Series veterans will also encounter a number of quality of life improvements - from the way you explore biomes with wirebugs to using the camera in the heat of battle with gyro controls.
However, though the on-boarding is better than ever, there’s still a learning curve for newcomers, and so our list of Monster Hunter Rise tips for beginners will help you get to the good stuff as fast as possible.
For more help on Monster Hunter Rise, check out our weapon types list and explainers on how to capture monsters, accessing High Rank and finding great wirebugs.
Monster Hunter Rise does well to chart a course through all that for new players, but stray away from that path and it’s easy to get lost in all the many things that Monster Hunter offers - Meowcenaries! The Argosy! Buddy training! - but don’t be intimidated by it all.
It’s easy enough to ignore all that and come back to it later once you’ve grasped the fundamentals, and you won’t be penalised for doing so.
These are split up as Village quests and Hub quests, and are picked up from two different vendors. The simplest distinction is that Village quests are single player only, while the Hub quests can be played both solo and in multiplayer.
Village quests are best considered an introduction to Monster Hunter Rise. Not only do they introduce concepts of the game more gradually, but the monsters within are easier to take down. Whether you’re new to the series or not, it’s best to start there.
The Hub is where the end game of Monster Hunter Rise thrives, especially as the addition of multiplayer allows you to execute more elaborate strategies.
The good news is that as you progress through to the later stages of the Village questline, you can complete licences which jump you up the Hub quest structure.
These are pretty challenging - tasking you with hunting multiple creatures in one go - but means you aren’t starting over from scratch, and can get to High Rank hunts faster.
The wirebug opens up maps to an incredible degree, and introduces a whole new layer to combat - it’s worth spending some time simply strolling around new areas and seeing where your wirebug can take you, as with a couple of well-timed bursts you can reach pretty much anywhere, or make any shortcut possible.
Likewise, don’t forget to lean on your new wirebug attacks, which can make a devastating addition to your combos and can seriously eat into a monster’s health.
There are a handful of options to cater to various tastes - you can just have the gyro enabled for aiming, which makes getting about with wirebugs much zippier, and makes ranged weapons much more palatable.
Or you could have it turned on for camera control too - our own preference - which means movement and placement are that much more precise, which in a game like Monster Hunter Rise makes all the difference.
The camera’s a much better behaved beast than it was in the past, though, and there’s a few handy tools to make things that much easier.
First of all, do see if gyro control is to your liking as it gives you more fidelity, and even if it’s not it’s worth remembering you can always snap to the direction of the monster you’re hunting with a touch of the shoulder button - something that’s easy to forget in the heat of combat, but something that can more often than not prove to be a lifesaver.
Speak to anyone with a speech bubble in the village (press and hold the minus button to open the map and shortcut your way to each one) and they’ll typically have a request for you.
These are often simple tasks that are worth fulfilling, such as finding a rock lizard - as the rewards are more than worthwhile, whether that’s new dango varieties that grant you stat boosts, giving you great wirebugs to act as shortcuts to higher locations, or unlocking whole new camps that make getting to your prey that much quicker.
They’re also often a nice way to unwind away from the action and drama of mainline monster hunts - and allow you to go resource gathering for ores and bones.
As well as getting stuck into battle, it’s also a boon for exploring. Press and hold the A button when it’s nearby, and you’ll start riding - allowing you to traverse any biome far faster than you would on your own two legs. Even better is the ability to use potions, sharpen your weapons, and gather resources as you go - so there’s no need to hop off each time.
Though mastering the wirebug is still highly recommended, the canine palico is also useful if you need a quick getaway during battle, or to stay mobile while a monster calms down during a frenzied phase - we recommend relying on one during your first encounter with Magnamalo, which can really punish you if you’re in its way.
Learn how to start Sunbreak - the first expansion - and from there, how to unlock Master Rank, use Switch Skill swap, and progress onward with our Monster Hunter Sunbreak walkthrough.
There’s also a monsters list, as well as individual pages on beating Garangolm, Lunagaron and Shogun Ceanataur.
For the base game, we have a number of Monster Hunter Rise tips and lists of ore locations, bone locations, weapon types, how to use Insect Glaives and Kinsects, details of how to join friends in multiplayer, how to capture monsters and learn about wirebugs and great wirebugs.
You’ll want to investigate everything you see; honey is particularly useful as it will automatically be crafted into Mega Potions if you have regular Potions on you, while ores and bone piles have their own weapon trees, allowing you to use your monster parts on other things.
There’s a lot out there, and thankfully, you can pick up everything at a sprint or on the back of a palico.
If you get stuck on an Urgent quest, then it’s worth going through the list of armour you can craft and cobbling together random pieces from what you have gathered so far - a helmet here, some gloves there - to raise your overall defence level. Remember, ores and bones also allow you to forage materials instead of carving them for certain upgrades, plus individual armour pieces from the smaller creatures are quick and easy to make.
That said, if you really enjoyed a particular hunt or love the look of a particular monster- we were huge fans of the Bishaten fight, for example - then it’s incredibly rewarding to take the time to farm a complete set. But don’t feel you have to - we recommend pressing on until the Hub and the High Rank before that, where you’ll get the most out of your time and effort.
