14 DAY TRIAL // Capcom must be pleased with itself. The company has just announced that Monster Hunter Freedom United, the latest title in the successful series, has sold more than 3.5 million units in Japan, making it the first videogame released for the PlayStation Portable from Sony to go past that milestone.
In the Land of the Rising Sun, the game is known as Monster Hunter Portable 2nd G and was initially released in March 2008. It has sold very well from the beginning and managed to keep popping up in the charts thanks to the release of a Greatest Hits edition, which saw a lower place. This “The Best” version accounted for about 1 million units of the 3.5 million sold during the life time of the game.
Monster Hunter Freedom Unite only arrived in Europe and in North America in June this year, with Capcom hoping to capitalize on the strong performance the game had in Japan. To that end, it has put up a big advertising campaign and is offering bundles and a PlayStation Portable console in order to encourage players to pick it up.
Monster Hunter is a very quirky game at its core as it focuses on players fighting, solo or in a group, tough and dangerous beasts with weird names. To make sure that the fight goes in their favor, they must carry the correct equipment, have enough potions that aid them in combat and then track the target in order to learn its rhythms, assaulting it in patterns and taking advantage of its weaknesses.
Grinding is pretty much the order of the day and the game really comes into its own when players cooperate to take out the beats. It remains to be seen whether Western players will be interested in this type of experience.