Monster Hunter Stories 2: Wings Of Ruin Review – Monstie Hunter

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With 2016’s Monster Hunter Stories for 3DS, Capcom has transformed its real-time monster hunting series into something dramatically different: a colorful turn-based monster-collecting RPG. Despite the distinct change in tone and gameplay, Stories offered a new perspective on the Monster Hunter universe, making it a fun alternative to the main series. Its sequel, Monster Hunter Stories 2: Wings of Ruin, closely follows the pattern set by the original 3DS game and, despite some repetitive elements, is another solid spin-off for the franchise.

Like its predecessor, Monster Hunter Stories 2 swaps killing monsters for collecting monsters. Instead of putting yourself in the shoes of a hunter, the game puts you in the shoes of a novice knight, someone who is able to bond with monsters and fight alongside them. While you will have to hunt down many monsters on your journey, you will spend most of your time exploring lairs and collecting new “monstie” companions that you can raise and take to battle. This makes Monster Hunter Stories 2 fundamentally closer to Pokemon than a traditional Monster Hunter title, but the game plays out very differently than Nintendo’s monster-catching series.

The first is the way you collect monsters. Instead of taming the wild ones, get new monsters by entering monster lairs and collecting their eggs. These emerge randomly whenever you leave for the outside world and are mainly of two varieties: standard burrows and golden “rare” burrows which typically contain better eggs. Regardless of their type, the burrows themselves are all quite rudimentary in terms of layout; beyond a few occasional ramifications (which usually lead only to optional treasures), there are no real environmental puzzles to solve, so they’re not particularly compelling to explore on your own. Despite this, the fascination of discovering new types of eggs never gets old and it is ultimately worth the trek through the burrows, especially as you progress through history and start encountering more fantastic monsters.

In addition to the regular monster lairs, each main area in the game also features a handful of larger dungeons called Everdens. These are much more labyrinthine than standard lairs and are home to some unique treasures like rare eggs and bottle caps, which can be exchanged for special items and upgrades such as more storage for your monsters. These updates make bottle caps among the most valuable products in the game, but they’re not as satisfying to find. Like regular burrows, Everdens don’t offer much variety, so they end up feeling the same and aren’t particularly pleasant to navigate. Plus, thanks to their winding paths, you’ll often run into multiple dead ends before spotting the monster’s nest, which ultimately makes Everdens more of a job to explore than regular burrows.

After you get an egg, you can bring it back to the stables and hatch a new monster. Depending on the rarity and egg weight, the monster you get will boast different genes, which determine what skills and attacks it will be able to use during battle. These genes are crucial if you’re hoping to get the most out of your monster, and they become a kind of mini-game in their own right. If you line up three genes of the same color, you will get a bingo bonus, which will further enhance your monster. You can also pass genes between monsters through a process called the Channeling Rite. This offers nice flexibility in how you customize your monster’s abilities, and it’s rewarding to tinker and come up with new combinations.

Monster Hunter Stories 2 takes a more tactical approach to combat than other games, allowing you to choose your attacks and support moves in turn-based encounters.

Your monsters are mainly used in battle. Unlike the main series, the encounters in Monster Hunter Stories 2 are turn-based. Although there are weaknesses and elementary advantages to consider, battles mainly revolve around three different types of attacks: power, speed and technique. Each type has an advantage over another: speed exceeds power, power beats technique, and technique exceeds speed. The crux of the battles, therefore, becomes understanding what type of attack the enemy monster will use and swapping the right monster to counter it. It’s a simple but satisfying system, and the game keeps it fresh by frequently introducing new types of monsters with different battle attack patterns.

The weapons you use also play a crucial role in combat. Similarly, weapons are divided into three varieties: slash, pierce and blunt. This opens up an extra layer of strategy. Different parts of a monster are susceptible to a particular type of weapon, so you’ll need to change weapons frequently throughout the course of battle and target specific parts to deal the most damage. Attack a part enough times and eventually you’ll break it, knocking a material over and knocking the monster over. While a monster is prone on the ground, any attack you land will deal critical damage, and you can even prevent some monsters from unleashing their most powerful attacks by breaking a specific part of their body. These wrinkles make battles always enjoyable, and the game boasts some nice quality-of-life features, such as the ability to quickly advance animations and even finish battles against lower level enemies immediately to mitigate fatigue.

In addition to their skills in battle, each monster can also perform a certain action as you ride them on the field, which will help you reach some otherwise inaccessible areas; the Yian-Kut-Ku, for example, can break rocks blocking the path, while the Tigrex can climb ivy-covered walls. However, these driving actions are disappointingly underused throughout the main adventure. Rather than opening up new paths to explore, these skills are generally used to reach out of the way chests, the contents of which are often disappointing. As a result, the skills on the ground seem largely unnecessary and actually add nothing to the experience.

In between expeditions, you can explore cities to talk to allies who can offer advice and services to help you improve your chances in the wild.

The weakest element in Monster Hunter Stories 2, however, is ironically its story. While the narrative is certainly more involved than a traditional Monster Hunter game, it largely stays within the JRPG tropes and is quite predictable as a result. The story also leans towards a younger audience, as demonstrated by Navirou, your cartoonish and witty companion Felyne. Since your avatar never speaks, Navirou takes up most of the dialogue for you and often straddles the line between cute and annoying. That said, the story addresses some themes that the main series never explores, such as the seemingly incompatible worldviews of hunters and knights, and is filled with funny and touching moments.

Overall, Monster Hunter Stories 2: Wings of Ruin is a fun Monster Hunter spin-off and a solid all-round JRPG, particularly if you’re into games like Pokemon. While the title retains some of the hallmarks of the series, its emphasis on collecting monsters and its fun turn-based combat system make it a decidedly different experience than Monster Hunter Rise, an experience that even those who have struggled to get into. right Monster The Hunter series can have fun.

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