I spent the weekend playing Monster Hunter Rise and its been a blast to play! There are many features you will have find have taken inspiration from Generations Ultimate and World but with a dash of the classic style from older entries in the series.
Before every starting quest its always important to eat to get certain effects that can only be given at the local canteen/bistro. In past games whenever you ate no matter what the effects you got your Hunter would always flex when standing from the table, the difference in Rise is that when you mix combinations the end pose gives you an idea of how well the combination worked, Here is what it looks when you get an excellent combo.
then after making my final preparations I was ready to begin!
Exploring the new zones takes some getting used to with the new Wirebug Mechanic, which allows you to basically zipline across the whole map no problem. But the newest addition to Rise which helps traverse the locales would be the new buddy type, The 'Palamute'.
Since I started off in Monster Hunter 3 Ultimate (3DS) I had a buddy called Shakalaka but I learned later after getting into MH4U and games before MH3U you have always started off with a cat companion called a 'Palico' which has a varied amount of abilities to help even the hunting field against the monsters you face, The Palico is still good for these things but since the zones in each locale is bigger and the monsters tend to run around the entire map while being hunted this has caused me to feel a need for speed! Mounting the Palamute ensures ease of travel and the option to get ahead of the monster to lay down traps or even explosives to end the hunt faster.
In the story the main objective is to protect Kamura village from an event called "The Rampage" Which as you might guess is a bunch of monsters banding together to invade and destroy the entire village. The villagers have made a stronghold for you(The Hunter) to fend off the Rampage via Gates, explosive placements, and ballistae/cannon turrets and buy time to defeat all the monsters that are approaching.
I was given an idea of which monsters are going to appear along with sub objectives to try to complete while the invasion is happening.
As I maintained the defense the stronghold leveled up which improved the damage on the placements
They come in waves and each Monster has a different icon that tells you what their purpose is (Blue for gate crashing, Red for attacking the Hunter/placements and green for ranged attacks on your hunter/placements)
After some times I had fought off the invasion (FOR NOW) and was successful in my defense of the village.
So that's where I am currently in Monster Hunter Rise. Its been slightly difficult getting used to the new controls but I am having fun seeing the new locales and the types of monsters that live in them.
Thank you for reading and Happy Hunting!