Foul Play

After spending about 50 hours completing the storyline of the original Monster Hunter World, I was able to end up in the harsh and wild northern lands and you know, it was worth it. All these dangerous jungle and lifeless wastelands are so fed up with me that the edge of eternal snows seemed to me a real outlet. Something painfully relatives and friends.

The plot of Iceborne expansion begins after the assassination of Xeno`jiva. Immediately after the final credits in the port, a small group of hunters will be waiting for us, a dialogue with which will launch a new quest chain. The plot is simple: the forces of the expedition discovered an anomaly in the ecosystem of the New World in the form of the migration of a huge amount of Legian towards the horizon. Suddenly, we witness how an incomprehensible giant creature attacks migrating monsters, which we report to the leadership of the expeditionary force. And this very management makes the decision that it is necessary to find out what is the matter. In general, wear warm clothes, hunters, we are waiting for the harsh north.

To be honest, Monster Hunter has never been about the plot and its presentation. However, the writers did a really good job and the storyline of the add-on can already be watched without tears. To take part in an adventure completely new for all characters, to equip the life of the settlement and just to survive has become a little more interesting. I would even say that in this regard, Iceborne gives a stronger motivation not to skip dialogs and tries to engage the player in the storytelling process, in contrast to the original Monster Hunter World.

Well, since the tropics have changed to the harsh northern lands, then get ready to take care not to freeze. Otherwise, in the heat of battle, you risk being completely without stamina. And in order not to freeze, you will have to constantly drink pepper warming tincture and bathe in hot springs, getting useful buffs, without which hunting for new critters would seem like real hell. But cold is far from the only problem at Iceborne. Due to the huge amount of snow on the locations it became much more difficult to move than in the original. Being waist-deep in snow, the character is now moving slower and dodging a monster’s attack with a clever somersault to the side has become more difficult. And without that the slow game became even slower. But the new locations look just awesome.

A new difficulty called Master Rank has been added to the game. Now, on the locations of the Master Rank assignments, it will be possible to get rare ingredients to create armor and weapons of high ranks. In principle, it is expected that with the addition of the add-on, almost all the equipment of the original version of the game with a flick of a finger turned into gray garbage. It is good that new players will be deprived of this problem, because everyone who buys the Iceborne expansion will be kindly given a set of armor with quite good characteristics for a comfortable start to the game. Although it will still be necessary to grind resources for pumping weapons. Plus, you will have to kill several hours to farm resources from Beotod - the first monster of the expansion, and to craft a set of armor and weapons of Beo, who at least somehow save the hunter's precious carcass from one shots.

The combat system has undergone a little tuning. Yes, no new types of weapons were added, but each old type was given a couple of new tricks, plus the developers slightly conjured over the balance. And they slightly corrected the scaling of bosses' health level from the number of people in the group. Now a group of two hunters is not making such a wild addition to the parameters of the monster, as it used to be and in a duet to stumble some Kirin or Kulve Tarot really became real. Thanks, Capcom, have been waiting for this year.

The most important innovation in the game, in my opinion, was the hook claw. When the monsters in the heat of battle get tired and freeze for a very short period of time, the player has the opportunity to cling to the creature with a claw. By pressing a certain button on the controller (on the PS4 it is a triangle), the hunter inflicts a strong blow on the monster. If you are armed with any kind of heavy weapon, then the blow weakens the part of the victim in which it was inflicted, and all subsequent strikes in the same part will do more damage. Well, if at that moment you had light weapons in your hands, then from the monster several charges for a crossbow will fall to the ground, which can be discharged into his head. In principle, you can try to cling to the monster at any time, and not only when he is standing and trying to catch his breath, but there is a great chance that an unknown creature will simply throw off the hunter.

Personally, I liked most of all the opportunity to climb a monster with a hook onto the head and, with a light touch of the R2 button, make the creature make a sharp jerk in a straight line. The main thing is to ensure that at this moment on the way the monster has a wall or a trap and he is not in a state of rage. This greatly simplifies the solo hunt, because after a collision with an obstacle the monster falls to the ground and the player has a window for dealing damage.

Well and where without new goals for hunting, which in addition more than 20 pieces. Bestiary Monster Hunter replenished with both new unique monsters and “recolors” of the old. With this, the Japanese developers are all right. Fantasy works as it should, and the new monsters look just as epic as before. And for Velhanu and Namielle, special thanks. So even Theostra and Odoragon did not set me on fire.

Iceborne is a sample of a great, almost perfect complement. The developers offer players an incredible amount of new content, while not forgetting and slightly lower the entry threshold for new players. If you like the original Monster Hunter World, then I definitely advise you to buy Iceborne. Although if you have an original game and PlayStation 4, then you already did it without my advice. Monster hunters who prefer PCs can say one thing: Iceborn can be safely pre-ordered on Steam as soon as such an opportunity