Monster Hunter is a series obsessed with its starring creatures. Every moment is spent in service to immense dragons, fire-breathing dinosaurs, and giant spiders, toads and squirrels that could bring down your house. However, the mainline series brings its own sense of melancholy with it, as you repeatedly kill and carve up these incredible creatures, using the parts to craft new and stronger weapons and armour. Continuing the spin-off RPG series, Monster Hunter Stories 3 feels like a direct reaction to that melancholy.
Monster Hunter Stories has forged a very different relationship between human and Monstie, a bond that brought friendship and companionship between the unusual pairing, and recognised the creature’s importance to the ecosystem and the world at large. Monster Hunter Stories 3: Twisted Reflection is the current culmination of those ideas, with a mature, dramatic fantasy storyline that explores ideas of environmentalism, conservationism and restoration.
Stories 3 is set in Azuria, with you taking on the role of the crown prince or princess, leader of the monster-riding Rangers. While you’re more interested in the growth of monster-trapping Egg Quartz and raising Monsties, your role as the Regent soon sees you wrapped up in the conflict between Azuria and its nearest neighbour, Vermeil, sending you across the continent into forbidden lands in search of answers to a series of mysteries.
It’s a step up from previous Monster Hunter and Monster Hunter Stories tales, with a real sense of who you and your companions are, the weight of your responsibility, and the need to unravel the mystery that’s entwined with your family. However, it’s your position as leader of the Rangers that plays an integral part in your progress and the expansion of the world around you, rather than the narrative. The world of Stories 3 is one where monsters are on the decline, and alongside the main storyline, you’re going to be spending time hatching monster eggs, raising them, and releasing them back into the world.
Not only does this mean the briefest glimpses of exceptionally cute baby monsters – surely we should have had a chance to use them in a battle or two? – but as you release them back into the wild, you increase the area’s rating, making the creatures born there stronger, and more likely to have good genetics. Once the area’s level is high enough, you’ll also trigger monster mutations, with rare and powerful species appearing.
Where the monster collecting in earlier games felt like a mildly more dangerous take on Pokémon, Stories 3 builds on that foundation and puts you at the centre of a breeding and specialisation program that allows you to utterly change a monster’s genes. Channelling lets you create stronger hybrid types, taking genes you need from unwanted creatures, and adding them to your favourite Monstie’s genepool. I imagine this is how they did it in Jurassic Park.
There’s nine spots on each gene grid, with bonuses granted for creating rows of three similar move types. It’s a massive diversion, and you can easily forget about the main storyline for a very long time as you attempt to build the perfect Monstie. My Rathalos steadily became a true beast, as I stole other monsters’ most powerful moves and added them to Ratha’s abilities. There are a few key annoyances to all this monster rearing and customisation, though, with page after page of information within the release screen, for example, but no indication of how potent that creature is, despite it being a major facet in how they’re classified. You also can’t tell what level your habitat is for a creature when trying to decide what egg to steal from a den, relying instead on your own, woeful memory. Alright, my woeful memory. Still, you learn to live with it.
Like all good Monster Hunter games, Twisted Reflection is tough. The turn-based reimagining of the series monster-hunting action finally makes sense to me, as it now feels truer to the spirit of Monster Hunter. The fundamentals carry over from the very first Stories game, with a Rock Paper Scissors-like setup for attacks, but, building on the enhancements from the second entry, every aspect of Monster Hunter combat feels fully represented. That extends from selecting different body parts to focus on, breaking those parts, and then leaping in with your whole team to whale upon a staggered foe.
I always felt that Monster Hunter Stories was too easy, both in comparison to the mainline series and to RPGs in general. That has been fully remedied here, with combat that’s more tactical and brutal than ever before. You will lose fights. You will have to run away. And you’ll have to grind and level up in a way that feels much more serious and essential than ever before.
It helps that combat looks utterly sensational. The Monster Hunter Stories games have always had enjoyable visuals, but everything here, from the monsters to the characters and the wealth of different move animations, looks incredible, nailing the hyperkinetic anime vibes and taking them a step further. Even after multiple hours with the game, I loved watching combat play out, though the ability to speed things up is handy for when you’re desperate to gain some levels or nab essential monster parts.
There’s still some disconnect between the eco-aware narrative, the environmental focus, the very nature of the bond between rider and Monstie, and the fact you’re still collecting monster parts and decorating yourself in them. Don’t get me wrong, I love this aspect of Monster Hunter, and the armour sets are just as tempting here as anywhere else, but this is the first time that it’s truly been at odds with the rest of the game. That dissonance works its way in elsewhere, too, with the team meeting a hunter at one point, merrily accepting and working alongside him. Meanwhile, I just viewed him with flat-out suspicion, like he was eying up my stable of lovingly hand-reared Monsties for his next armour set.
It is disappointing to find that there are a few nagging technical shortcomings with the Switch 2 version of the game, which certainly haven’t been apparent in the PS5 version that I’ve seen. Just as Monster Hunter Stories 2 was for the original Switch, this is pushing the hardware extremely hard, and while the Switch 2 boasts much more power than the last generation, that’s been matched by Capcom’s desire to push the envelope in terms of open-world areas and graphical detail. It’s perfectly acceptable, largely staying at 30fps, but there are drops, and you can’t help but notice them. You have to cross your fingers for some further performance patches, though.
The only real loss that some might feel from Monster Hunter Stories 2 is the lack of co-op. I’m not sure how many people played the Stories 2 multiplayer compared to the singleplayer, and it had a bunch of limitations thanks to only being accessible outside of the main storyline, but it could be a fun diversion if you had a group of friends that were into Monster Hunter.
Still, Monster Hunter Stories 3 is eminently likeable. I’ve loved roaming the plains, hopping into Monster Dens and nabbing the best eggs, before hatching them, stealing their best genes, and then releasing them back out into the wild to restore the environment. The farewell animation when they turn their back on you makes my heart swell every time. Have I been a good Monstie dad? Have I set them up for the world in the best way possible? Am I replacing my worries about my own children with fictional monsters? It’s hard to say.
I’ve also enjoyed grinding to level up, watching the gorgeous animations play out in front of me over and over again, before hunting for the next thing to fight and doing it all over again. Most of all, I’ve loved the visually vibrant and appealing world. It reimagines the Monster Hunter canon and iconic menagerie in a way that’s so thorough and so gorgeous that I’m a little sad we probably won’t get a mainline entry with this art style.
