Summary
Debuting all the way back in 2004, theMonster Hunterfranchise has enjoyed a pretty successful stint so far, gradually becoming more of a major franchise in the West with each new entry. Fromthe PS2 to the 3DS to the PS4, Xbox One, and now even the Nintendo Switch,Monster Hunterhas really gotten around over the last few decades, and naturally, when other games about fighting giant creatures come around, they’re usually compared directly toMonster Hunter. That’s been exactly the case for theHorizonseries.
Released in 2017,Horizon Zero Dawnsaw players take on the role of Aloy, a young woman in a seemingly prehistoric world filled with robot dinosaurs. ThoughMonster HunterandHorizon’s core gameplay loopsdiffer greatly, that hasn’t stopped countless comparisons over the years, and ifHorizon’s upcoming multiplayer spin-off wants to stand out, then it’s going to need to focus on its most unique qualities.
Horizon’s Multiplayer Game Needs to Double Down on Exploration
Monster Hunter Is All About the Fight
Though it’s seen its fair share of changes and evolutions over the last two decades,theMonster Hunterfranchisehas retained the same general gameplay loop since the very beginning. An average play-session of a mainlineMonster Huntergame will see players pick a target, prepare for the upcoming fight by crafting various consumables, gather their friends, head out on their hunt, track down a monster, slay it, harvest its corpse for resources, and bring that stuff back to camp to craft new gear and weapons so that they’re ready to do that all over again.
This loop is central totheMonster Hunterexperience, regardless of whether fans are playing solo or with friends. The entire core ofMonster Huntercenters around the fight, whether it’s getting prepared for it, the build-up to the climactic moment, or enjoying the spoils that come from it. WhileMonster Hunterhas continued to evolve over the years, this loop has remained, with Capcom choosing to just add to it rather than reinvent it with each new entry. It’s this loop that keepsMonster Hunterfans coming back time and time again.
Horizon Can Lean More Into Co-Op Adventure
While theHorizongames definitely put combat at the heart of the gameplay experience, it isn’t their sole focus.Horizonis an action/adventure series through and through, and the adventure part is just as important as the action. For every robot dinosaur that Aloy needs to hunt down and destroy, there are a handful of new areas to explore, new settlements to find, new NPCs to meet, new factions to learn about, and new collectibles to discover. Adventuring is half of the fun inHorizon, and it’s the thing that could really set its multiplayer game apart fromMonster Hunter.
Right now, nothing official has been confirmed aboutHorizon’s multiplayer game, with its existence only being talked about in interviews with various Guerrilla developers. This means that, currently, theHorizonmultiplayer game could be anything at all. But whatever the game ends up looking like, it should ensure that it leans all the way into the series' more adventure-focused side. Though combat should still feel just as great as ever, and play just as much of an important role in the gameplay experience, theHorizonmultiplayer game should focus more on giving friends the opportunity to explore a vast new world together.
Horizon
The Horizon franchise follows Aloy as she is forced to contend with a series of powerful, towering robotic creatures in a post-apocalyptic landscape. The third-person action-RPG has already seen a sequel with Horizon: Forbidden West and gives players the freedom to explore the open world as they see fit.
