Monster Hunter Stories 2: Wings of Ruin
Steel Sky Productions
While I’ve played the main Monster Hunter series titles, I didn’t expect to see this sort of a spin-off. I’d heard this new game, titled Monster Hunter Stories 2: Wings of Ruin, was a bit of a hybrid and contained elements of Pokémon, a JRPG (Japanese Role-playing Game), and of course, Monster Hunter. The original Monster Hunter Stories game was apparently made for the Nintendo 3DS years ago, but I never played it.
Knowing that Monster Hunter Stories 2: Wings of Ruin brings some of its combat system influence from Pokémon, I didn’t know that this game’s turn-based combat goes even further. Some of the gameplay itself can bog down a little bit, but thankfully, the game features an option to speed them up to as much as three times as fast. You can also skip over some of the more lengthy animations.
Of course, what would any Monster Game be if you couldn’t acquire monsters and customize them? In this game, you’re a character called a Rider who bonds with friendly monsters called Monsties that fight alongside you during the entire epic campaign.
Monster Hunter Stories 2: Wings of Ruin isn’t an open-world game—it’s much more linear in its design. I didn’t really mind this as the game’s world-building is pretty sweet. During the game’s beginning stages, you’ll typically find yourself running up and down long hallways, but everything opens up later on when you gain the ability to fly.
The game’s mission structure is fairly traditional. If you’ve played CRPGs in the past, you know what to expect—go here and get that, then come back, etc. It’s all pretty standard stuff that essentially boil down to fetch quests. There are plenty of side-quests that you can take up besides the main ones, which can greatly increase the game’s length to upwards of 50 or so hours—so it’s a pretty big game. And if you simply love hunting and collecting monsters over and over, you can get even more hours out of it.
And when you’ve finally tired of Monster Hunter Stories 2: Wings of Ruin’s single-player mode, you can always round up a buddy and try its multi-player features. While it’s not as full-featured as other CRPG’s it’s nice that Capcom included it and it is fun to team up with friends to go out monster hunting together.
Graphically, the PC version of Monster Hunter Stories 2: Wings of Ruin looks great and runs smoothly on even lower-end gaming PCs and gaming laptops. I liked both the anime art style and the bright, interesting environments that your characters adventure through. While some folks might not like the game’s sometimes over-the-top animations, I think they give life to the game and make it more of a joy to play.
In all, I’ve really enjoyed my time with Monster Hunter Stories 2: Wings of Ruin and intend to keep it in my Steam library for some time to come. If you like JRPGs with charming graphics, light humor, and an epic storyline, you may just might want to check this one out!
SCORE: 8.2/10
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