A quick guide to Monster Hunter Rise

With the release of Sunbreak just around the corner, we’ve been hammering Monster Hunter Rise again, on PC to get ready.

Countless hours between Switch and PC mean that we have some idea of how to play relatively effectively. So, it seemed prudent to put a few tips together for anyone starting Monster Hunter Rise now.

Games in the Monster Hunter series can be tough to get your head into. Between multiple menus, complex systems for weapon and armour builds and even monster fight strategies. It’s quite a tough nut to crack. I did a bit of a guide over at FullSync.co.uk a while ago, but thought it time to beef it up!

Thankfully Monster Hunter Rise is the most accessible game in the series, and hopefully these tips will help you become an efficient monster-slaying hunter in no time!

 

Stay sharp

Ok, this might seem simple enough, but when you’re in the heat of a hunt, surviving a brutal knock-down, can lose track of what’s going on. When I say “stay sharp” I don’t mean, keep your whit’s about you. Monster Hunter Rise, like the other Monster Hunter Games, requires you to keep your weapon sharp.

Keep an eye on that sharpness meter and stop, hide and sharpen when required. Monster Hunter Rise isn’t particularly different in this aspect, so if you’ve played the series before, same old story.

Improve your weapons as you go and look at the different colours of sharpness. Aim for white at all times (when you can), always maintain the better colour to the best of your ability. Usually green is a good starting point, then purple and white as you improve gear.

Keep it sharp, do more damage!

Save yourself

This is the one that took me a while to grasp. By the time I’d hit Monster Hunter Rise, I knew what was expected of me, though. Look after yourself at all times.

If you’re on a group hunt (the best ones!), you’re all working with a pool of three “carts” (lives). If you collectively cart 3 times, the hunt is over. So you can time out (all hunts have a time limit) or you can fail because you run out of lives.

You literally have the responsibility to act selfishly in Monster Hunter Rise because if you don’t take time to heal, to buff and to remove those de-buffs, you’re hurting the team. Take a few seconds, get somewhere high or hide around a corner, heal, sharpen, do whatever you need to.

You can absolutely get items to help support your squad, or even play as a Hunting Horn user to apply buffs etc. But until you’re comfortable, don’t be the one to stop the hunt. Hide, heal, wreak havoc, repeat.

 

Practice make perfect

Like anything, you’ll be better at Monster Hunter Rise with practice. What you don’t often get told is how specific each weapon makes your approach to a hunt. How each monster requires some practice to learn their moves, their tells and how you can go about maintaining the flow of the hunt.

Some monsters hit really hard and fast. Others fly and use projectiles. Everything uses a combination of speed, power and range. All to different degrees, and you need to learn, pick-up the nuance and improve.

Using one of the weapons is an entirely different ball game all together……

Pick your weapon

This goes hand in hand with practice. The selection of weapons, weapon builds and types is immense. But each weapon requires time and mastery.

I started out with the Charge Blade which felt a bit too slow for my tastes, so I’ve sampled the bow, the dual blades and I’ve become an Insect Glaive main. Monster Hunter Rise changes how some of these weapons work, with the addition of wirebugs and silk-bind moves, but everything serves its purpose.

Pick whatever you think looks cool to you, and try it out. Go to the training area, learn the combinations, watch videos to understand the potential of your weapon of choice, and have fun with it!

Some things are over-complicated in my mind, but others just work. Monster Hunter Rise gives you choice and breadth, enjoy it. Give yourself some time to learn and try things out. You’ll benefit from it immensely.

What will you choose?

 

Save those parts

Early game in Monster Hunter Rise, you might be tempted to splurge all the monster parts you’re picking up, or all that ore. Using it to build armour sets and weapons.

That’s absolutely your prerogative, but trust me, you’ll just be wasting them. Get into the “HR” (high rank) hunts before you worry too much about gear. You can scrape by on those low-star ones, and collect a bevvy of parts and zenny (currency) to get you started properly after you’re warmed-up.

When it comes to creating specific builds and wanting to play in specific ways, you’ll need to farm specific monsters and hope the RNG gods drop the parts you need. So don’t waste them early on for no reason.

Monster Hunter Rise lays-out the parts you need for the gear you want, so you can always have a shopping list and some direction to steer your hunts!

Play with strangers

I personally think that Monster Hunter Rise does online multiplayer better than a lot of games. Sure, the matchmaking and lobby system need some work, but in terms of co-op play with randoms, you’re all united by a common cause and there’s very little in terms of chance for trolls.

You don’t need to speak with people really, you can use on-screen text communications and random canned-text for certain events, but it’s an easy experience. You might get the odd smart-arse that wrote some crappy canned-text, but it’s rare, particularly in Rise.

You can get a full squad and go beat-down the monster. The fun of Monster Hunter Rise is very much here, it’s the heart of the series. Different weapons, different playstyles and a common goal. It’s clean, effective and great fun. Get on those hub quests!

 

Eat your meals

Holy cow did I miss the train on this one for a while.

You can eat a meal prior to every hunt that will give you a rage of buffs and perks. Things like defense up or perhaps even a chance at more monster parts when carving at the end. It’s a cool system, and the dango meals available in Monster Hunter Rise look great (not as delicious as the meal look in Monster Hunter World, though).

The thing is, whilst you’re playing the odds on activating specific boosts and buffs, you’ll always get a boost to your health and your stamina. This is critical, especially as you go into those harder hunts, you need as much health and stamina as you can get.

If you cart, you lose those buffs and boosts. Go into the tent in the starting area of each map and you can get yourself a meal cooked in there too. There’s never a reason to not have buffs applied and boosts available.

Eat those meals!

 

The story missions are just the beginning

Playing the story missions of Monster Hunter Rise are never where the fun is at. This is just the introduction to the world, the mechanics and the monsters.

Get the story done and you’ll have a great handle on how to play, that’s when it gets good. You’ll have a full suite of optional quests with all kinds of rewards. There will be harder and new monsters to hunt.

You get to the point where hunts are a challenge. When you’re playing with friends, or you get that synergy with some online allies, that’s where the fun kicks-in and where the end game hits full-flow.

This is why you farm materials and work on your builds. Sometimes to be specific to a particular monster, because as that difficulty ramps-up, you need every advantage you can get.

Get out there, get your rank up and farm those nasty buggers, Kamura village needs your help! And soon, Elgado in the massive Sunbreak expansion!