Monster Hunter

Okay so its been a while I know but what can you do?  Life is just busy, no two ways around that.  However this week I'm back and I wanted to do something in a bit of a different direction from just the usual identify a problem and offer insightful ways to solve or otherwise get around it.  Today I just want to point out a game that has been gaining steam in America slowly but surely, but still hasn't received the attention it deserves.  Today I want to tell you about Monster Hunter.

Can't beat the original.

So as some of you may know Monster Hunter is a game in which you create a Hunter from a small village in a land occupied by terrifying prehistoric beasts.  You start off small doing basic gathering quests going out getting meat and herbs for you village so you can learn about general game mechanics so you have some sort of survivability for the harder fight.  But after the whole jazz of having to run around do everyone errands for else in the village you hunting career begins.  You, needless to say, start off small with Velociraptor like creatures but quickly work your way up to Wyverns that will ruin your day should you make the wrong step.

The hunting does get really intense after you work your way up because not only are you fighting the Wyvern but your also fighting against the environment.  For example sometimes you'll fight in the desert which will continuously drain your health due to the heat, you can counteract this by items but it forces you to be prepared for every situation and really know where your fighting as well as what your fighting.  Of course in addition to this you have the ability to bring things to help you fight against these monsters such as traps and bombs.

Awesome armor to tide you over till high end plus hunts.

The game gets even better when you take it online (Monster Hunter for PS2, unfortunately the servers were taken down though) or linking via wifi with your friends (any of the Monster Hunters for PSP).  The fights are bigger, badder, and even deadlier than offline.  This includes fighting epic monsters that make you feel like your fighting a Navy SEAL team with spit wad launchers.  You also learn the value of using different weapons and having a balanced team in approaching these fights.

Long and short its a great game, that if you haven't, you should check out.  But that's not the big point that I'm trying to make here.  My big point is that the game, in recent years, has been gaining a lot of popularity, so much that people who appreciate the PSP games need to understand its roots, oh and don't even get me started on the Wii version, it doesn't exist in my mind.

The Rathalos, King of the Wyverns.

So many hunters now-a-days don't understand the fact that the first game was much harder, the weapons were more limited, the game was way more challenging and the monsters more deadly, I mean the first time you fight a Khezu you have no idea what was coming at you, and the Gravios was almost unpredictable.  The game had a much higher learning curve and there were no colored monsters.  There was just the regular ones offline, then the online ones.  Plus the secret hunt at the end of the game.

So I guess my point here is that if you call yourself a Monster Hunter fan and you haven't played the first one then you really should get out and play it to appreciate how difficult it is.  I tell my friends I hunt with about how hard it is and they only reply "Oh dude, I've killed those like 60 times."  Or the say "Well this isn't the original."  Yea it's not the original but at the same point in time there has to be an appreciation for where the game has come from.

So once again sorry about the infrequent posts lately, I've been really busy with midterms and preparing a special post for you guys that should hopefully be out later this week.  So yea guys, I'll get back to a more frequent posting here shortly.  Till next time.