I’ve mentioned numerous times the obscure and obtuse systems that make MHW run so well.  Nergigante is a solid example of that.

Imagine if you will, a giant dragon that continually grows thorns, and if those thorns grow numerous enough, it will throw them at you for a 1 shot kill.  There really isn’t a good way to avoid him using the skill, but enough damage will break the thorns and delay the attack.  Further, the deadliest attack is a dive bomb that not only can kill you straight on, but will explode the thorns sideways as well.  Fun times.

Now onto the obscure systems – namely food and diving.

Food

Food items are based on type and color.  Any increment of 2 (2, 4 or 6) provides a larger benefit.  Food types provide either attack, defense or resists in small/medium/large amounts.  Food colors have a chance of providing a specific buff – there are 6 color types.  One of the most notable ones is from 6 blue items, which can provide a buff that gives 1 free death per quest.  The catch is that ingredients can only be used once per quest, and that buffs can only be triggered if the ingredients are fresh (random if they are, per quest).  You can use a voucher to assure that they are fresh, but you are severely limited in vouchers.  And additional ingredients are found in quests…so it’s unlikely to have say, 6 blue fish before you’re all the way at the end.  And this doesn’t count random daily buffs from food.

All of this is provided in a 2 paragraph tutorial screen that sums to say “eat food before eating to get benefits”.  I needed to test each food combo, click a button to get a description of the skill, then cancel and repeat.  Fun times!

TLDR: Always be eating.

Diving

There are many avoidance moves, depending on a few factors.  Most weapons allow you to roll out of the way, though movement speed can be slow for large weapons.  Some provide a side lunge attack to close the distance, or to run away. Understanding how those moves works allows you to stay away from the face, and focus on the sides without getting hit.

Then there’s superman.  This is achieved by sheathing your weapon, pressing run and dodge at the same time.  You will launch yourself on your belly and for most of that duration, be immune to damage.  The catch here is that each weapon takes a different amount of time to put away, and you need stamina to dive.  One of the only effective ways to avoid Nergigante’s dive bomb attack is to use this move.

It took me way too long to figure out this invincibility bit, and once I did, Nergigante became a different fight altogether.

(Side note.  Diving/jumping from ledges acts differently if you have your weapon out or not.  Ledges can act as walls in some cases)

Free Addition: Flash Pods

Flashbugs can be turned into Flash Pods.  You can have up to 10 of the former, and 3 of the latter.  Using this on your sling attack will cause a monster to be disoriented. Using it on a flying dragon causes them to fall down and get slightly stunned.

Flash Pods have a ~90% success rate.  Be sure the monster is affected before running over.

TLDR: Always have Flash Pods.

The more I play of this, the more I realize the sheer stupid pleasure of a grind.  Where else would I play for 45 minutes, fail in a spectacular fashion, and still have a smile?  It seems like every single action taken, no matter how small or large, provides some movement forward.  I learn a new skill nuance, I learn new timing, I get a new ingredient for a buff, I find a new gem, I get the last piece to craft that piece of gear.  And there’s a lot of joy heading back and smacking some heads that took me to town not too long ago!

I’ve done a fair chunk of hunting now.  Nowhere close to some other people, but enough to have a general idea of what’s going on.  One thing I’ve come to terms with is that Monster Hunter World is complicated and obtuse – something that will push people away.

Sure, at the most basic level you run through environments and kill really big monsters.  And you can do just that, until the Anjanath (T-Rex battle).  From there on, there are some rather large walls that need to be breached.  My thoughts on that.

Weapons

Try them all out in your personal quarters.  The trial mode isn’t super, but it works enough.  Realize that the Horn is meant for group play only, and that the 2 ranged weapons are much better suited for group play but can work solo.  Blunt weapons will work to stun an enemy on the head, and sharp weapons will be able to cut off tails.  Tails, in nearly all cases, are very dangerous and cutting one off makes some battles pretty easy.

Keep a “normal” weapon with no elemental damage at maximum upgrade rank, and use it for all new quests where you’re not sure what enemy you’re going to face.  It is also quite useful for missions where you fight multiple enemies with different resistances.  After that, you want to have a weapon of each damage element type – they make a massive difference.

Use the Wishlist feature (triangle on PS4) to track items.  It took me too long to figure out the use for this.  Great for when you’re tracking materials for 5 items at once.

Some weapon effects are greyed out.  They need the Free Elem/Ammo Up armor skill to activate.  Charms and a few armor pieces have this.

Armor

My rule of thumb now is that your defense level be equal to the Assigned Mission level x 10.  So if you’re on mission 12, then have at least 120 defense.  Low defense means you die faster, and you will get hit in long battles for various reasons.  Having high defense means you can ignore most mechanics and just go to town.

Resistances are good too, and you want to stay as close to neutral as possible.  In particular for Fire attacks.  You can use buffs to help with this instead of armor if need be, but keep it in mind.

Armor skills are great to have, but you’ll find yourself worrying about the above more than this for the middle part of the game.  Decorations (gems) and Charms (necklace) can add some extra skills without impacting armor.

Tools

Mantles and gizmos provide all sorts of benefits.  You’ll get the Gillie Mantle first, which hides you from combat.  Great to heal, or sharpen a blade.  You’ll find other types through optional quests that increase resistances, damage, or other useful features.  Each has a timer for re-use.  I personally like the healing mist tool, as I can put it down and the effects last for quite a while.

Palico

You Palico is very useful.  Their weapon type is great for inflicting status on enemies, not so much for damage.  The Palico can’t die but will be stunned for a bit if it takes too much damage.  Not much value in the armor here, except for cosmetic reasons.  Palico tools though… that’s good stuff.

Each zone has a Grimalkyne base, they looks like Palicos.  The icon on the map is 4 white icons.  Each has a quest involved, which rewards you with a tool and the ability for your Palico to ride a smaller animal in combat.  The solid one is from the Rotten Vale (zone 4), which is a Plunder Blade.  This thing allows your Palico to loot more items from combat… extremely useful when you are looking for ingredients.  And of note, each of the tools has 10 levels, gained through use.  Each level improves the function of the tool.  The Vigorwasp tool should be used for any new enemy, allowing you more room to learn.

Also of note, Palicos are not in battles with 3 or more players, but still gain experience.

Safaris / Argosy / Tree

These are free-ish loot events.  The Palico safaris unlock with zone 4, and you select a group of Palicos to spend 5 quests collecting items.  Their skill level needs to match/exceed the events in the quests.  Good to find some specific resources.

The Argosy is a rotating vendor, with 3 packages.  You can select the type of package for the next round.  I’ve found a few rare items here.

The Tree allows you to plant items that grow after every quest. There are more additional quests to plant extra things, grow them faster, and have more space to collect.  I use it solely to generate Zenny (gold).  Has uses.

Food

This is way more complicated than I like.  Long story short, eat before every mission.  For monsters that you consider easy, choose the Attack buff food, otherwise focus on Defense.  Food has a 10 minute timer before you can eat again, and if you die you lose the buff.

Complete optional quests in order to unlock more food types.  They have a big impact in the buffs food provides.

Nutrients also provide temporary food-like buffs.  You should not need any until you’re at the very high rank battles.

Quest Types

Assignments are the main story missions.  One time events (sort of ) that cannot be repeated.  They unlock more zones and more options.  These are the walls you need to breach with better weapons & armor.

Optional Quests provide 1 time benefits (extra food, items, gear) and are repeatable.  There’s no reason to do them more than once, with an exception.  Some main mission battles against Elder Dragons show up here after you’ve completed the assignment.  They randomly appear, with 2 attempts each.  Strongly recommend doing these.

Investigations are repeatable quests that focus on a specific activity, on a specific target.  Kill 20 wasps, capture an Anjanath, and so on.  Unlocking more is based on a ton of things.  Finding more tracks, killing monsters, looting items… just normal play will unlock more of them.  After a while, you’ll want to delete the lower ranked ones to make place for higher ranked events.

Bounties – these are not exactly quests but collection missions that can be completed at any time.  They unlock additional hunting sites, more food, more storage… very useful things.

The general order of things for me is

1. Assigned quests until I hit a wall
2. Optional quests that unlock needed items
3. Investigations for specific enemies where I know I need their drops

Captures

This investigation type provides additional loot, but requires some extra steps.  You have to bring the enemy down to near-death status (often shown by a limp).  Then you need to lay down a trap for the monster to walk through – lightning works best.  That’s a Thunder Bug (in zones) and a Trap Tool (from town).  Then stand at the head and throw at least 2 Tranq Bombs (Sleep Flower + Parashroom – both in the zones).  If you are prepared, these are actually easier than regular fights.

Big Monster Battles

Some general tips.

• Pay attention to attack patterns.  They often chain together.
• Understand your weapon, how much time it takes to attack, and how long you cannot move.
• Do not attack any enemy head on.  They will bite, or shoot something at you.  Attack the head from the side.
• If you have a sharp weapon, always sever the tail.  It provides more loot, and removes a painful attack.
• Attack from above where possible.  Jump, and attack in the air when close to the enemy.  You may mount them, or provide a ton of damage, while avoiding most.
• You want to see reddish numbers when attacking.  And large numbers.  Each part of the enemy has different armor levels on the body.  Pay attention to the numbers.
• Enemies will change location in battle after a specific set of time, and sometimes after a certain amount of damage is dealt.
• If another large monster shows up, step away and watch the fireworks.  There’s nothing worse than getting a fireball in the back.  Bazelgeuse in particular does this.
• Keep weapon sharpness in mind.  You always want it to be “in the green”.  Yellow will do with weaker enemies, but won’t be able to hit tougher ones.  Always sharpen when you’re tracking a monster after they run away.
• Negative effects are super useful.  Stun is obvious.  Sleep allows you to lay down bombs (always carry 2).  Paralyze negates their abilities, though they still shuffle.  Poison does some minor damage over time.  Blast is a lategame skill that acts a bit like poison – but the damage is all at once instead of overtime.
• Elderseal only impacts elder dragons.
• If you can’t kill a monster in the 50 minute timeslot, upgrade your weapons and pay attention to resists.

Monster Hunter feels like a game of plateaus, sprinkled with randomness.  There’s something to be said about hunting a dragon for 45 minutes, then taking it down with a fraction of life remaining.

The randomness first.  Enemy behavior is based on code.  They have specific move patterns, and those patterns can change based on a few factors, mostly environmental.  If there’s another large prey around, expect a battle between them.  If they are under 25% hp, expect them to enrage and use a different skill set.  Some movement patterns are restricted due to the space on the map – space between you or space to the wall.  The randomness is which of these skills are used, against which target.

Diablos has 2 killer moves – a quick rush and a burrow attack. Both pick a target, beeline to them, and can shift a few feet left/right.  They can also trigger this move without a whole lot of warning.  Or you can stumble on a rock, or a bush.  Or just run out of stamina and get stunned.  Or, you can take a minor hit that knocks you down, and then he’ll charge you for a quick trip back to base.  That’s a bugger.

Randomness at low percentages plays against you the longer the fight draws on.  Say it’s a 5% chance of a tweak to a move that can kill you.  If he uses that move every 30 seconds, then your odds of seeing that tweak are a lot higher after 30 minutes than after 2.

WeaponTiers

Weapons have a clear tier structure, and each increases some portion of power.  For the quarter of the game, it’s just numbers.  More damage = quicker fights.  After that point, elemental damage plays a much larger role.  For the 4 basic elements (ice, thunder, fire, water) it’s pretty obvious that the damage is welcome.  Dragon is a bit different – enemies that deal that damage are usually weak to it.  This is weapon #6.

Why have a normal damage weapon?  For quests that require you to take down more than 1 enemy, who have competing resistances, and for times when you need to explore a map and don’t know what you’re going to find.

There’s a fair chunk of grinding to get the pieces needed for each item.  Thankfully there are wishlists that let you know once you have all the parts.  Still.. having to take on a 20 minute hunt for 2 items, and only 1 drops at a time, that’s a bugger.

Armor

Oh what a fun thing you are.  They say “defense wins championships” and that is certainly the case with MHW.  There are some fights where you will simply die in a single strike.  Diablos is one.  Pink Rathian is another.  It is not possible to avoid all damage due to the randomness listed above.  You can certainly avoid the big hits for a long time, but eventually you’re going to get hit.

There are 3 ways to reduce the impact of the damage – armor, resistances, and buffs.

Armor is pretty straightforward.  You have 5 slots, each with a number.   If you are in starting gear (for the skills on the gear), then you likely have ~30 armor total.  You need more like 150 to take a hit from Diablos.  I am at 171 now and I’m sure I could use a boost to something better.  But then I’d be giving up a lot of skills, which is a tough trade off.

Resistances are a pretty straightforward % decrease to specific attacks.  You want more fire resist to be able to take a fireball hit.  This is tough enough since a piece with a decent armor score and a decent skill may have a negative resistance score.  I find that the most important two are Fire (burning) and Thunder (stun).

Finally buffs – either from armor (defense boost), food (defense (L)), or nutrients.  These are extremely useful.  The downside to food and nutrients is that they are temporary, and food buffs cannot be reapplied for 10 minutes.  In the 2nd half of the game, there’s a chance that the mission will not start at a camp base, meaning that you really should be eating before leaving.  It’s a bugger when you die before that timer is done.

Breaking a Wall

There are two parts here.  Damage is what you need to kill a monster before the timer expires, and to reduce the chances of having a bad random event.  You need to have the best weapon possible, based on the available list, with the appropriate damage type – at the very least the “neutral” damage weapon should be always at max.

Armor is what you need to survive those bad events.  It allows you to experiment with new tactics and figure out how to optimize future runs.  If you are dying in 1-2 hits, then this is where you need to invest.

The more I think about this, the more I think about training wheels.

Great games have a large amount of complex, intertwined systems that allow for player agency.  You can pull a string here, and then something way down the road changes – EvE is a good example.  Amazing games have the ability to simplify this complexity, allowing for a “easy to play, difficult to master” gameplay model.  It’s a tough balance though, as often times the simplicity takes precedence and the complex under-systems get cut (looking at you WoW).

Further, many games have a tutorial (either in name or in practice) that gate the complex content until further along the process.  I don’t mean power gating, where your attack power or defense gets improved.  More like moving from ground combat to air attackers, or putting in active dodging.  The content available is typically linear, so as not to drown the player in complexity.  Smaller drips and tests, then move on.  A few games have systems that are so complex that they just put it all out there to start (most survival games).

Monster Hunter takes an interesting approach, in that the intertwining complex systems are generally available at the start.  You have 14 weapons.  You have armor.  There are tons of enemies in the first area.  Nearly all the quest types are available.  From there to the Anjanath, it’s a fairly gradual skill progress.  There are minor systems, but nothing terribly obvious or complex.

Then you open up the other half of the game after a couple missions. The maps turn vertical. Charms show up.  Environmental damage.  Modified armor and skills that stack. A very large weapon tree. I recall the start of the game going about 4 hours before understanding even the basic items, then it sort of worked out.  I feel that this is quite similar to a system dump of options, bordering on overload.  It gives that feeling that you have to do everything rather than focus on what’s important.

Compounding this is the concept of optimization.  Often, you move from one mundane task into more complex ones.  Finding a way to stop doing the mundane.  For example, in UO I spent a lot of time mining to supply my blacksmith with materials.  After a while, I had enough money to just buy the ore and produce at a much larger volume for the same time investment.  Other games have power curves, where enemies simply die faster since you are stronger – orders of magnitude stronger.

That is much less evident in Monster Hunter.  The first time you take on any big game it’s usually a 20 minute battle.  Your power goes up sure, but you’re still not talking about taking down a TRex in 5 hits.  The monster will still run away, evade attacks, you’ll get knocked down.  You can still die in a few hits if you’re not paying attention.

I guess that’s part of the complexity.  Your skill is as much a factor as the power and tools at your disposal.  And the factors you need to take into account just continually grow over time. I certainly feel like I’ve improved dramatically since the start.  I can read tells, avoid specific areas, spot beneficial items at a distance, know when it’s a smart move to sharpen the blades…all tiny things that combined make a large difference.

I have to say, I’m continually impressed after every session.

The gate has been breached.

The concept of “the zone” isn’t a new one. It’s been used in professional sports for some time.  For most people, the closest we get is when we roll 2 Yathzees in the same game.  Something in the air just lines up perfect and boom, things are going your way.  I’ve had sequences in D&D where the rolls were just non-stop crits (off-setting the times where I couldn’t hit a barn).

The seems to be more common in games with an element of chance.  For multiplayer games, this chance is the other people playing with/against you.  Maybe they all line up for a group headshot.  Maybe your team sequences their special attacks to put up a wall of invincibility & death.  A pre-made group has better odds of this, as you’re reducing the number of chances for negative outcomes and more of the positive.  I get the adrenaline rush of this, and counter, I understand why the toxic side comes out when random is random.

But single player games… woo.  The game number crunching is where you need to fit.  In some places it’s about learning the timing (Ninja Gaiden), in others it’s about the stars aligning with the pebbles on the beach (most open world games).  We’ve all seen some of the Zelda/Switch videos… where the open world allows for tremendous experimentation and super fast runs.  Awesome Games Done Quick is an event that celebrates speed runs, and is predicated on every second being in the zone.

But for mortal folk, we pray to the gaming gods for that one event, that one single run where everything goes perfect and you are more of a passenger than a participant.

T-Rex Attack

I upgraded a few bits and went back in with some bombs. I took it a bit slower once I found him, hoping to surprise him.  Which did work out.

There’s a particular move set that only occurs when you are above your prey.  You jump on their back/head and go saiyan. I managed to do that.  I was riding a T-Rex like a bucking horse.   It was glorious.

After he finally threw me off, he decided to run away.  I tried coaxing him back for the same type of attack but that wasn’t in the cards.  I did end up hitting him a few more times in the legs, enough for him to run off.

Right into a Rathalos.  A giant flying, fire breathing, poison striking beast of an enemy.  He picked up the T-Rex like he was a doll, then threw him on the ground (cue music).  Great.

He ran away, I jumped on his head once more and then he was limping off.  I had not realized where he kept his lair in the past.  Always too dead to make way there.  Anyhow, he ends up in the large tree area, where there are multiple floors, each acting like a trampoline.

For some reason he decides to take a nap.  Great time to lay out some bomb barrels.  A few explosions and he’s in the death throws.  Now, a few-ton T-Rex moving on a trampoline means that I am not moving.  It took another 5 minutes before I could find solid footing.  And once I did, a single hit to the back of the leg was what took him down.

Now, I’m not saying every dice roll was a natural 20.  But I am saying that I didn’t roll a single 0, and that once I did roll those 20s, it was glorious.

Now onto collecting some bugs.

The quest – loot – upgrade cycle is underway.  I cleared out the main quests until Anjanath, the giant T-Rex with wings.  I upgraded my weapons as far as they could go.  I took out the baddies.  I looted and crafted and stabbed my way through a fair chunk of events.  I was taking out the mud-fish Jyuratodus with good efficiency.  Even the lightning-flying squirrel (Tobi Kadachi) wasn’t too bad.  T-Rex time!

I died in 2 hits.  1 hit that bit me, the other was a charge that took out 70% of my hit points.

Back to the drawing board.  Anjanath is big, and fire based.  So fire resistant armor and water weapons seems logical… let’s see.

Capturing Monsters

Capt Mud-fish is water based and I needed some loot from him.  Figuring out the loot dropped from him the first place was more guessing than anything.  I checked the investigation board for a quest and all I could find was the capture line.

Captures require you to drop them to ~80%, drop a trap, then stand in front of their heads and throw smoke bombs at them.  Then pray it works and they don’t eat you.  Oh, and you need to craft the traps and smoke bombs from environmental loots.  Well, not exactly true – you need a trap tool that’s bought in town, and can only carry 2 of them on you (more in your stash).  Anyways, long story short and my first capture was a complete failure until I understood those points.  Second attempt worked just fine.

Back to Leg Attacks

I really like the speed of dual blades.  The damage potential is amazing, if you can get everything to hit.  The full demon-mode super swing is like 20 attacks in a row.

The downside is that everything is always moving and hitboxes on legs are quite small.  It’s that age-old DPS simulation issue.  If everyone was Patchwerk (nothing but a meat wall), then dual blades would dominate everything.  If I can knock down something, then it’s insane the amount of damage that can be pumped out.  But that doesn’t really happen.

I tried another 3 times (max per quest) and wasn’t able to get much farther.  I’m going to have to do some more studying of this bugger and likely further upgrade my armor with speheres to take more hits.  It really isn’t that he hard to read, it’s that you can’t really make a mistake.  And mistakes are bound to happen due to the trees/cliffs/junk strewn about.  Even a wandering monster is enough to muck it up.

So that plan — shore up defenses, find a better spot to fight, try a better in/out attack pattern, and maybe, just maybe, load up on fire barrels.

I still don’t really know what I’m doing in Monster Hunter World. It’s fun to play and experiment with the mechanics, but I am quite lost.

I can see that I can upgrade my weapon to something better, but I can’t tell what pieces I am missing to make that upgrade, or where they drop.  I just end up going with the flow of the game.

I can see that I can craft a whole bunch of items.. traps included.  Not why why I need them just yet though, or how to better manage my inventory of all the things I’ve collected.  Do I need spiderwebs?

There are quite a few quest types.  The main mission ones (assigned), optional ones (I think I can repeat them), investigations, deliveries, bounties and then open world exploration.  They are offered by different folk, with different criteria, for different rewards (that I don’t quite understand yet either).  Quite honestly, this game could be in a completely different language and I don’t think that would matter.

I will say that the act of Monster Hunting is a lot of fun.  I’ll see if I can get a video of it up.  I use Dual Blades, which are a very close ranged weapon, with set animations.  These animations cannot be cancelled, so you may end up pressing a combo that locks you for a second or two… and then the big monster hits you.  Timing becomes extremely important, as well as understanding hit boxes.  I’ve become partial to a slice and dash combo that does decent work.  And when I see the monster setting up something large, I go for the 6 second demon slash combo that just looks like ginsu knives.

I will say that this is the first time I have ever been in the middle of a fight with a giant monster and been distracted by collecting footprints.  That is very weird.  One second I’m slicing away, avoid jaws of death, and then “ooooh, a doodle” and off I go.

Anyhow, in terms of main quest the Pukei Pukei is down. A giant flying T-Rex appeared in the middle of that fight.  I did what anyone would do, and ran away.  Which was cool, because more footprints/mucous/doodles!

If all of this seems like the ramblings of a mad man, yes.  That is true.  I feel like a madman.  I barely understand how all the pieces fit together and that’s just fine be me.  It’s a level of fun I haven’t had in some time.  And that’s the main reason I play any game.

I am a Monster Hunter neophyte.  It was on my radar as a potential game, though the PC date of “fall 2018” doesn’t really inspire much confidence.  I never pre-order, and after some rather positive vibes and initial reviews, I figured what the heck and picked up a copy at my local game store.  (Side note, the reservations were low, but reviews were high, so their stock was near empty.  Brick and mortar stores in igloo-town have the same price point as online stores, just faster delivery.)

Syp would be happy with the character creation tool.  Everyone is human, mind you, but the options are pretty neat.  And you can customize your cat butler.  After spending a bit too long in this section (wonder if you can change it later…) I started up the main game.

It’s rare to start a game without training wheels these days.  Following the intro mission, which is just an interactive cut-scene, the game opens up pretty much every single system at once.  Every weapon type, crafting, eating, mission types, scanning… everything.  There’s a breadcrumb system to lead you through it, but it is a lot to absorb at once.

How are you supposed to select a weapon style from 14 options?  I barely caught that there was a training scenario were I could test them out, and even then, it’s about pacing swings more than understanding the nuances of each.  I opted for dual blades – short range, slash damage, has a super saiyan mode.

I finished the first quest, which boiled down to “kill 7 bears”.  There are items all over the place to pick up.  Either as slingshot ammo, gear crafting, potion crafting, food crafting… I don’t rightfully understand it.  The end of the mission gives you some time to collect the big bad guy.  I did learn that spamming the collect button makes it go a lot faster.  I also learned that the default action after ending a run is “sell all”.  Which is not what I would have expected, since all that loot is needed to make stuff.

Return to town and I opted to craft some stuff.  The weapon crafting is just… I thought that Path of Exile was obtuse in skill points… this thing is something else.  It’s a giant tree of options, none of which you know what they are until you craft them.  There are plenty of paths, and you can undo the choices (great!)  Impressive.  The armor crafting is a bit simpler, in that there are distinct items with benefits.  You can mix and match pieces, and each one has a linear power upgrade.  That seems simple enough.

I don’t quite get food/potion crafting yet.  I’m sure that will come.

I don’t quite understand monster research either.  I did some investigation on footprints and mucus and so one, but I don’t quite get the relation to the active mission, rather than eventually unlocking more info outside.  It appears I break a leg… but I did nothing but attack legs and nothing broke.  I’m sure it will make itself clear.

I’m up to the Pukei-Pukei mission.  Very early on, but still a couple hours in.  It’s going to take a while for me to figure out exactly how all the pieces fit together.  It seems somewhat obvious that each system works with the others, I just don’t see all the links yet.

I will say that I greatly enjoy the art, music, and setting this game presents.  The world feels lived in, which is quite an achievement.  Items and services seem to be placed with purpose, and the various wildlife interacts with each other.  The time I spent was simply lost to looking around.  It’s a great feeling when 2 hours go by and it feels like 15 minutes.

There’s more digging and swinging to do.  I’m not convinced for the need to go online yet, but maybe once I get a better hang of things.  Should be a fun ride.