Capcom knows you love to hunt monsters so the company brought almost nothing but Monster Hunter news to Tokyo Game Show 2021. In a video presentation, series producer Ryozo Tsujimoto and Monster Hunter Rise director Yasunori Ichinose outlined a few upcoming additions coming to the game, and then offered a glimpse behind the scenes of the four-year development process.
Here's everything the show covered in one place:
Sunbreak's "Massive Expansion" Gets New Details
Sunbreak expansion director Yoshitake Suzuki joined the video to talk about what he's been working on. Scheduled to arrive next summer, Tsujimoto said Sunbreak is a "massive expansion" of the base game which includes "new locales, monsters, gameplay, and a new quest rank: Master Rank." Suzuki explained that Sunbreak will take place in a new base of operations far from Kamura Village, and the "flagship monster" of this game is the elder dragon Malzeno. He also added that Shogun Ceanataur from Monster Hunter 2, a crab-like beast with a hard shell and pincers, would be returning in Sunbreak.
Monster Hunter Rise Comes to Steam in January
Via a new trailer, Capcom revealed that the Steam version of Monster Hunter Rise will launch on January 12, 2022, and that a demo will go live on October 13. This new version of the game will include all free DLC from the Nintendo Switch version through the end of November. No technical specs were revealed, but the trailer did mention 4k resolution, higher-resolution textures, uncapped frame rates, and an ultrawide display. An official website, along with pre-orders, should be live by the time this story is up.
30th Anniversary Sonic the Hedgehog Collaboration Announced
Very little about this Monster Hunter Rise collaboration was revealed, other than the fact that it's coming in November. Ichinose mentioned that Monster Hunter 4 Ultimate had a Sonic collaboration and stressed that this one would be different.
More Free DLC Coming to Monster Hunter Stories 2
The RPG spin-off will be adding new Monsties, quests, co-op challenges and more – a trailer (above) outlined a full schedule of upcoming free updates to the RPG, and a trial version is now available which allows players to carry over save data to the full game. Also, by linking save data from Monster Hunter: Rise, players can receive "Kamura Garb" layered armor in Wings of Ruin.
Ghosts n Goblins Collaboration Coming to Monster Hunter Rise in October
After a series of Monster Hunter Rise crossovers with other Capcom titles, the fifth internal collaboration will be with Ghosts 'n Goblins Resurrection. On October 29, players can earn materials as an event quest reward that will transform their hunter into the legendary Sir Arthur, the hero of the Ghosts n Goblins series. Equipping this layered armor will turn players' throwing knives into Arthur's signature lances, as well as unlock music from the recent revival of the spooky series.
Monster Hunter Rise's Japanese Themes Explained
Tsujimoto and Ichinose spent a few minutes delivering a "behind the scenes chat" outlining what went into making Monster Hunter Rise, in particular the Japanese themes that inspired many of its monsters. Many of the giant beasts players hunt were based on yokai, mythological creatures from Japanese folklore. Ichinose cited many specific examples: Aknosom resembles the umbrella-like Karakasa-obake, Tetranadon looks like a Kappa, and Teostra draws on the story of Yama, lord of the underworld who judges souls after they die (you might remember a giant, red version of that figure in Dragonball).
Ichinose said that they took so many ideas from yokai that they eventually ran out of fantastic beasts to draw upon, such that Valstrax ended up borrowing a bit of mythos from Halley's Comet. We also saw a series of performances of music from the game, showing off the traditional Japanese instrumentation used.
Capcom Expands Street Fighter V Tournament to 8 teams
WIth no more Monster Hunter news, Capcom's show closed with a "news corner" dedicated to eSports. There will be a Street Fighter League tournament on October 5 (with an English language broadcast) where the number of teams has been expanded from six to eight, meaning the total number of matches increases to 56.
Diamond Feit is a writer/podcaster in Osaka, Japan who uses Twitter and Twitch as feitclub.