As someone who considers Monster Hunter World: Iceborne to be among their favourite games of all time, I kinda regret that I never reviewed the base game and its expansion separately. That's because Iceborne was already out by the time I started this Backloggd account, and I didn't think I'd really be able to remember my thoughts on World separately from Iceborne enough to make a full-fledged review. Now THE TURNS HAVE TABLED however, as Sunbreak did release after the creation of this Backloggd account and - if you can believe it after I have reviewed base Monster Hunter Rise. I don't know why I didn't write a review at the time of finishing, maybe because I knew there was post-launch content to come? Maybe because I was feeling lazy or depressed or dealing with another case of old-man-back which made me wanna avoid sitting at my desk or hunching over my laptop and typing. (Realistically, it is the latter.)

Now that the dust has settled and my chiropractor has snapped me like a wishbone, I can confidently say that Monster Hunter Rise's expansion, Sunbreak is - good! Like Monster Hunter Rise itself, it's just kinda good! I like it! But it's not a patch on the combo that is World and Iceborne imo. It does all the stuff that's worth getting excited about for a Monster Hunter game's expansion. It adds a bunch of dope ass monsters, a new hub, some super tough endgame fights and a couple other little niceties here and there. That stuff alone is enough to make an expansion worth it, but it does feel like a noticeable step down from the way Iceborne transformed World. Iceborne's new hub was a significant improvement over the base game's, it added the Raider Ride to make traversal much easier, as well as the Guiding Lands and the Clutch Claw (the latter of which, don't get me wrong did not work out as intended and hugely fucked with the game's balance, but it was something significant.)

Maybe you could argue Sunbreak didn't need to bring such big changes because the Palamute which Rise introduced is already basically the Raider Ride and no one really had any problem with the hub world (except me, I do not like Kamura Village, lmao.) But what we get in these things' stead just feel super inconsequential. NPC followers? A bunch of drab, unlikable characters who talk too much to come along with you and trivialise fights even more? Sunbreak desperately needed to make Rise harder imo, not even easier. The new hub, Elgado is like...Nice, I guess? I prefer it over Kamura at least, I find its music less annoying and think it's more aesthetically pleasing, but as far as layout is concerned it's super uninspired. There's really not much to see here. When you see how little Sunbreak actually does to change or iterate on Rise fundamentally, I think you realise how much the Switch's hardware truly hampered them. Yes, the game eventually got ported to PC, Xbox & Playstation, but it started out as a Switch exclusive and what I would've liked to see from an expansion like Sunbreak is some of the nifty little details World has that Rise is missing. Seeing monsters you've captured in pens back at the hub, seeing the environment of the maps change when an Elder Dragon is present. None of that came, and I think it's clear to me that it's because the Switch just couldn't handle it. What we're left with is some pretty limp stuff like...New Silkbind moves, which I just don't think is something we really needed. Rise already gives you enough options as is, gameplay was never the problem.

I like Sunbreak, but it's not an evolution of Rise the way Iceborne is for World. It doesn't really bring anything new to the table, it's just more Rise. Which is fine! Rise is fun! And getting to play a version of Rise where I can fight Astalos and Seregios and fuckiiin' Espinas is fine by me. Including a Monster Hunter Frontier-exclusive monster like Espinas in a main series game for the first time might be the coolest thing Sunbreak does. The monster himself might be pretty whatever but it sets such an exciting precedent, I really hope we can expect some of the cooler Fronter-exclusive monsters like Lightenna and Akira Vashimu/Jebia down the line in main series games. That'd get me pogging in my fuckin pants

Anyway, it's more Rise! If you like Rise, good! If you were hoping for its difficulty to be ramped up at all, gotta wait for those Risen Elder Dragon fights! Which are good, don't get me wrong (Risen Shagaru Magala actually gave me like 6 heart attacks) - but you gotta wade through a lot of the same old boring characters and iffy presentation to get there. Thankfully, as was always the case, the gameplay might just make it worth it!

Sunbreak refines Rise's mechanics with some nice quality-of-life improvements, and swapping out Anime Feudal Japan for Anime Western Fantasy is a nice change-up. There's a bit more emphasis and effort put into the writing, which makes it disappointing that it ultimately takes no risks. Also disappointing that all of the new, interesting mechanics are basically all superfluous because of how damn easy the game is. Still, the monster designs are broadly fantastic, the new areas are fun to explore, and the slight extra emphasis on environmental interactions is sorely appreciated.

just as long as the base game but still with a undeniable charm, i'm digging capcom basically making a new game and selling it as dlc of the base game, shoutouts to my buddy for carrying me through G-Rank or master rank as they say now, just like in the base game i still had i blast making builds and even grinding at times.
there is just something so satisfying about monster hunter's difficulty that feels right .
another shoutouts for the mexican community who's still keeping the game alive along with the korean peeps.
this was a Great DLC

- 70 hours played
- Weapon of choice - Light Bow Gun

Monster Hunter Rise Sunbreak takes an already great game and improves upon it in almost every aspect. This dlc features the best version of all the base game monsters, whilst adding a host of new fantastic monsters to the roster. There wasn’t one single monster added I didn’t love to fight. Also the new monsters are really fast and aggressive. Some utilising large AoE attacks to counter the insane movement of the player. Also the final 3 “End Boss” monsters were utterly amazing in their grand spectacle. Gaismagorm, Amatsu and Primordial Malzeno all offering huge set piece moments that were entirely playable. I love when a game can create huge moments like these without ripping control away from the player.

Rampage quests were done away with which addressed a big problem I had with the base game. Follower quests were introduced and these were much appreciated as it was super fun to hunt with Ai bots. I never really wanted to play online so this helped me feel like I was whilst keeping it single player. The weapons and armour were all great and I loved the designs.

There’s content galore here. So much to do and despite leaving the game now Primordial Malzeno is beaten, there’s a whole Anomaly quest and ranking system I never bothered with. Despite adoring this game and it becoming one of my new all time favourites, 160 hours is long enough when there’s other games I want to explore.

There’s some negatives but they are very small. Moving away from the eastern vibe of Rise and Kamura village kind of robbed the game of some of its personality. Whilst I loved new characters like Fiorayne and Bahari, the Kingdom felt kind of drab and self serious. I preferred the story of the Qurio when compared with the Rampage but I preferred the vibe of Kamura as well as the monster introduction cutscene poems in Rise. I was however glad to hear some different hub music because Elgardo’s started to grate.

All in all, a fantastic addition to an already great game. Taking Rise from a 4/5 to a new 5/5 rating and becoming one of my all timers.

Yeah baby, MONSTER HUNTER!

Rise, depending on who you ask, was a pretty good experience, but didn't offer a lot for people wanting to sink time into a new monster hunter. There are many people that, at the time, wanted to jump back to world, and used the disparity in content between the games to herald their supremacy of world>rise (which, is a wholly unfair comparison at the time since rise didn't have an expansion). so, with sunbreak being announced, and now fully released, how does it stand up to the monster that was world + iceborne?

WOOOOOOO ITS SO GOOD LIKE HOLY SHIT, two new maps that were fantastic additions to rise's (admittedly) very average base map roster, a BOMBASTIC monster cast with honest to god NO horrible fights (yes, even magma almudron). All the weapons got fancy shmancy new wirebug moves, and i think sunbreak is the closest a game has ever been to have every weapon be strong and balanced at endgame (lance being the biggest exception, with some others im surely forgetting). The post-game update cycle also didnt have the issue that Iceborne's had where each update made the last one's builds irrelevant, but instead would bring either lots or no changes depending on what weapon you used. I'm mixed on this, as I think it's probably better for the game, but I also mained Gunlance for sunbreak and didn't see ANY build/meta changes until like... the second to last update.

Despite my rating, I still don't think sunbreak is perfect. backloggd doesnt have a 4.9/5 option so I just gotta round up. The endgame grind, while it's probably one of the better monster hunter ones, still really doesn't serve a purpose other than "fight bigger and badder versions of existing monsters" and hardcore min-maxxing your sets. It also feels like player power creep hit SERIOUS levels here, to a point where I feel like we need a refresh with MH Wilds so we don't hit god level powers. As much as I loved wirebugs they absolutely need to stay in this title.

The WORST thing sunbreak did, hands down, isnt an issue with the game itself: this game brought out the ugliest people from both sides of the monster hunter fandom, with World Defenders and Rise Defenders at eachothers throats 24/7 about which game is better. People claim to be super hardcore MH fans and then act VILE online anytime the game they don't like is brought up. I then challenge you to think, would a true fan not love every child, even the ugly ones? But still, online discussion of any monster hunter past GU is pretty much ruined due to how loud these people are and it's honestly pretty rough. I hark back to the days when the MH fandom was less toxic before World came out (i wont say it was all sunshine and rainbows lol) but, such is the burden of popularity.

I can't talk enough about how much fun I had with Sunbreak. If you thought base Rise was just okay, and that it could've been a bit better in some places, this expansion 100% fills those holes. If you're afraid to hop into Rise because of how used you are to World, get out of your comfort zone a little bit. You're missing some seriously good monsters here.

Si ya vieron mi review de Rise, sabrán lo que opino del juego... Aunque incluso teniendo una switch me espere hasta que saliera la versión de PC e incluso en su momento tuve que comprarme una nueva laptop solo para jugarlo y también lo preordene, la diversión no duro más de 3 o 4 meses ya que había hecho todo y más que ofrecía el juego.

Mi hype por la expansión se fue y simplemente pase de él y ni siquiera sabia que monstruos o cosas nuevas traía. No fue sino hasta el mes pasado, mas de 1 año después de la salida de la expansión, que decidí comprarla y... Al principio es cierto que fue mas o menos divertido y me vicie por semanas jugándolo, pero al final no como el juego base, esa diversión no duro mucho y al final se volvio repetitivo y aburrido y ni siquiera menciono el tema de que el online esta muertísimo y las únicas veces donde puedes jugar con alguien son los fin de semana o en la noche.

Al final si considero a Sunbreak como mejor que el juego base, pero tiene el mismo problema que Rise que después de llegar a MR200, tener mi build meta y hacer algunas misiones más de evento, al final se vuelve aburrido, ya que se siente sin contenido real y no hay una razon real para seguir jugandolo...

Tal vez soy yo el problema? Ya MH no es para mí? Incluso juegos como portable 3rd que ni siquiera tiene online oficial ni tampoco rango G al final me le dedique muchas más horas que a Rise (y ni hablar de world que es al que menos jugué).

EDIT 25/4/2024: no he vuelto a tocar Rise ni me interesa, pero viendolo en retrospectiva aunque mantengo lo que dije, he sido un poco duro con Sunbreak y le he subido un poco el score

When I hear people saying how Sunbreak isn't Monster Hunter I always check for two things, and usually at least one of them checks out:
1) They're World fans
2) They "used to play Freedom Unite back in the day with their good ol' PSP"

Don't fall for the common accusations, Sunbreak is the absolute pinnacle of Monster Hunter combat, paired with one of the best monster rosters in the series: you've got Astalos, Primalzeno, Gore Magala, Lucent Narga and many other stupid good fights to learn and get your new hat out of.

A thing I usually criticize about Iceborne is the sets balancing: you want to do GS? Fatalis. CB? Fatalis. DB which are literally elemental killing machines? Fatalis, elemental sucks ASS in that game. Pair those weapons with a full Fatalis armor (or one AT Velk piece if you fancy) and slot in the decos you just grinded 100+ tempered Teostra for and you're good to go!

Now here, things are different: any weapon has so many possibilities, in terms of both elemental and raw damage and skills you want to implement to your playstyle. Berserker, Strife, Blood Rite, Buildup Boost; you name them, they got them.

My very reasons for it not being 5 stars are bond to the fact the expansion starts VERY slowly, like 3 stars worth of missions are mostly boring fights you already did with a fire/blast variation of a newcomer you fought in base Rise BUT the second you slay that damn Astalos the game just starts to ramp up and it NEVER STOPS.
My other reason is the fact once you get to the endgame it gets a bit disorienting for all the stuff it introduces you, so it takes a while to understand that + it slows down quite a bit because the real juicy stuff starts after you reach MR100, with Scorned Magnamalo and the Risen fights which are just that good and challenging!

Man I love this game, what a wonderful life-ruining experience.

The live service content model solidifies an extreme bitterness in me for a game that I would otherwise love.

I'm not exactly coy about how much I love Monster Hunter. I love 4U, I love GU, I love World, I love the scatters of other old games I've played (Tri, P3rd, 3U, Frontier), and, I loved Rise. With both Rise and Sunbreak, I had a great time with them when they came out, and tapered off when the title updates came out. But Sunbreak taught me to dread the inevitable approach of Yet Another Update.

Float like a Bnahabra - Title Updates and the Gameplay Loop

Monster Hunter is a game about long, slow progression. Individual hunts are long, and you need to hunt the same monster a lot if you want a piece of its gear. Because of this, most monsters you come across won't be anything more than a stepping-stone to get to the next one - if you don't need any rewards from a monster, why fight it any more than you absolutely need to? Yet even if you barrel through only the mandatory quests and try to reach the 'endgame' as fast as possible, it's still a very substantial experience - there's a lot of monsters to get through, and the difficulty will ramp enough to where you'll likely have to stop and get some gear upgrades a few times per rank.

Title Updates (TUs) in Sunbreak added about 1-3 new monsters per update, alongside their respective gear and a few new decorations. TU content is detached from main progression if you reach the endgame of the previous TU before it releases, meaning each further TU is its own self-contained experience; this gives rise to a few issues. There’s no real reason to re-fight any of the monsters in the current TU apart from for the sake of it, as all the monsters in any TU hover around the same difficulty as each other - beat one and you can beat them all, and if you can beat them all already then why would you want any of their gear?* This, combined with the lack of monsters in each TU (which is understandable, especially considering their frequency), makes each TU feel more like a theme-park visit where I hop in once, beat them all once just to see them, and then turn the game off for another month.

Sting like a Dreadqueen - Monster Hunter Rise and Difficulty Creep

Two aspects of the combat I’ve always been critical of are Wirefall, and a heavy focus on counters; without going into great detail, two easy and extremely powerful defensive options that observably warp the monster design around themselves. Throughout the main game progression, you might notice some things here and there on some of the tougher monsters, but it’ll largely feel fine regardless of how you play or the weapon you use. But as the TU content is effectively Sunbreak’s postgame, it understandably feels the need to up the ante a bit, but how?

These monsters have an increasing focus on heavy tracking and huge sweeping or AoE attacks that aren’t *undodgeable*, but being stuck out of rhythm against them makes it incredibly hard to get back in - a problem mitigated by simply being able to counter them, of course. This new problem then needs to be solved by further creep - some of these attacks multi-hit fast enough to punish you for countering them, or doing so at the wrong time. This is all fine in the specific context of answering counters, but falls apart once you have to try to outposition these monsters throwing out hyperactive combos, huge AoEs and tracking so aggressive you can see the monsters visibly snap towards you. These factors also ostensibly help mitigate the effectiveness of Wirefalling - fast multihits and large AoEs are more likely to catch a bad fall - but all it really does in practice is make you wait on the floor a bit longer before sending it. It’s natural and expected that monsters would have to rise to match the new power of the hunters, but the end result is an unsatisfying arms race warped around the new, powerful tools and the monsters’ response to them.

Proof of a Villain - Musings and Conclusion

The months from the announcement of TU1 up until today have been a fight against a slow and crushing vortex - TU announced with information inescapably trickling through my Steam library and social circles, TU comes out, I play for an underwhelming hour or two, and then clear my mind for a couple of weeks until the cycle begins anew. While I spent most of this review pulling apart the gameplay problems with the TU cycles, the real culprit is the cycle itself - the ever-present marketing and conversation-driving to ensure my incapability of just uninstalling the game and burying it with my happy launch week memories. The cycle that wants you to keep playing their game until *they* decide you stop, not until you do.

Monster Hunter: Rise is a very good game, and Sunbreak is largely a great expansion, but I would only recommend it now that it’s over.


Postnote(s):
I got into world practically at the end of Iceborne's lifespan so even tho I would probably leverage the same sort of complaints against that if I was there for the ride I don't carry the disdain that I do for this. Also helps that I think it's more fun lol
* (TU monster difficulty) Ignoring the existence of investigations to make this point, but if you enjoy the investigation loop in any way at all then you are a freak of nature and I will never be able to associate with you

It's hard to come off the coattails of MHW Iceborne, but this entry is really solid, and does a lot of things better than Iceborne too. My main issue with Rise is that while the combat is flashy and fun, I can't help but feel it makes fighting monsters a little less intimate than before. I've put far less effort into recognizing telegraphed attacks because I'll get by just fine through generous counter windows, wire bug attacks, and some beefy ass hits. I miss the environmental hazards and more grounded approach that previous entries had. Weapons are all extremely powerful, perhaps too powerful, with not a single one being notably outclassed.

That being said, I'm still very glad this exists on its own. It's nice to have a Monster Hunter game that's a bit more like Dynasty Warriors, especially with combat so buttery smooth. Many new creatures are so well designed and fit right in with the old, looking at you Magnamalo. World traversal and wirebug recovery moves also take a lot of the sluggishness away that exists in other games, and I think that's a great choice for this more amped up combat style.

While I prefer the approach earlier entries had to combat more, I still really respect this game because it knows exactly what it is. A fun, flashy, sometimes mindless ARPG with some great creatures and weapons to explore. This is a quality game, it's really a matter of preference between this game's approach and World's approach.

I really think Rise made me decide I wasn't going to talk or put my thoughts on any of these games online until they're fully 100% truly done with updates and while this still has a few more event quests to go that I will gladly get to as it stands this shit is done with Primeval Malzeno.

Sunbreak (from this point on occasionally referred to as Sunrise keep up) is without a shadow of a doubt probably the first one of these I've really been as addicted to as I was to 4U way back on the 3DS. While with Worldborne it eventually became a game of endless deco/KT/Safi farming Sunrise is a game that while as of this moment I have less time put into it than Worldborne unlike that game I can see myself definitely making another character to do an all new playthrough with a year or two from now.

The fantastic and frenetic combat of Rise is back in full swing and as with most G rank titles the monsters are faster and meaner than ever before, but Sunbreak goes even further implementing features and mechanics thought to have been lost with Frontier. Monsters like the Espinas duo and P Malzeno go absolutely berserk and it fucking rules. You can tell this time around the devs and especially the director who has been really open about about his love of Frontier really wanted to bring all that shit back and while I can't speak as someone who has played Frontier the consensus from those who have is enough to tell me they basically got it right. To combat this new ferocious beastiary we get the new scroll swap and switch skill mechanic and while I can definitely see the scrolls being a Sunrise exclusive gameplay element I hope to god switch skills return going forward. Being able to switch out your weapons moves for different ones is a million times more interesting to me as someone who cares more about game feel than the maps feeling alive and like a real ecosystem that Worldborne pushed.

This is also the first MH since 4U where while still having the same nonsense and simple "What could be causing this? Oh, it's monster! Actually it's this monster!" story MH always has it truly gets the feeling across of being on an adventure with a ragtag group to investigate and slay a dragon. It's funny too cause like Worldborne has a similar thing as always going on but it feels dumber in that game than here or 4U or even 3U? I don't know why, but it does. All this eventually culminating with the launch versions dragon satan finale and now the final update's P Malzeno leave me with a feeling of satisfaction that neither Xeno nor Shara really left me with despite the latter's genuinely great fight. Love the characters in this one too. I know it sounds silly considering most of them are just trope characters you see in lots of Japanese media, but Monster Hunter has always had a weird sort of like Jurassic Park 1 likeability to (most of) its characters that I can't help but enjoy interacting with them. Capcom knows this too cause the follower system (another thing kind of taken from Frontier) implemented in this game is really just a dating system lets be real and it better come back. Also if you look like Minayle hmu.

Yeah most of this review sounds like rambling, but I've got a year of shit to say and I've had plenty of time to reflect on and honestly I really really really like this game. It's a feeling like I've mentioned I haven't felt towards a Monster Hunter since 4U around 8 years ago (Jesus Christ kill me). Sure I can criticize how the roster isn't as big as GU's (stupid). Hell I could criticize the super slow grind of the Anomaly system, but I personally don't mind it. It's a much more passive grind that I could play at whatever pace I wanted and all the post launch monsters don't really require all the shit you get from it to fight them. Afflicted monsters being a genuinely fun challenge and the THE best version of endgame powered monsters (this is not arguable don't even bother) only helps. Loved the secondary combat mechanic of hitting the glowing bits like hyper monsters, but unlike them it actually feels like it does something. Love the knockdowns leading to tired state for easy hits after doing enough damage, but unlike 4U Apexes it's not annoying as fuck to get there without some shitty extra item. Love that they actually get cool slight distinct visuals aspects (Khezu full on looks like Red Khezu, Luna looks like a super Odo), as opposed to the boring violet metallic tint of World's tempered monsters. Yeah I'm shilling hard and I'm not gonna sugarcoat it, this game is better than Worldborne. What it lacks in fidelity (made up for by better art direction here anyways) it more than makes up for in being actually fun to play and having creative combat scenarios that could never be done in that game's slower pacing or shitty attempts at MMO raid type battle.

Oh my lord the music of this game too. I am very vocal in my dislike of some of World's tracks (Iceborne is definitely a bit better about this), but Sunbreak like Rise before it goes all in with some of the coolest original tracks in the series alongside remaking older ones in a much closer fashion to their originals while still adding in new touches to make them feel fresh. The end result is just chefs kiss baby. Peak MH OST.

Sunbreak may not be perfect and it kind of like Generations Ultimate is hampered by a good as fuck but also kind of weaker first half (Gen portion in GU Rise portion here), but by the time you're dug in like a tick in Sunbreak that shit won't matter when Fiorayne leaps through the sky and slamshitfucks Pacific Rim back into the Earth. Yeah, I'm thinking I'll be playing this still a fuckton while waiting for MH6 and years away from now too.

Monster Hunter games are so refreshing. It feels crazy that they're allowed to release the title updates for free, AND there's no predatory monetization track. Everyone speculating if MH6 is gonna be a world sequel, or bring back underwater combat; I'm just scared there's gonna be a season pass.

On top of that, they have to make something that serves, like, a dozen different types of players. It needs to be fun in single player and multiplayer. It needs to be a forever game that the MR999 crazies can play 24/7 for a year, and something that people can dip in and out of with each update. Change it enough that it feels like a proper sequel, but not so much that the oldheads riot. This thing is a miracle.

It doesn't all work. The end game grind is pretty uneven. Tacking on new systems in the updates has created some really labyrinthine menus.

Quiro crafting stands out as something that works early on, when anything you get feels like a bonus, and very late, when you have functionally infinite resources to craft multiples and roll forever. But in the middle, when the rolls you need to make a functional build become narrower and narrower, it starts to feel really limiting.

But honestly, it's all nitpicking. The hunts feel so good, the monster variety is great, the title updates were exciting. Monster Hunter forever.

Talvez esse seja meu Monster Hunter favorito, essa expansão traz toda a simplicidade das hunts que adoro no Rise, mas tira as rampage quests que eu odiava, adiciona os melhores monstros do jogo e novas habilidades ótimas, e um sistema de upgrade para as armas no endgame que te faz querer continuar jogando.

Eu ainda acho o World um jogo melhor, mas me diverti mais com o Rise e ele me prendeu mais, o wirebug deixou tudo mais rapido e dinâmico além de focarem no que mais gosto, lutar contra os montros, deixando as investigações de lado.