Capcom’s ecosystem has become a terrible pinball machine
When our demo handler discovered the beast, it was chilling with its pack, denser monster herds being another new-ish Wilds feature. Initially, the demo player attempted to fight them all simultaneously up-close, but this meant that all we could see of Wilds was massive furry buttocks clipping together against a soundscape of outraged tuba noises, so after a moment or so, we beat a tactical withdrawal aboard our Seikret, using a projectile of some kind to tag the Alpha Doshaguma and lure it away from the throng.
Then began a brisk 15-minute exercise in finding every last new feature in Wilds and making the Alpha Doshaguma run into it. To begin with, our demo player led the Doshaguma herd into a pack of velociraptor-type things, who leapt aboard the bellowing juggernauts and nibbled at them unsuccessfully before getting stamped on. Then, we took the Doshagumas on a tour of some thorn bushes, which successfully blocked the advance of the lesser Doshugama, allowing us to focus on the Alpha. And then, a quick scramble up a dune and into the territory of some kind of burrowing leviathan, who conjured a quicksand whirlpool into which the Alpha Doshaguma dutifully tumbled.
It was able to escape after much pitiful thrashing about, and you know, a kinder soul would have put the creature out of its misery and shown us a few of the new biomes, perhaps walked us through a crafting menu or two. But no. Having aggroed the Alpha Doshaguma once more, our Capcom presenter guided it into a thunderstorm which wasn’t actually a thunderstorm, but the mobile meteorological lair of a bloody great dragon, the region’s apex predator.
The storm dragon pounced on the Alpha Doshaguma, ripping off its tail with a single blow. The aforesaid burrowing leviathan then caught up and tried to strangle it. I was, you’ve hopefully deduced, firmly rooting for the Alpha Doshaguma at this point, though I did enjoy the fancy weather effects and the attendant noticeable impact upon such specialised hunter techniques as “moving around” and “seeing”.
The Doshaguma survived the storm, somehow, and again, a merciful antagonist might have stepped in to finish it off hand-to-claw, but that would have meant passing up the opportunity to demonstrate some new destructible terrain elements, so off we went to visit some caverns abundant in paralysis-inducing electrobugs and dangerously loose stalagtites - perfect for shaving away monster health at a few hundred points a pop. Also in the caverns, a Chatacabra - or giant rocky frog - with whom the Doshaguma briefly merged into a roaring, belching ball of scales and fur.
After taking a couple of stalagtites to the head, the Alpha Doshaguma was bristling with wounds, these being a system of glowing weakpoints you can target using a new “focus” aiming mode, which applies across all the weapons. By this point, the creature was evidently pretty sick of being Capcom’s demo assistant and decided to head home for a snooze. Ah, Monster Hunter’s limping animation. Is there any greater source of pathos in all of videogaming? The Doshaguma needing a time-out, however, was not consistent with Capcom’s desire to show off the ability to roll exploding barrels down hills. In this case, the exploding barrels missed their victim, so our demoer decided to call it quits by summoning three other hunters on Seikrets to smash the remainder of its face in.
I’ll be honest, the final couple minutes of the demo are a blur for me. There was talk of new weapons, and some thrilling displays of grappling and mounting, but I had by this point, filled up my brain with different methods of Doshaguma-bothering, and could only glaze over in sorrow as the big, beautiful beastie met its end.
What do you do after you’ve slain an Alpha Doshaguma? Despair of the inhumanity and take up a new career as a villager? A cheesemaker, perhaps, dispensing puns alongside the fromage to hide the swelling dark clouds of self-loathing, not so deep inside? No, you suddenly come over all David Attenborough. The presenter wound up by pointing out some small avian critters perched in a tree and, I shit you not, suggesting that we “take some time to enjoy nature”. You absolute fucking bastard, I mouthed at him from across the auditorium, smiling and offering a thumbs-up. You filthy bear-baiting scumbag. Vengeance! Vengeance for Monsters! Vengeance for the Alpha Doshaguma!
