I tried and failed to love a 'Monster Hunter' game

It was roughly two months ago that I received a midnight email from our gaming editor Ben Gilbert. The subject: "Review Code -- Monster Hunter 4 Ultimate for 3DS." The email: "Assuming you want this?" I didn't. Sure, I'd played an older Monster Hunter on the Wii a few years back, but I gave up 15 hours in, shortly after the grueling tutorials ended. I've always felt like I should be into the series, though. I'm into RPGs; I'm into grinding. I use up the precious few vacation days I have crawling through Persona Q's dungeons or leveling up familiars. So I decided to offer up 100 hours of my free time to see if I could learn to love Monster Hunter. I tried so hard to love it.

But I failed.

If you're unfamiliar with what Monster Hunter is, or what's so Ultimate about this game, you shouldn't feel ashamed. Despite being one of the biggest gaming franchises in Japan, its presence in Western markets has been extremely limited. It's a third-person action RPG -- think Dark Souls, but not so unforgiving, or Zelda, and way less forgiving.

MH4U is an expanded version of Monster Hunter 4, which debuted in Japan way back in 2013. This particular incarnation was released there last October, and it's now available in the US and Europe for the first time. Here's what it looks like:

The barrier to Monster Hunter entry used to be pretty high, and to developer Capcom's credit, a lot of work has been done to fix that. Previous games in the series have involved hour after hour of dull tutorials, and that's pretty much gone with MH4U.

Within a couple of hours you'll be on a bona fide hunt, and additional tricks you need to learn will be taught to you along your journey. There are still loads of things that the game doesn't teach you, for sure -- you could probably clock 100 hours just watching and reading tutorials online -- but it's a huge step in the right direction.

In the game, you play -- surprise! -- a Monster Hunter, who -- surprise! -- runs around hunting monsters. Okay, there's a little more to it than that, and the game's cast and dialogue are actually semi-engaging, but there is little-to-no story threading the game's many, many quests together. Nobody is playing Monster Hunter for the story, though.

It's all about the gameplay, which is essentially a series of reward loops. Capcom took a typical action RPG, worked out what made it addictive and removed everything else. You'll mostly spend your hours fighting giant creatures, collecting the necessary materials to craft traps, potions, armor, weapons and the like in order to hunt bigger, badder monsters. There are a few find-and-retrieve missions thrown in for good measure, but they're super dull. For the most part, it's collect, craft, boss fight. Collect, craft, boss fight. Here's an example of the gameplay in video form:

This video shows one of the game's earliest quests: hunting a giant spider named Nerscylla. It's heavily edited for brevity.

Fighting, for what it's worth, feels pretty great. There's a huge range of weapons to choose from, and fighting with a Charge Blade -- a morphing weapon used for close combat -- feels completely different than fighting with a Gunlance, which feels completely different than fighting with a totally ranged weapon like a Bow. Regardless of your weapon choice, combat always feels deliberate, measured and fair. You have a stamina gauge, meaning you'll have to consider each move you make in order to not run out mid-battle. Much like in the Dark Souls series, enemies loop through different attacks, and you'll have to learn their visual tells to know what's coming next. There are specific ways to beat each enemy, and mistiming a hit or a dodge will be punished. All told, it's a very solid combat system, and the only times I felt like failure wasn't my fault were when I was hampered by the in-game camera.

I began playing MH4U on a 2DS. It was a total nightmare.

I'd always heard "the Circle Pad Pro is great for Monster Hunter," but I hadn't appreciated just how bad an experience I'd get playing with a 2DS. There's no Circle Pad Pro available for the 2DS, and without dual sticks the camera is controlled via the touchscreen (you can also auto-lock the camera to larger enemies). I lost count of the number of times I took damage because I was tapping away to adjust the camera.

The New Nintendo 3DS solves this issue by adding a little nub above the action buttons, which makes camera control much easier. I've clocked roughly 75 hours in MH4U -- 40 or so on the 2DS, and an additional 35 on the newer 3DS. Needless to say, it's a much, much better game with dual-stick controls, although it's still not ideal -- it's definitely better suited for a console, a PC or even the Vita.

The single-player game is just one half of the proposition here. As fans will no doubt tell you, teaming up with friends to tackle larger monsters is a huge part of what makes the game so popular. You can either play local (wirelessly with different consoles) or online, but the game treats progression in multiplayer and single player completely separately: You must repeat quests from each mode in order to progress. It's a little nonsensical, especially given how well other online titles handle this kind of thing. Think carefully about how you want to play MH4U before getting too invested in either mode.

There is a huge amount of content in MH4U. I can't think of any game that I've put 75 hours into only to feel like I'm nowhere near unlocking its most precious treasures. But it's all just... content?

In removing all of the trimmings and focusing purely on mechanics, Capcom created a ridiculously full, eerily empty game. There's a clear comparison to be drawn between the Monster Hunter series and Bungie's Destiny. Both make little attempt to hide their gameplay hooks behind story and intrigue. In the same way that I lost interest in Destiny's loot loops fairly quickly, I probably would've given up on MH4U if I hadn't promised to play it for 100 hours. I'm not the first to draw this comparison, of course, but I'm maybe the first to make it for negative reasons.

I might be able to deal with the exposed mechanics if MH4U nailed everything else, but in my experience it really doesn't. This is entirely subjective, of course, but I find the game's myriad creatures and locales to be really bland. Though there are one or two semi-interesting monsters, especially as you get further into the game, the majority looks uninspired. Fighting larger foes can be fun, especially with friends, but it would be way more rewarding if I didn't feel like I was hunting a reject from the new Jurassic World movie. Coupled with the finicky camera and lack of any meaningful story to keep me hooked, I found motivating myself to continue playing a real chore. About halfway through my ordeal, I ended up setting alarms every evening to force myself to pick up the 3DS and clock in a few more hours.

Concept art for Teostra, an elder dragon that originally appeared in 'Monster Hunter 2.'

So what can you learn from my experience? While it's definitely not for me, I'll concede that, if you own a 3DS and have any interest in action RPGs, you owe it to yourself to give MH4U a shot. It's way more accessible than previous incarnations, and you might enjoy it a lot. I'm pretty sure you could, with online play, get a good 150 hours out of it if you really get hooked, which, from a pure value perspective, is difficult to argue with.

But, if you don't have either a Circle Pad Pro or a New Nintendo 3DS, you're probably going to have a bad time. And if you value story and character design, you're probably going to have a bad time: If that describes you, don't give up 100 hours of your free time to find out. In case math isn't your strong point, I fell 25 hours short of my initial commitment, but 75 hours is a pretty good effort, given I wanted to set fire to it after just 20. Needless to say, I won't be volunteering to review Monster Hunter 5 any time soon.