In tried-and-true fashion, Monster Hunter Wilds’ Ascendance expansion will offer dedicated content for hardcore players with the introduction of Master Rank quests. Of course, those who played around launch may be a little hesitant to return because of the potentially low challenge. After all, the base game received pretty extensive criticism (including from me) for being relatively easier than previous titles.
Updates like Lagiacrus and Omega Planetes shook things up further, and though they received complaints for going overboard on the damage, Gogmazios seemingly fared better. So how is director Takuro Hiraoka addressing the difficulty with Ascendance? First, he noted that balancing this is “one of the most challenging things to get right in a game,” via translator to PC Gamer. The goal was to ensure that those who bought the game didn’t find themselves in a situation where they couldn’t finish it.
“In my mind, that’s where the difficulty curve should be for Wilds, and I think we achieved that—but the player base was so good and so skilled. We had a bit of a gap in expectations. Maybe players got better than we expected in the intervening years. We’ve grown the audience greatly since Monster Hunter: World, and that was a game where a lot of players dropped off before finishing the story because it got too hard too quickly. We’re trying to tackle that issue, which I see as a problem.”
After the base game released – and didn’t exactly have the same sales tail as either Monster Hunter World or Rise – the team wants to appease both sides and “not just the hardest of the hardcore.”
“We expect that if you purchase the DLC, you’re going to want to see as much of the story that we’ve presented as possible—but for players who want to go far beyond and have the really toughest challenges, we expect that the endgame loop is what really satisfies their needs. We’re working on that balance at the minute.”
What you’ll actually spend time with in the endgame is another big question that needs to be answered. Another criticism of Wilds is that it launched with scarcely anything to do, especially since Artian Weapons were easy to craft, and only three or four monsters posed any threat in their Tempered status. Then again, Monster Hunter World and Rise faced similar issues at launch, which the Iceborne and Sunbreak expansions addressed. So time will tell.
Monster Hunter Wilds: Ascendance is out in 2027 for Xbox Series X/S, PS5, PC, and Nintendo Switch 2. Thus far, Capcom has confirmed returning Elder Dragons such as Kushala Daora, Lao-Shan Lung, and more recently Teostra, though players can expect fresh challenges like Araketa and Gundoraja.
