We Need To Stop Giving 2025’s Most Over-Hyped RPG A Break

It is no small secret that 2025 has been a great year for RPGs. We’ve had some incredible releases like Kingdom Come: Deliverance 2 and Clair Obscur: Expedition 33, with even more to look forward to in the near future. Of course, while there have been a handful of duds, for the most part, RPG fans, and even those entirely new to the genre, have been well and truly spoiled. This is also following the undeniably amazing RPGs that were released in 2024, meaning there are easily 100s of hours of RPG goodness awaiting us lucky fans.

However, as much as I am grateful that 2025 has given us some of the very best RPGs ever made, I am frustrated that it has also given us one of the most over-hyped games in recent memory. This game has suffered a lot, yet fans continue to give it the benefit of the doubt. No matter how badly it and its developer mess up, its loyal fans stick behind it, and I don’t think it is helping. It is time this RPG got some tough love, especially if we all want its developer to do better in the future.

Monster Hunter Wilds’ Performance Is A Problem

It Is Making It Hard To Enjoy

Monster Hunter Wilds’ abysmal performance, particularly on PC, is a real problem. Right now, the PC port of the game remains largely unfixed, with tens of thousands of negative reviews flooding the game’s Steam store page in the desperate hopes of getting Capcom’s attention. MH Wilds is simply poorly optimized, requiring ridiculously powerful rigs to run the game, even on low settings, despite the game’s impressive, yet not nearly demanding enough, visuals.

Let’s not pretend that the issue is exclusive to PC either. While performance on console is far better, it is not uncommon to get stutters during intense fights or after fast traveling. Despite being glad I didn’t buy Wilds, I eventually caved, if only to be better acquainted with exactly why everyone is so intensely hating on it. I figured I’d be safe on PS5, but even there, I have run into more graphical and technical issues than most AAA games.

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If you’ve been waiting for the right time to jump back into Wilds, the second title update has more than enough content to warrant a new expedition.

Naturally, all of this has led to a rather aggressive Monster Hunter Wilds review bombing campaign, one that I assumed was full of sentiments shared by the majority of the fanbase. However, that doesn’t seem to be the case, as, for every negative review hoping Capcom will address the bad performance, at least on PC, there are fans defending the game, explaining that Capcom will fix it, eventually. Frankly, it is that kind of response that needs to change.

MH Wilds Isn’t The First Time

Monster Hunter Wilds is not the first time Capcom has released a terrible PC port of one of its games. Just last year, it released Dragon’s Dogma 2, a game that could barely run on any platform, let alone PC. That was a game I was genuinely hyped for, as I adore the original, but I really struggled to get into it, in large part thanks to its poor performance. It took Capcom far too long to address the many problems plaguing that game, and even now it isn’t fully fixed.

Capcom is taking the same elongated approach to fixing Monster Hunter Wilds as it did Dragon’s Dogma 2, and it is setting a bad precedent. Defending a developer that takes upwards of a year to fix a product that should have launched in a stable state is not a good idea. I didn’t see fervent fans defending CD Projekt Red when Cyberpunk 2077 launched in an unforgivable state, so it is strange to see such dogmatic dedication to Capcom for Wilds.

I’m not even about to say that Monster Hunter Wilds is bad, as it obviously isn’t. But it isn’t nearly good enough, at least in my opinion, to warrant such a defense of its evident flaws. Simply put, the good does not outweigh the bad when it comes to Wilds. Of course, there are plenty of ways Capcom can fix Wilds, but they will all take a very long time, and fans, especially those who are so eager to defend the developer, shouldn’t have to wait for them.

Especially The Open-World Ones

I wrote that Wilds’ performance, and specifically the reception to said performance, could mark the end of an era for Monster Hunter. I still stand by that sentiment, even if it is a tad dramatic. It isn’t so much that Monster Hunter is going to go away, but rather that fans won’t trust Capcom to deliver a new entry at the level of quality they have come to expect. Monster Hunter isn’t gone, but the era of unmitigated masterpieces is.

We will all come to expect that Capcom games will launch in a buggy, glitchy, laggy state, and not buy them at launch. Those who have nothing but time and patience on their hands are more than welcome to throw away money and then wait a year before the product they paid for is usable.

However, I’m not expected to do that with any other product I buy, so I shouldn’t have to put up with that for a video game. Imagine having to wait a year to be able to properly use a new fridge, TV, or washing machine you bought. Capcom needs to better optimize its games prior to launch, especially its open-world titles.

This level of terrible performance doesn’t typically plague its more linear releases, so there is clearly an issue with the RE Engine handling open-world spaces. If Capcom prioritizes optimization and ensures that whatever its next Monster Hunter or open-world game it releases is in a stable state, then it will recover some of its lost good grace. For now, I advise everyone to stop giving Capcom a break for Wilds’ terrible performance and be wary of its future open-world RPGs.

Source: Steam

Monster Hunter Wilds

Systems

8/10

Released

February 28, 2025

ESRB

T For Teen // Violence, Blood, Crude Humor

Engine

RE Engine

Multiplayer

Online Multiplayer, Online Co-Op

Cross-Platform Play

Yes, all platforms