the art team led by Fujioka as well.
"Attacks like the Focus Strike didn't exist in the series before, so now that we had this new form of expression available to us, we began by coming up with ideas while focusing on making it feel good over anything performance related,” Fujioka explains. “The Great Sword is an all-rounder weapon, so we generally begin with it when creating animations. It's one of the first weapons we created for the original Monster Hunter, and there's a strong sense of wanting to challenge ourselves with the Great Sword first. We felt excited when we first made the Focus Strike for the Great Sword, thinking that if we were able to create something that feels this good, we'd be able to do even more with the other weapons."
It seems that the Great Sword has an even larger presence when it comes to the development of Monster Hunter's animations than we expected.
Tokuda continues: "I feel like weapons with a sense of heavy tempo like the Great Sword are rare in other action games. That's why it's a Monster Hunter standard to begin by making sure that the Great Sword is fun to use. The concepts for the other weapons come together in part by placing the Great Sword at the center and seeing how we can differentiate each of the other weapons from it.
“I guess you could say that once you're used to the game, you'll have noticed that the Great Sword is the most rounded of them all. While the speed of weapons like the Dual Blades or the Sword and Shield will always result in there being technical elements needed in order to earn damage in small ways, you're able to go straight to defeating a monster once you're good at using the Great Sword's style as it exists. It can even block, it has area of effect attacks, and it can create moments where you can deal solid damage. It's actually made so that you can go back and forth with a monster in the most straightforward way if you can just get used to its weight."
"Creating a game that's fun to play using the Great Sword's weight makes it easier to create weapons that fight with a quicker tempo,” adds Fujioka. “If high-tempo weapons become the focus, or if we match the speed of the monsters to them, movements will just get quicker and quicker. I think that we're able to create a game that feels like Monster Hunter when you play it by making sure that both sides are properly tuned with a weapon that has the Great Sword's tempo."
Weapons with Personality
Every hunter has a favorite weapon, with strong feelings about weapon types in general. But at the same time, it's an unavoidable fact that there will always be a most used and most popular weapon along with a 14th-place weapon. Players will make themselves heard if they feel that a weapon is being treated unfairly, and many players will inevitably pick a weapon up if its strengths are easy to understand. There are no right answers when it comes to weapon tuning, which is why these creators aim to bring out their individuality instead.
Fujioka explains, "We always think that it's better to focus on how to design what makes a weapon unique rather than trying to make all weapons equally easy to use. That said, we do think it's a problem if players can't have the gaming experience we want them to have. Of course, it's not a good thing to have a weapon that's both easy to use and overpowered, so there are weapons we've made a lot of changes to for the release version of the game given what we saw in the open beta."
What exactly does he mean by "what makes a weapon unique?” Tokuda explains, using the example of the Hunting Horn.
"At the outset, I told the team that I wanted the concept of this weapon to be that it can produce proper amounts of damage when used where it performs best, the area around you,” he says. “Instead of being able to unleash one attack after the next, you can use something like an Echo Bubble to deal damage by controlling the area. Since we have this element of sound that other weapons can't produce, how do we make use of that while outputting damage? That's the kind of thing we challenged ourselves to do with the weapon. Instead of thinking that it's all about damage, we care more about making the most out of each weapon's personality.”
“Now that you're able to carry two weapons in this game, there was some discussion during the open beta about the most powerful choice being to buff yourself with the Hunting Horn before switching to another weapon and fighting. We're tuning the release version, balancing with the end content in mind, to make sure that the Hunting Horn isn't the only choice for a secondary weapon by having self-buffs be worthwhile but not too strong."
There are always going to be certain weapons that do better or worse against each individual monster. The developers accept that these discrepancies are going to exist, but they want to avoid there being a certain build for a certain weapon that would allow anyone to hunt every monster in the most efficient way possible. Of course, the range of monsters that players target will narrow the further into the endgame they go, and weapon usage will narrow to some degree from an efficiency standpoint. Yet flattening the uniqueness of the game's weapons and monsters would be to erase the roots of Monster Hunter.
Fujioka has this to say. "While I think that weapons that stand at the top in terms of time efficiency–ease of use and ease of hunting–are going to see more popularity, we have made it so that if you really care about a weapon type, you'll be able to beat a monster through enough trial and error."
Regarding this, Tokuda brings up the fact that hunters can carry a primary and a secondary weapon in Wilds.
"Even if you have somewhat specialized weapons, it'd make me happy if players brought two in order for them to complement one another as they play," he says.
Build Your Own Skills
When thinking about weapon performance, one ultimately begins to wonder about the endgame content that is decorations. The decoration system affects skill builds, so what does it look like in this new title? Tokuda explains.
"Decorations are currently similar to the system in World, with decorations having specific skill abilities,” he says. “These skills are still activated by placing them into weapon or armor slots (In Wilds, weapon and armor skills can each be activated separately). However, you can make single-skill decorations through something like alchemy. So in [Wilds], players won't have the issue of never being able to get a specific skill."
Fujioka nods vigorously from his seat beside Tokuda before speaking about his experience with World. "I never ended up getting it once. My Shield Jewel 2... I ended up finishing the game without having completed my build." (Read more about how equipment skills work in Monster Hunter Wilds.)
Now that we are on the subject of builds, I decide to ask the duo about their favorite weapons. Tokuda says he often uses long-range weapons like the Heavy Bowgun and Light Bowgun, and the Sword and Shield which has high adaptability to show monster actions and movements, because as the game's director, he needs to explain what's going on as he plays. He says that he'd like to take plenty of time after the release of Wilds to try out all the weapons now that hunters can carry two. Meanwhile, fans are aware that Fujioka's favorite weapon is the Lance.
"I'm a Lance main, or rather, I only use the Lance,” he admits. “I think that the Lance is a weapon where positioning is very important, as you stick to a monster's feet or some other part. Until now, you had to perform this kind of positioning by walking or sidestepping, but in Wilds it's now a lot easier to make minor adjustments, like shifting over slightly as you attack. It's a simple change, but it's important for players to have more choices, so in that sense I think that's one of the positives for Lance users in this game."
Then again, the Lance is also the weapon that generated the largest reaction during the open beta. While the developers have already announced that major tweaks will be coming to a number of weapons before the official release, we ask Tokuda about the user reaction they received during the beta.
"We received a lot of feedback during the open beta test, and to be honest, one of the largest reactions we got was that the Lance isn't embodying its concept as a weapon,” he says. “Our intention was for players to guard in a variety of ways, sticking to a monster as required and counterattacking. But there were a lot of actions that weren't working properly, such as it being hard to use and perform the right action at the right time, actions going off by mistake, actions coming out late, and so on. Surrounded by so many other actions that worked properly, it ended up feeling like a pretty dull weapon. We're now making major improvements to this for the release version, and we hope you look forward to that."
Even at the time of our interview, the Wilds creators were working tirelessly in order to give hunters the best time they can. They've heard what players had to tell them during the open beta. Both as developers who've made Monster Hunter for many years now and as hunters, they're coming face to face with the 14 weapon types to build the greatest gaming experience. Monster Hunter continues to be an unmatched action game series because of the support it receives from both the players' passion and the developers’ tireless spirit of inquiry.
You can see for yourself just how much the Monster Hunter Wilds developers take feedback from passionate players into account in their official detailed community update video, where Tokuda covers performance enhancements, detailed weapon changes, and more.
Shuka Yamada is a freelance writer for IGN Japan. This article was translated by Ko Ransom. Casey DeFritas is deputy editor of guides for IGN.
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