'Monster Hunter World' Is The Fastest-Selling Capcom Game In History
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Monster Hunter World, the AAA console title that expands on past handheld games and the series’ PlayStation origins, is doing supremely well, and is one of the first big gaming success stories of the year. I have to believe the common thought around the Capcom offices right now is “why did we wait so long to do this?”
In the three days after launch, Capcom announced that Monster Hunter World had shipped 5 million copies. Now that number is 6 million, and Capcom has officially announced that it’s the fastest-selling game they’ve ever made. Yes, this is Street Fighter Capcom, Mega Man Capcom, and Resident Evil Capcom, but Monster Hunter World has bested them all.
Monster Hunter World is also sitting pretty on top of the paid charts on both PSN and Xbox Live, beating out even PUBG on Xbox Live which is really saying something. And all of these records being broken come before its PC release down the road, which will boost its fortunes further.
Why is Monster Hunter World doing this well? I think it’s kind of a perfect storm of events:
This has been ages in the making – Monster Hunter fans have been waiting for a high-end console game like this for eons, and the final product did not disappoint.
The game is both accessible but challenging – There’s a lot to learn at the outset of Monster Hunter World, but not so much where I think it will fully overwhelm players. It’s also difficult, but more about patience than absolutely requiring tons of skill to progress. Where in Dark Souls you’ll just die on repeat as you learn, in Monster Hunter, your fights will probably just take longer until you master the game, the difficulty curve is well designed for all audiences.
It’s a looter, and a good one – We are living in an age when loot-based games like Destiny, The Division and Warframe are among the most popular games among fans right now, and Monster Hunter is bringing something new but fun to the genre. Rather than sprinkle the ground with loot drops, Monster Hunter offers clear goals and paths to farm monster-made armor sets and weapons, which is a welcome alternative to much of the RNG-based drops of other games.
It’s a great streaming game – In this day and age, stream appeal is incredibly important, and it’s a great game for either streamers to goof around with friends during chaotic, multiplayer monster hunters, which can end up being hilarious, or for ultra-high end players to farm the hardest content in the game so viewers can watch in awe.
No loot box drama – A game free from microtransaction controversies is a rarity, especially in this genre, but Monster Hunter World lets the game itself do the rewarding, not your wallet.
All of these combine to make a title with pretty mass appeal, despite the fact that it’s a series that at least some measure of the public has not been terribly familiar with, as it’s been more popular overseas and on handheld devices in recent years than in the west. But this is a clear crossover title that will have a long lifespan and hopefully, many sequels as Capcom capitalizes on its success.
We don’t know exactly what’s next for Monster Hunter World, though Capcom promises “more monsters” (duh) which will keep players playing for a good long while. It’s cool to see this game succeed to this degree, and I predict a long and health life for both MHW and future games in the series to come.
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