Monster Hunter Stories 3: Twisted Reflection
Developer: Capcom
Publisher: Capcom
Platforms: PlayStation 5, Xbox Series X/S (Reviewed), Switch 2, PC
Release Date: Available Now
Price: $69.99 USD – Available Here $129.95 AUD – Available Here
Overview
Whenever someone thinks of Monster Hunter they generally think of one mission, hunting down a monster to gather its parts and make better equipment to take on the next biggest monster all while the story plays in the background. In recent years the Monster Hunter games have been developing more involved story modes but one that has always embraced storytelling the most is a spin-off that takes the standard gameplay loop and puts a significant twist on it. These are the Monster Hunter Stories games and while they may have been entertaining, they never quite felt like they were given the same level of seriousness or care as the main franchise.
The first entry, originally a DS game, was rather childish in general, while the second that saw a wider release expanded on things a bit but still struggled with finding the correct tone and pacing. Now though, with Monster Hunter Stories 3: Twisted Reflection, Capcom has not only found their footing but also delivered one of the best stories to date set in the Monster Hunter world and one that fans of the franchise will definitely want to experience even if it is far different than the normal hunting fair.
Story
It’s worth noting that hundreds of years have passed since the events of the previous Monster Hunter Stories games, meaning that players will not have needed to play either of the original entries to understand the storyline here, though returning players will instantly recognize references and a certain returning character that appears later in the game. One of the first things that players do in Twisted Reflection is create their very own rider, be it a male or female, and it turns out that rather than being any random child or an inexperienced rider such as previous entries, they end up being the prince or princess of the entire kingdom of Azuria and the sole rider of the long-thought extinct Rathalos bearing striking markings similar to legends.
The Princess (in our case) is the leader of Azuria’s vaunted Rangers division, a group of riders assigned to her with their task being to investigate the Crystal Encroachment that is plaguing the environment. This strange crystal-like spread has eaten up swathes of land and even encased monsters entirely within, leaving numerous monsters endangered or extinct while others have been forced into becoming invasive species, forced out of their homes due to the strange environment. To make matters worse, even monsters themselves have appeared with crystal blights attached to them that drive them feral while unlocking untapped potential, making them dangerous forces that even the toughest Rangers must deal with in pairs.
While Azuria is still thriving mostly due to the Rangers and strong land-placement, the neighboring country of Vermail is on the brink of collapse and ready to go to war to take Azuria’s abundance for themselves. In an attempt to find a compromise Vermail’s princess Eleanor agrees to become a hostage of sorts for Azuria and soon joins the player as an ally, learning the ropes of Ranger school and the unique bond that they have with their “monsties.”
This small peace is shattered when war literally breaks out at the border with Vermail attacking in droves and revealing numerous twists back to back that leave the Princess struggling to figure out what to do next, but the only answer is to venture out beyond the the wall that is not meant to be passed and into a forbidden zone that the kingdom has respected for hundreds of years due to a vow with the Wyverians. Venturing forth into the unknown with only her monsties and fellow Rangers at her side, it is up to the Princess to find a way to save not only both kingdoms by putting a stop to the war but finding the origin of the Crystal Encroachment itself.
In a rather strange way, Monster Hunter Stories 3: Twisted Reflection is the most mature and adult storyline in the entire series to date. It’s almost as if the storylines grew up and developed with every iteration, the first being for children, the second being for teens and young adults, and now this one placing players right into the dire world where serious events take place, betrayals, dangerous developments occur, and unique plot twists are not only refreshingly surprising but entirely fitting as well. Sure, the game’s side-quests are generally fairly basic, but the core plotline is exceptionally engaging, making players want to progress the story even while they are trying to develop their monsties the best way possible.
It is also worth noting that while the standard side-quests from NPCs are a bit generic, every single one of the player’s Ranger companions will have their own unique story quest as players progress through the game, revealing more about their history, their own unique traits, and even a bit of what they like to do. This adds some extra characterization to the party while also strengthening the team at the same time as completing these side-quests boosts their abilities in combat. Combine this strong companion writing with engaging writing for the main storyline that sets the stakes high right from the get go and players will find themselves hooked right away. It is worth noting that not all of the game is serious, there are still plenty of moments of levity with the Rangers and the team, but joke mascot Palico Navirou is gone now and replaced by a far more responsible but equally likable Rudy. Rudy is treated more like an actual character than a walking joke which is a nice touch for the talking Palico and helps add even more nuance to the team at times.
Gameplay
In many ways Monster Hunter Stories 3: Twisted Reflection feels as familiar as the original two games and incredibly different at the same time. The biggest difference is exploration and the fact that it opens up almost immediately. Unlike previous entries that generally saw players starting with low-grade monsties and have only a minimal amount of exploration abilities, this time around players are thrown right into the fray with the most exploration options available right out of the gate. Between the players’ Rathalos already having the ability to glide, fly, shoot fireballs, roar to stun enemies, and even melee attack to smash walls or trees, players are already off to a great start. Combine this with the Tobi-Kodachi that can also climb walls that are in their party at the start and nearly every exploration ability is unlocked at the start.
Sure, being able to swim, travel through dug tunnels, and more, require specific monster types but this is a great start. Especially since throughout the game players will find that there is plenty of hidden content to find, be it Poogies scattered throughout the world, treasure chests containing decoration gems and recipes, or even monster droppings that reveal more info about their ecology. The various maps in the game all have different ways to navigate around them, be it climbing walls, using wind gusts to fly further, and more to explore and even the maps themselves are broken into subsections where only certain monsters will spawn and eggs can be gathered from dens, though this time around players can have some influence on that.
As with every Monster Hunter Stories game, raising a monstie and having it join your party to defeat other monsters is the key part of the game and fighting alongside a battle buddy, which can be changed at any time now except for personal missions. Players can carry up to twelve eggs with them at a time but doing so will involve entering dens. Dens are scattered throughout the map and range from standard, to rare, to super rare with higher rarity giving eggs unique traits sometimes. Inside of a den players will search a nest and randomly pick up an egg and be given the option to continue searching if they don’t like their pick. Until the player has hatched a specific egg they won’t be told the exact monster that will hatch from it, though if players happen to make a monster retreat into a den then obviously all eggs will be of that monster.
Perhaps one of the biggest quality of life improvements to egg gathering is the fact that egg dens are no longer mini-dungeons scattered with other monsters. Instead they are small rooms filled with materials and with the nest right there and easy to access, making egg hunting a far easier and enjoyable experience. There are rare events that can happen in dens such as having two nests to pull from, extra materials to gather, barrel felynes running around, or even a slumbering monster inside raising the threat level. In fact, players can even have Eleanor cook food to increase the rate of rare events happening, though she can also cook other meals that have half an hour long effects that boost health, experience gain, gathered items, and more, though only one can be active at a time unless it’s a special meal.
One of the new elements introduced in Twisted Reflection is the Ranger’s core mission, habitat restoration. As mentioned before each part of a map is broken into a subzone with specific monsters and there are feral monsters that lay claim to each zone. When players defeat a feral monster the team will not only establish a base there but also be able to release hatched monsties in that zone. Players can release monsties already available in that zone to boost their stats and trigger unique stat increases for further eggs for that species there but the real fun comes from creating “mutant” versions of monsties or element variations such as having a lightning-based Anjanath. The real test though comes from defeating the invasive monsters that come out at night. These battles are more puzzle-like in nature as players are simply meant to drive them away rather than slay them and, when successful, it will reveal a den containing a once extinct monster egg within a crystal shell.
Hatching these extinct monsties and then releasing them back into the wild gives players a chance to then find not only more of that monster out in the field to farm materials but also eggs of it as well, such as a Rathian being the first available. The unique element to these extinct monsters, and a few others are that players can help unlock even more powerful monsters if certain conditions are met. For example, raising the Rathian ecosystem rank to S not only unlocks a difficult Pink Rathian that will roam the land now, but even the deadly Dreadqueen Rathian. These eggs will spawn in similar fashion in dens and can be added to the player’s party of monsties though fighting them out in the wild is another story entirely, especially since some unique monsties players can unlock early game by meeting certain ecosystem conditions can be near end-game level of difficulty. It is also rather neat to release a monster completely random in an ecosystem and see it joining far different types of creatures roaming around, or changing elements entirely thanks to their ecosystem change.
Of course, it wouldn’t be Monster Hunter if there wasn’t plenty of combat but rather than the action based combat of the core-game Stories retains the same turn-based RPG style combat it always has as well as the rock-paper-scissors style combat chart with power beating technique, technique beating speed, and speed beating power. Players cannot directly control their ally or ally’s monstie in combat but they can dictate orders to their own monstie and select their own combat moves. Both pairs of fighters have three “hearts” that are shared between the human and monstie and when they fall in combat one of these hearts is depleted. If the player’s ally is defeated entirely, they will eventually pop back up if players can survive long enough on their own but falling in combat yourself will end the fight.
As is standard, players can make use of a decent number of weapons in the game, with there being six types total tying to the three damage types of slashing, piercing, and crushing. This is handled through charge blades, long swords, bows, gunlances, hammers, and hunting horns. The player can equip three weapons at a time and swap between them to use skills on the fly, especially when targeting enemy weaknesses such as certain elemental weaknesses or body parts. Weapons and armor are crafted from materials obtained from slaying monsters or through blueprints that players can rarely find in treasure chests scattered throughout the land. Similarly, players can bring with them their entire party of six monsties and can swap between them at any time during battle, dictating them to use skills as needed to target the same weaknesses.
That being said, swapping out monsties will reset the “kinship gauge” that will prevent players from riding on their monstie and combining their strength and unleashing a “kinship attack” that is basically an ultimate move, or even a combined kinship attack should their partner also be riding their monstie. A new system called Wyvern Soul also works as a stagger gauge that can make enemies weak for a moment or even topple them to the ground and give players the opportunity to trigger a “Syncro Rush” that will also deal massive damage and boost their Kinship gauge but the monster will stand right back up as a result.
It is worth noting that compared to the first two games in the series, Monster Hunter Stories 3: Twisted Reflection does not pull any punches when it comes to combat, almost to the point it can feel a bit cheap at times. The other two entries were mostly about guessing enemy attack types and countering them properly while this time around enemies not only actively use skills that bypass the head-to-head counter system, but also transform or activate extra defenses or offensive skills regularly. Fighting against enemies the player’s own level can be a danger if they aren’t taking advantage of elemental weaknesses and defenses, especially since many monsters can unleash party-wide high damage dealing attacks if they aren’t stopped. This means that players shouldn’t expect an easy win even when things seem to be in their favor. It is nice to note that the game does indicate when enemies are going to be a challenge or are outright above the player’s abilities by displaying a yellow or red icon above their head as they roam the field. Similarly, enemies that are below the player’s level by a decent margin can be slain by attacking them directly while roaming the field or through “instant kills” if they happen to miss an attack or want to try triggering a den retreat.
For those who really want to get in-depth and see everything that Twisted Reflections has to offer when it comes to training their monsties, the options to perform gene modification and even training missions can help boost their abilities or unlock stats and skills. Gene modifications take genes from another monstie and assign it to the chosen place on the player’s monstie, giving it a skill or attack while also potentially offering “bingo bonuses” if it matches the elemental or type of trait, further increasing their strength. Training will give a monstie the ability to venture into an area to boost its stats to match the ecosystem, meaning if a monstie was originally only a C rank with a slight HP boost, having it train in an improved S rank ecosystem can give it a full star HP boost. While not necessarily required, all of these options and ways to train the player’s party make this the most in-depth the spin-off series has ever been and with more monsters than ever before, that is an incredibly impressive feat.
Audio & Visuals
Monster Hunter Stories 3: Twisted Reflection is an incredibly impressive looking game that takes an anime-esque art style and applies it perfectly to the monsters that everyone knows and loves from the mainstream franchise. The environments themselves are nice and lush, though they can be a bit annoying to explore in some locations, and the character models are handled incredibly well. The designs of weaponry and equipment that players forge is unique and fitting to the series’ overall theme and those that want a little extra style can find DLC to deck out the other Ranger’s with special costumes too. It also really must be said that the kinship skills are truly exceptional as every single monstie in the game has a unique kinship skill that is a blast to behold, with even some of the simplest looking monsties having some rather fancy looking cinematic animations.
The English voice track throughout the game is handled quite well with the voice cast fitting their characters well enough. The emotional weight of the storytelling is believable through their acting and all of the signature monster cries are as memorable as ever. It is also nice to note that Rudy’s voice actress is an incredible improvement over Navirou from the first two games and that the main character is also voiced fully, giving them actual agency in the storyline. The title’s soundtrack features a great collection of background music that varies from location to location as well, helping to keep things feeling fresh.
Overall
Monster Hunter Stories 3: Twisted Reflection may not reinvent the core concept that the spin-off has followed since the first two games but it has built upon it exponentially. Not only is the story darker and more engaging thanks to some twists and turns as well as giving the main character a voice. The other Rangers having solid storylines as well help keep the whole group feel engaged as players explore each new location, tracking down and fighting new monsters and rebuilding the ecosystems along the way with combat that is both entertaining and challenging in equal measure. Between these improvements and a gorgeous presentation, anyone that is a fan of the Monster Hunter would be remiss not to check spin-off out.
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