Fashion hunting, or mixing-and-matching armor sets, has always been a major part of my Monster Hunter experience. The thrill of crafting a new armor set after taking down a monster can be just as satisfying as the hunt itself. But with Monster Hunter Wilds, that excitement is no longer there. Capcom has sucked the fun out of armor design, and honestly it’s like it stole a piece of the game’s soul and never looked back.
Let’s get back to 2015, back to Generations Ultimate or pre-Fifth Generation games at the very least. Back in the day, Hunters were spoiled with sets that had clear distinctions between ‘Blademaster’ or melee and ‘Gunner’ or ranged versions. Blademasters got beefy defense and Skills tailored for close combat, while Gunners had lighter armor with Skills that helped with playing keepaways.
The designs are totally distinct as well. I never used Bowguns but my favorite aspect of Gunner armor is the asymmetrical gloves. Their right hands are often reinforced with shield-like gloves, probably for protection against shrapnel and explosions. At least in lore, if not in gameplay. You know, like that weird arm cast-like thing Final Fantasy‘s Yuffie likes to wear.
World changed this system by introducing Alpha and Beta sets, with Elder Dragon getting a Gamma variant. Sad to say that sometimes change doesn’t always come for the better.
Gone are the mechanical differences. Both sets had the same defense stats to make sure they could be used by all weapon types. The main variation between Alpha and Beta armor was Decoration slots. The removal of the Blademaster and Gunner split made things feel too game-y as well. I mean, why does my armor suddenly become sturdier because I picked up a Gunlance? Why was it as thin as a paper mache when I grabbed a Bow? Is it because of those Wylk-powered Wyverian shenanigans?
Still, I could live with it. I started the series with World, so I didn’t have as much as ‘nostalgia’ as the veterans. There were still enough distinct variations to keep fashion hunting interesting anyway. Then Wilds was finally released. I wonder what kind of new Layered sets I could make–
Oh boy, did they drop the ball.
While fortunately, Alpha and Beta sets still exist, my nightmare came true: they both look exactly the same. Even any color differences between them are completely negated once you change their primary and secondary colors.
Me and a small number of fans always suspected that Capcom is going to ditch Alpha-Beta sets after it announced that male and female armors are now interchangeable. Then no one, even small-time YouTubers, asked if the distinct designs between the two still exist.
To be fair, this problem started in Rise and Sunbreak. But back then, I was willing to give Capcom the benefit of the doubt. COVID messed up development, and they had to work with what they had. But Wilds? This is a full-scale, next-gen Monster Hunter. There’s no excuse for this level of, pardon my wording, laziness in armor design. This is even worse than Iron’d-and-Bone’d weapons of World and Iceborne.
What’s appalling is that the team already has tons of great designs sitting around! Returning monsters like Gypceros and Blangonga have existing Gunner designs from older games. They wouldn’t even need to draw brand-new concepts — just remodel them as Beta sets. We could’ve gotten four completely separate designs to be used this time, but no, we get identical Alpha and Beta armor pieces instead.
That completely killed my motivation to care about fashion hunting in Monster Hunter Wilds. In older games, I was hyped to see what eye-catching sets I could make from each new monster. Now? I just slap on my trusty Obituary or Beetle helmet and Damascus/Ingot armor set because, honestly, why bother?
This sucks because I wanted to mix and match that fashionable Lala Barina’s chest piece with other parts. I really did. The universal male-female armor was a good idea as well. In World, I prefer the female Uragaan’s chest piece because I think it had better pauldrons. But that’s not a good enough reason to completely neuter Alpha-Beta armor designs in Wilds.
Not to mention that Monster Hunter Now, the mobile spin-off, is already following this trend. Capcom’s design team really dropped the ball again here; emphasis on ‘again.’ At this rate, I’m seriously worried about the future of fashion hunting and visual designs in the Monster Hunter series.
This isn’t just nitpicking or ‘new bad, old good’ — we’re talking about a part of the soul of Monster Hunter. This is something that designers Kaname Fujioka and Tomonori Kambe speak of proudly in the past.
In the Monster Hunter Illustrations Volume 1 artbook, Fujioka stated that the team doesn’t want the battle to become the only fun part of the game. ‘Souvenirs,’ like unique weapons and armor, added another layer of fun. I quote, “[…] We also knew that going out to hunt a flying dragon wouldn’t be as satisfying if you went home empty-handed.”
Now, it’s like someone put a tax on said souvenirs and we got back home with only a half of what we brought. I doubt an inevitable Master Rank expansion can fix this one glaring issue. Personally, after playing a bunch of Monster Hunter games, it feels like its soul keep slipping away with each new generation.
