In 2004 I caught excited whispers and game mag glimpses of a waking giant on the horizon. The fuzzy intel received: Capcom would be releasing a Japanese-only PS2 game where one tracked and killed kaiju in epic battles of attrition. An impulse import purchase was made, and, about a hundred hours later, I managed to overcome a Fatalis-sized language barrier (and fangs and claws) to achieve victory in my first Monster Hunter of many.
Fast forward 20 years, and I'm somehow sitting down for a chat with one of the key persons responsible for my younger self's torment and triumphs, Series Producer Ryozo Tsujimoto. When I whip out my original PS2 copy and explain the origins of how I became hooked on his franchise, despite such a hostile introduction to it, he's delighted—perplexed that I even attempted such a thing, but delighted.
Though its three-day beta wasn't a perfect experience (as is the nature of betas), I then explain to Tsujimoto-san that I'm basically already on board with his latest entry, Monster Hunter Wilds. And so, over the course of an afternoon, he reiterates the parts of Wilds that excite him and his team most, and I pepper him with questions about this new venture and how far we've all come as Hunters over the decades.
We'll dive into that in a second. For now, though, I should service any fellow "my mind is pretty much made up to play this" types with the cheapest prices. If you'd like to skip the window shop, please click here to skip past it.
The Cheapest Monster Hunter Wilds Deals
Physical:
Big W: $99
JB Hi-Fi: $109 Standard | $119 Steelbook
MightyApe: $89 Standard | $109 Steelbook
Digital:
PS Store: $114.95 Standard | $144.95 Del. | $179.95 Premium Del.
Xbox Store: $114.95 Standard | $144.95 Del. | $179.95 Premium Del.
Steam: $104.95 Standard | $134.95 Del. | $164.95 Premium Del.
Monster Hunter Wilds Interview
I begin my chat with Tsujimoto by commending him and his marketing team on the decision to definitively nail down some lore in the recently released Welcome to Monster Hunter explainer. I do, however, admit to him that my 2024 bingo card did not have “Hollywood actress Daisy Ridley does a 10-minute doco on Monster Hunter” on it.
"We understand that we have lots of players playing [Monster Hunter]," he explains, "but we're going to get even more players. So we thought we'd explain what the Monster Hunter universe is for the old, long-time players while also helping new players into it. As for using Daisy Ridley, I think we just thought she was the best person to explain how the world, how the series was, but also...*laughs* I guess there were a few people in our team who were just big fans of her."
I tell him that sounds fair enough. Also, given the Nat Geo nature of the trailer, I suggest that Sir David Attenborough would've been a solid pick, too. Again, he seems delighted.
Before we move away from the contents of said trailer, I note something of a ludo-narrative dissonance with a line that's stated within. One thing I never thought I'd see woven into MH canon is the concept of Hunters being responsible conservationists who "maintain balance" in their world. You know, as opposed to being carcass-stripping profit fiends, which is certainly how I've played over a dozen outings in this series.
I don't say this next part to him, mostly due to a fear of it becoming lost in translation, but the trailer almost felt like some sort of in-universe propaganda reel. Because when I heard the term 'maintainers of balance,' it sounded eerily like a Helldiver talking about 'bringing managed democracy' to an environment.
"So, I understand how it's hard to believe that hunters are responsible for maintaining the balance of the world because of the nature of the game," he says. "It's not so much greed, but more like a need for people [in this world] to hunt, and that might look like they're constantly taking things away from the game. But in the Monster Hunter world, it's meant to be—that's their job. Balance of the world is indeed what [players will] do."
I tell him that I'm fascinated to see how that cultural dynamic plays out in Wilds. Particularly as he and his team have self-described this entry as having "the most immersive story in the series yet." I've certainly seen inklings of that in the beta and promo material, though I doubt he'll reveal too much of that to me as we rapidly approach the February 28th launch date.
Instead, I press Tsujimoto-san on what interests me far more—the titular wilds and the lethal cast of monsters within. The beta certainly gave me the impression of a larger, richer playspace, but I also imagine that, developmentally speaking, this expansion comes with challenges as well as cool new wrinkles to the formula.
"So if you're looking at things under the hood, there's been a lot of improvement in technology with Monster Hunter Wilds," he says. "One of the key things that we worked on was the mentality of the [monster] herds. Obviously, we did have herds in games past, but we only had a few entities of the herd. In short, what we had "looked like" a herd—a mass controlled by one AI for the group.
I love that with our advancement of technology we can tackle that differently. Now, we have herds where each individual monster can act on its own and show this uniqueness through the improvement of our AI tech."
I agree with him that it's a pretty neat upgrade. Indeed, when I first watched it play out on-screen, I had a mini Dr. Alan Grant from Jurassic Park moment. Even though I expected they would, I caught myself marvelling at the way these majestic beasts do move in herds. How far we've come from the sometimes ropey monster pathing of those PS2 days...
Struck by a little bit of nostalgia, I mention to Tsujimoto-san that it was a sobering moment to hear that Wilds is not only going to be available widespread on all major platforms but will support cross-play among them. I know that his role on that first Monster Hunter game was rooted in networking code, and I ask him if it blew his mind to watch this niche PS2-only game bloom into a multi-plat, 100 million units sold worldwide monster in its own right.
"I think the [whiplash feeling from back then to now] feels like that because joining the old PS2 multiplayer had so many hurdles to it," he reminisces. "You know? You had to buy a separate Network Adapter unit to plug into your PS2, then physically plug into an actual network in order to join in and experience Monster Hunter fully.
The team and I knew about that difficult environment when we went into development. It was going to be hard, but we had our work on Resident Evil Outbreak [another early online co-op title] and xxx to draw upon. Despite those challenges, I imagined a future where the effort would be worth it as people gravitated more and more to networked play. And so we strived to build the know-how and insight to build the knowledge banks needed to bring these places to such a future.
I know it sounds like a bit of a lie, but this is what we always imagined, back when we started making these."
I tell Tsujimoto that I don't think it sounds like a lie at all. More like good old-fashioned forward-thinking visionary stuff. Though only a very small slice of Aussie gamers got to play it online—because kilobytes were still being delivered to many of us by bullock train in 2004—it was still revered as a touchstone title for budding online players.
From here, we part ways after he rather graciously signs my original copy of Monster Hunter, and the remainder of our time morphs into a reminder presentation of the key improvements of Wilds to be most excited about. Many of those facets were covered here in our preview coverage; I highly suggest you watch and absorb the info within to sharpen your understanding of (and longswords for) what sure looks to be a cracking sequel already.
Adam Mathew is our Aussie deals wrangler. He plays practically everything, often on YouTube.
