"Prepare to lock yourself in your room until the next sequel comes out."

My first real game for the PSP was Monster Hunter Freedom. Before that, I had Medi-evil Resurrection, and I got that as a birthday present. I had seen MHF ads all over the place, it looked like a fun game, it was a Capcom game, and it made a killing in Japan. Not to mention it was my first game with any real blood or gore. Needless to say, I had high expectations.

210 hours of hardcore-game play later, I had barely scratched the surface. My expectations were met.

Then I heard that Monster Hunter Freedom 2 was coming out. I marked August 28th with "Here be Monsters" on my calendar, and waited.

Now, nearly eighteen months later, I hold this game in my hands, and my expectations have once again been fulfilled.

Monster Hunter was originally released on September 24, 2004 for the PS2. A follow-up, Monster Hunter G was released in Japan only. From there, Monster Hunter Freedom was released to massive success in Japan. Monster Hunter Dos was released in Japan, with no release in sight for America. The collective sigh by American gamers must have reached someone's ears, because we got Monster Hunter Freedom 2.

The premise of the Monster Hunter games is simple. You are an unnamed "Monster Hunter," usually newly recruited by your home village, which serves as your base of operations. You chose from a variety of quests to go out and hunt everything from Velociprey, which are raptor-like carnivores, to the Yian-Kut-Ku, a bird like-fire-spitting wyvern, to the flagship Rathalos, a formidable fire-breathing dragon. Simple concept, which translates into a highly deep game.

Game play: 10/10
As I've said, the premise of the game is easy: kill monsters. Each quest is started in your town, which in this case is the snow based village of Pokke [No Poke'mon jokes.]. From here, you can go to the Felyne Kitchen, where semi-anthropomorphic cats called Felynes cook for you, the Pokke Farm, where you can gather a small amount of items from upgradeable mines, fishing piers, and even a mushroom tree. You can also go to the Training School, where you take on Challenging monster fights that have fixed armor, forcing you to strategize, you can upgrade and forge new weapons, which there are apparently over 700 of, and armor, which there are apparentley over 1400 pieces of. And, of course, you can take on single-player quests from the Village Elder, who is for some reason a little old lady this time, and ad-hoc quests from the Guild Hall. Sadly, we have yet to get infrastructure compatibility without using XLink Kai.

And this brings us to the quests. There are three types of quests: Gathering quests (self explanatory), Slaying Quests (Kill x number of monsters), and Hunting quests (Kill x monster), along with some special quests. The bulk of the quests, Hunting quests, go something like this:

Find Monster. Beat Monster/get beaten by monster into a pulp. Monster runs away/you run away. Follow monster. Rinse and Repeat until monster is dead. Carve up monster for scales, hides, fangs, wings, etc.

With a formula like that, it would seem the game would get boring really fast. Yet, the variety of environments and monsters keeps the game entertaining. Weapons vary from Bow and Arrow to Bowguns to Hammers to Greatswords (think Cloud (and there's even a weapon called the Buster Sword!)) and more. Also, playing with friends can lead to even more game time. The only time it gets monotonous when you're just finishing up a group of quests and are about to unlock another 20 or so. Plus, it's REALLY addicting.

Controls: 8/10
This is where the game takes a hit. Most of the controls are fine: the analog stick to move, X is a dodge of some sort and a menu confirmation, Square uses an item or puts your weapon away, Triangle takes out your weapon and does various actions depending on the weapon, O exits from menus, allows you to interact with your environment, and does other weaponry-related actions. R lets you run, block, go into first-person, or do some sort of special attack depending on the weapon. L centers the camera and opens up an item selection window when held down. Start opens up a menu BUT DOES NOT PAUSE THE GAME! And Select does to almighty, honest-to-gosh last resort, kick. Which does nothing. But it's pretty funny to see a One-Man-Army run up and try to kick a huge beast to death.

But wait! What does the D-Pad do? Well, that's what got this an eight. The d-pad controls the camera. Well, what's the problem with that? The camera is fixed. So, if you turn around to get a better line of sight for your shot, the camera stays where it is. So you have your hunter facing the screen. Which wouldn't be a problem, but if you don't keep and eye on your prey at all times, your survival rate just plummeted. Which means that half the time you have a your index finger arched over the side of your PSP to hover over the D-Pad. Which hurts after a half-hour long hunt.

Story: N/A
There isn't really one to speak of.

Graphics: 10/10 (By PSP standards)
Beautiful landscapes, easily the best I've seen on a handheld. Wonderfully crafted enviroments, realistic monsters, and great textures. There's actually been one occasion where I realized that one of the monsters had eyes just like a humans, and walking up to it, I could see the eye in heavy detail. The water effects are spectacular, and a huge geyser of water is thrown up into the air when that swimming-freak-of-nature throws itself out of the water at you. And as a parting note: the bonus movies and title screen sequence is, in my opinion, on par with Halo 3's graphics. Stellar.

Sound: 9/10
Awesome orchestrated pieces are the name of the game here. A jungle beat plays out when fighting in the Jungle, well tune played on sitars and other stringed instruments is in the background while in the desert. Most monsters have their own unique theme, and the Monster Hunter fanfare appears quite a few times throughout the game. My only complaint is that it gets a little annoying by the late 200+ hours when you've heard most of the songs 20 or more times, but then you either tune it out or listen to an MP3 player.

Lasting Appeal: 11/10 : )
Seriously. Remember how I told you I had over 210 hours on the first game? I chickened out. The most hardcore gamers have around 500+ hours on it, and this one is shaping up to be the same. Think about it. 500+hours on the last one, and this one has even more stuff. Plus, Capcom has a download option, and are putting up new quests a little bit at a time. Also, with room for three save files, you can make a file for each weapon type. You can even import characters from Monster Hunter Freedom 1, for any other vets out there.

Final: 9/10
Buy it. And tell your friends to buy it. Seriously, this is possibly the best game I've ever played. Turn off Halo 3 long enough to try this. PLEASE. The camera really is bad, tho'.

Reviewer's Score: 9/10, Originally Posted: 10/01/07

Game Release: Monster Hunter Freedom 2 (US, 08/28/07)