MONSTER HUNTER RISE

The multiplayer is terrible for a modern Monster Hunter game. Frequent random disconnects, unstable matchmaking. Random errors get thrown your way when you do anything multiplayer related, like searching for hunts, or playing with others. SOS flare is also terrible and usually just doesn't work, seemingly only having players join when the monster is 10% or 5% hp. Additionally, there's a region-lock baked in to the game that makes the already bad matchmaking even worse. If you want to play with random people, you almost NEED to install a third party mod and even with it the experience is still miserable. It's literally the only thing holding back Rise from being a pretty good experience overall.

tl;dr It's a good game with fast and frenetic combat. If you're coming from other Monster Hunter titles, it helps to get into this game by thinking of it as "not a Monster Hunter game." Instead, treat it as a high octane character action game ala DMC 5 and it becomes easier to enjoy. --- I have played MonHun for most of my life. I started with Freedom Unite as a kid and have played pretty much every mainline game excepting only the OG and 3/3U. In terms of gameplay experience: I've solo'ed MHGU from start to the entirety of G-Rank, beat Fatalis solo in Worldborne, and solo'ed most of Frontier's rank progression. I'm telling you this because I find Rise + Sunbreak to be the hardest MonHun, second only to endgame Frontier. I find that even though the hunter is mega juiced in this game, the monsters don't lag behind at all. They are fast and unrelenting and, at times, possessed of some truly questionable hitboxes. But this is, of course, personal opinion: others find the game easy and that may very well be the case with you. So why do I find it so hard? Simple: it's not Monster Hunter. I don't mean this as an insult, only that it took me 300 hours of trying for the game to finally "click." Going into this game expecting and playing as if it were any other New-Gen Monster Hunter is a mistake and will only leave you frustrated. Temper your expectations and be flexible with your playstyle, however, and suddenly the game really opens up and becomes quite enjoyable. Then understand that it was made for portable gaming on the switch and suddenly things make sense: hunts are short, there is no tracking, and quite a lot is streamlined. There's that phrase again: This is not Monster Hunter. It's an arcade-y character action game. And if you can live with that? I'd say it's one of the best.