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Monster Hunter Wilds does away with one of the series' most unique features - the Monster Hunter Language - but for a very good reason

We'll miss you, Monster Hunter Language, and your borderline nonsense sounds.

A still from Monster Hunter Wilds
Image credit: Capcom

One of the most remarkable things about the Monster Hunter series isn’t its huge monsters or lush landscapes. No, the thing that we’ve always found fascinating about Monster Hunter is that you could play most of the games in the totally made-up and mostly nonsense language that Capcom invented for the series. At least, until Monster Hunter Wilds comes along. But the developers have a good reason for removing the Monster Hunter Language option from the game.

Executive director Kaname Fujioka revealed that Monster Hunter Wilds won’t Monster Hunter Language as a dialogue option because otherwise, it wouldn’t make any sense to the player. “I’ve put a lot of focus on the story this time around,” he explained in an interview. “And right from the beginning of development, we’ve had discussions about how the storylines were developed.”

But the focus on the plot isn’t the only reason that Monster Hunter Wilds discards the in-universe language – which, admittedly, is made up of a bunch of nonsense words – in favor of real-world languages that make sense to the player. “From the perspective of immersing the player into that experience, the actual dialogue is human languages in multiple different localized versions, including – for the first time ever – the Hunter character themselves who actually has dialogue voice lines. So you can’t have all that changed to Monster Hunter Language, because I think it kind of wouldn’t make sense anymore as a storyline.”

On a surface level, we understand the reasoning behind the change; it would be frustrating for a player to be given dialogue options and have no idea what their character was saying. However, there is something sad about missing out on the Monster Hunter Language in the latest game. Though it will apparently be present in background conversations and the odd phrase slipped into the conversation, Monster Hunter Wilds will be the first game in the series to not have Monster Hunter Language as a full language option.


 

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Trent Cannon

Trent Cannon: Trent is a freelance writer who has been covering anime, video games, and pop culture for a decade. (He/Him)

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