Monster Hunter – Rise: Sunbreak Test – Swap Art Swap, Monster Variety, Follower Quests

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Two new areas, tons of fresh skills, stronger monsters, master rank and much more. Capcom serves up a lot for monster hunters in Sunbreak, making up for Rise’s mistakes.

All screenshots and video scenes are from GamersGlobal

An ominous aura hangs over the citadel. Two hunters cautiously enter Malzeno’s nest, not knowing what awaits them. The oldest dragon is still asleep, but that can change at any time. After a first hit, the beast goes straight to 180, roaring and thrashing. It teleports from A to B, delivering a violent swipe with its tail that hits both hunters and knocks them right out of life. Now it’s getting tight. Just one more faint, as soon as one of them falls out of their shoes again, it’s all over. Now it’s time to concentrate. And 25 sweaty minutes later, the Malzeno exhales its last breath and the valuable parts can be cut out of it.

Not every quest in Monster Hunter – Rise: Sunbreak is just as exciting. But there are some situations in the expansion that make your heart rate soar. It’s at moments like this that I know why I fell in love with the series. But even apart from that, there’s a lot to appreciate about Capcom’s monster hunt.

However, the voices from the community were higher than last year Monster Hunter-Rise (in the test, grade: 8.5) appeared, not consistently positive. Not enough real endgame, too lax monsters, too powerful buddies. These and other criticisms came up. The developers want to do everything better with the “giant extension” Sunbreak and implement the feedback. After a few hours in Elgado and the surrounding area, I will draw a conclusion for you in this test: Is the addon, which costs at least 40 euros, really worth its money?

At the bottom of the screen you will always see which skills you currently have equipped.

Skill change you

Probably the most important innovation on the gameplay side is the exchange art exchange. With this you can take two movesets with you on the hunt. Silkbinder attacks, combos and other skills, you can save all of that in two variants. During an ongoing mission you can switch between the red and the blue scroll at any time, which offers a corresponding number of tactical options.

I played through the main story of Sunbreak primarily with the longsword and the gunlance. And with these two weapons it has already been shown how strongly the art exchange can affect the course of a hunt. The flying change between the sakura hit and a subsequent helmet breaker is an immense gain in comfort, in combination with new moves like the holy scabbard combo there is a lot of room for juicy hits and for experimenting.

However, this profound innovation naturally also brings with it problems. This complicates the already complex controls even further, which can cause frustration, especially at the beginning. I’ve never done without the mechanic, it’s too powerful for that. But sometimes it could get on your nerves and the way to master the exchange art exchange was long and arduous – but it was worth it!

The Lunagaron is reminiscent of a werewolf and is quite a tough one.

Monster busy

In addition to the movesets, the huge beasts are of course one of the most important elements in a Monster Hunter. And here Capcom has treated some new and old critters. For example, the dragon elder Malzeno, Sunbreak’s figurehead. With his vampire mechanics, he shooed us nasty through the citadel and constantly kept us on our toes. But the feeling of exhilaration when the Saukerl finally died after almost 25 minutes is hard to put into words.

But my favorite from the new monster series is probably the Lunagaron, a fanged wyvern that is vaguely reminiscent of a werewolf. But you shouldn’t take the old acquaintances from the main game too lightly either. The angry Rajang made my hunting group and I sweat a lot, as did Bazelgeuse, who rained down bombs on one tour. And fresh sub-species like the Blood Bishaten and the Magmadron provide a lot of variety and cool hunting moments

In terms of monster variety, you really can’t complain. It’s also nice that Capcom has bagged the lack of entitlement. You are given little in Sunbreak, the monsters hit you extremely hard and track you much better than in the main game. However, in connection with the sometimes extremely large life pools, this can be quite annoying. But Capcom had to come up with some kind of new challenge for the master rank – but that should be different. But that never really bothered me.

The new pupa spider is hanging on the king’s ludroth and thanks to it the cattle are thrown straight into the wall.

Improved companion and follower quests

In addition to tons of new weapons and armor for you, Capcom has upgraded your companions by quite a bit. The Palicos can now learn secret new techniques with which they can support you, for example with a small dragon spear, and the Palamutes are now busy collecting stuff. You can also use a Palico scout to have another one-time fast travel point. This is especially useful if you don’t have a dog to ride with you.

If you don’t have any real teammates, Capcom has also thought of you: in the trailer quests, which can only be played solo, you will be accompanied by NPCs who behave surprisingly cleverly. They mount and ride monsters, heal you and so on. Everyone uses a different weapon and is pretty good at it.

With the bouncing skewers, the dangos increase in level, but their activation chance is reduced – vouchers help here.