Monster Hunter World: The Board Game review – Capturing the thrill of the hunt

Monster Hunter World: The Board Game is just as complex, replayable, and ambitious as its video game counterpart. But does the board game version manage to live up to Capcom’s beloved beast-slaying series, or does it fail to capture the thrill of the hunt entirely?

The Monster Hunter series is renowned for its boss-like battles, where players work together to take down monolithic monsters. Its addictive gameplay loop of kill, craft, and hunt has been present since 2004, when the first game stomped its way onto the PS2. 

Since then, Capcom’s beloved beast-slaying series has spawned numerous mainline titles, several spinoff games, and even a fairly successful Hollywood movie. Despite the growing success of the series, there’s never been an official board game adaptation. 

Well, that’s until Steamforged Games decided to rise to the challenge, breathing new life into Capcom’s toothy terrors like never before. 

Key Details 

Steamforged / Capcom

• Developer: Steamforged Games
• Price: $129.99
• Players: 1-4
• Time to play: 60 – 90 minutes

A worthy adaptation

Recreating Monster Hunter’s complex systems and applying them to a tabletop format was never going to be an easy task. But the experts over at Steamforged Games have been able to do just that. This is largely down to the game’s intuitive combat, which converts the series’ real-time hunts into reactive turn-based battles where positioning, communication, and strategy are key to your success. 

Just like the games, Monster Hunter World: The Board Game is split up into three main phases: Gathering, Hunting, and downtime activities. During the Gathering Phase, you’ll track your group’s chosen monster and gain valuable resources like rare ores, monster bones, and materials. 

This is done by reading through the game’s chunky Quest Book, which comes packed with beautifully detailed Choose Your Own-style adventure segments. These not only help to set the scene but also give each quest great replayability. One particularly memorable moment had my group squeezing through a dark cavern in search of rare ore, only to spend several turns taking fall damage and clambering out with a small bounty of Coral Crystals. 

While we were initially pleased with our rocky rewards, starting the fearsome Anjanath hunt with four HP was far from ideal. What followed was an incredibly intense fight for survival as my party desperately dished out damage, while avoiding the fiery AoE attacks that threatened to send us reeling back to base camp. It’s here where the Monster Hunter World: The Board game feels at its best – it successfully manages to deliver adrenaline-fueled fights that you’ll remember long after playing.  

Even the series’ infamous Desire Sensor is alive and well, with dice rolls determining which monster materials you gain after a successful hunt. I found myself cursing the RNG gods as I failed to get my Tobi-Kadachi Scale after four back-to-back hunts, only to secure it on the fifth try, which led to sighs of relief from my hunting party. 

However, the tantalizing prospect of securing shiny new weapons and gear, which you can use to make future hunts smoother means there’s a real incentive to replay quests. This replayability also helps make the $129.99 price tag a less daunting prospect, as you’ll be getting a solid table top experience that you can comfortably spend dozens of hours with. This is especially true if you aim to continue your adventure by purchasing the Wildspire Waste core set. 

Brutal combat & fearsome foes 

Arguably the best part of Monster Hunter World: The Board Game is the combat. In the case of the Ancient Forest core set, the weapon options include the heavy-hitting Great Sword, lightning-fast Dual Blades, defensive Sword & Shield, and armor-piercing Bow. 

No matter which one you choose, each weapon feels unique thanks to the unique deck of attack cards that faithfully reflect their video game counterparts. In my first run, I chose the Great Sword Hunter which focused on utilizing empowered charge attacks – an ability that applied additional part breaks onto the monster’s body. 

Just like in Monster Hunter video games, destroying a beast’s body part increases your quest rewards, and can even reduce their combat effectiveness. Breaking Tobi-Kadachi’s tail reduces its Thunder attack damage, while destroying Great Jagras’ stomach prevents it from being able to recover health whenever it damages Hunters. It’s a simple system and one that perfectly replicates those satisfying moments of lopping a monster’s tail off and breaking its claws to reduce its effectiveness.

Unlike the real-time fights in the video game, the amount of attacks you can play is reflected by the monster’s Behaviour Card – a unique deck that determines the monster’s movement, attack, and target. For example, Tobi-Kadachi’s Thunder-based moves enable it to leap to the farthest rock node, before launching itself towards a Hunter for a shocking surprise. 

Certain Monster Behavior Cards also enable the whole party to attack, while others only allow one member to take a turn. I found this to be one of the most riveting aspects of combat, as you’ll need to constantly coordinate with your team to come up with the best plays. Do you have your Bow user taking a turn to paralyze the monster, effectively incapacitating it for a turn? Or do you rush in to deliver an all-out Great Sword attack?

Tying directly into this strategic gameplay is the stamina board. Whenever you use your Hunter’s Attack Cards, they are placed on the board, allowing you to deal damage or avoid it by dodging, with every action filling your meter. Once you have placed five cards onto your stamina board, you’ll no longer be able to attack or dodge. The only way to remove cards is by using a Potion, discarding a Time Card from the Time Deck, or dying.

The latter is far from ideal, as the three-death rule remains and you’ll be sent back to your HQ and need to spend a day repeating the quest all over again. Managing dodges and attacks becomes a minigame in itself, where one misplaced move can end in an instant kill – an aspect that I appreciated as it captured the brutal difficulty the series is known for. 

If that wasn’t enough, you’ll also need to keep an eye on your Damage Cards. These are used in coordination with Attack Cards and determine the amount of damage you deal to your opponent. Once you’ve used up all your Attack Cards, you’ll need to spend one turn Sharpening to shuffle them back into your hand. There are certainly a lot of mechanics at play here, and with each hunt only affording you three deaths, and a 25-day campaign timer – beating the end-game Tempered Rathlos isn’t for the faint of heart. 

In fact, my biggest gripe with the game is just how complex it can be, especially for those not familiar with Capcom’s beast-slaying series. While the rulebook covers every aspect of the game in great detail, it’s this amount of detail that can be impenetrable to newcomers. This wasn’t a problem for myself and the group I played with, as I’ve spent hundreds if not thousands of hours playing the video games, and know all about each monster’s behavior patterns, elemental weaknesses, armor skills, and weapon attacks. 

While you could pick up and play the game without any prior knowledge, having a veteran Hunter in your group undoubtedly makes the overall gameplay experience that much smoother. Even then, I still found myself wading through the hefty rulebook to decipher the numerous card symbols and double-check how status attacks work. 

The verdict 4/5

While its complex battle mechanics and meaty rulebook may not be for everyone, Monster Hunter World: The Board Game manages to break into the tabletop scene with a triumphant roar. 

It’s clear a lot of attention has gone into creating the game’s monstrous minis, which are just as detailed and imposing as their virtual counterparts. Once these toothy terrors have been placed on the board, it’s hard not to get wrapped up in the game’s intuitive deck-based combat system. 

Steamforged Games has successfully managed to distill the very essence of what makes the Monster Hunter series so special. It’s replayable, it’s complex, it’s addictive, but most importantly, it’s fantastic fun.

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