Monster Hunter Wilds. The name conjures images of vast wilderness, colossal animals, and thrilling hunts. And it fulfills these promises tremendously; especially now with an open world that is fluid and seamless for the first time in the series. But are we missing out on some of the more interesting moments as we try to face the world?
Seikret: Sword of Double Speed
The arrival of Seikret, your loyal mount, looks to be the game's trump card. Suddenly, great distances shrink. Camps become a skip away from your new monster encounter. Resource gathering? Zipping to collect materials without dismounting, hardly an inconvenience. Maybe just slightly too good.
But speed induces blindness, at this point. You have drifted through these beautifully designed biomes on your Seikret, and you just stop caring for all of it. The cascading waterfalls in the Scarlet Forest, the wind-crying dunes in the Windward Plains, to the strange, oily pools in the Oilwell Basin: they all become an unpleasant blur, with images flickering by like the next colored object shining forth on your map.
Streamlined to an Addiction: Putting Sight to Keep Moving
Monster Hunter Wilds manages to draw you in and push you forward. Gone are the prolonged investigations of tracks; monsters are practically annotated on the map. The rhythm of the game is hunt, prepare, find again. Such loop may be effective, but it subversively discourages hanging about, exploring, or just...slowing down.
And it was only many hours into my own journey (nearly every beast hunted and every side quest ticked) that a thought came to me: "What if I just ...walk?"
Claimed the World, One Footstep at a Time
After leaving my Seikret behind, I made clear my trek through the Forbidden Lands on foot. Slower? Very much. Harder? Sort of. Yet, the gains were far more. All of a sudden, the scale of the world hit me squarely. The dunes felt gigantic while I was trudging through them. The details in the environments that were previously a blur now snapped into focus. I saw little creatures, some tiny plants, and slight changes in the ground beneath my feet.
There were lovely moments between hunts. Pausing to check your inventory, watching the endemic life traipse around you, and perhaps trying a quick bit of fishing before going into battle. Sure, they were interludes, and they were downtime; but they are part of the Monster-Hunting experience, times for breathing and paying attention to the world you are in.
Finding the Balance: Convenience against the Connection
Conveniently, Monster Hunter Wilds does give you the option of not rejecting your Seikret on a permanent basis (it is a loyal friend, after all!); but it is equally rewarding to take a conscious effort to do some exploring on foot, even for a short way. It nurtures a deeper bond with the world which exposes detail and beauty that would so easily be missed at high pace. And while we praise convenience, often the most rewarding journey, one that takes its sweet time, is the scenic route.
