Horizon Zero Dawn May Have Spoiled Monster Hunter Wilds Big Twist

Spoiler warning for both Monster Hunter Wilds and Horizon Zero Dawn

Monster Hunter Wilds is a big departure from Capcom’s beloved series in a number of ways, but none are more evident than its increased focus on narrative. While Monster Hunter has always had some semblance of a plot, it’s more or less been thinly-veiled excuses to poach lots of wild animals and turn their skulls into fancy hats. And while I wouldn’t necessarily call Wilds’ story a major evolution of that premise, it’s certainly the case that Capcom put a lot more work into the characters, worldbuilding, and storytelling than is typical for Monster Hunter.

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Something I do really appreciate about Wilds’ story is the way it expands on the lore of Monster Hunter’s world, revealing secrets that have long been hinted at throughout the series but never truly explored until now. There’s some exciting payoff here for long-time fans, and the reveal gives the impression this is something Capcom has been planning for a long, long time. Unfortunately, 2017’s Horizon Zero Dawn already beat Monster Hunter to the punch.

Prehistoric Monsters And Primitive Weapons, Where Have I Seen That Before?

There’s obviously a lot of crossover between the Monster Hunter and Guerrilla Games’ Horizon series. In fact, there’s a literal crossover in Monster Hunter World, which lets you turn your hunter into Aloy and dress your palico up as a watcher. Guerrilla clearly took a lot of inspiration for Horizon’s world and combat from Monster Hunter, and Capcom graciously acknowledged that influence with World’s in-game Horizon event. This isn’t about anyone stealing anyone else’s ideas. This is just how art evolves, and it’s a beautiful thing.

However, Wilds reveals that there’s considerably more overlap between Monster Hunter and Horizon than we ever knew. It’s not just the gameplay and setting that makes them similar, their worlds actually share nearly identical origin stories too.

Wilds Brings Us Closer To The Ancient Civilization

The overarching narrative woven throughout the Monster Hunter series is the story of the Ancient Civilization of Wyveria. We’ve learned little details about an ancient advanced society in other games, particularly in relation to the Artian armor set, which appears in almost every Monster Hunter game and has a very out of place, sci-fi aesthetic. Fans have speculated for a long time that Monster Hunter takes place in a post-apocalyptic world, and now, thanks to Wilds, we finally understand how that world came to be.

There are a lot of details throughout Wilds campaign that are worth experiencing for yourself, but to keep it brief – we learn that the people of this ancient civilization had a strong relationship with the monsters, and even trained them to protect their important structures. They used parts from powerful monsters to build their empire, just as we use them to build our weapons and armor, and over time, their relationship with monsters degraded.

Eventually, these people developed the technology to create their own monsters. These constructs were perfect clones of real monsters, but they couldn’t reproduce or die, and never had to eat. They sustained themselves on energy from the earth, which seemingly came from an artifact called the Dragontorch. Making these constructs, which the people called guardians, required the sacrifice of many monsters. As you can imagine, the monsters weren’t particularly happy about that.

This eventually led to the Great Dragon War and the destruction of the human empire by the most powerful of all elder dragons, Fatalis. Many of these details were known to us from past games, but it wasn’t until Wilds that we finally learned what the Ancient Civilization was, and how their technology became lost to us. As many suspected, Monster Hunter does indeed take place in a post-apocalyptic world.

Fatalis? More Like Faro Plague

If you’ve played Horizon Zero Dawn, a lot of these plot details likely sound familiar to you. Its story is far more complex than Monster Hunters, but the gist of it is that an advanced society that had long built its empire by domesticating animals eventually discovered the technology to make their own animal constructs. These constructs, called chariots, were used as war machines, much like the people of Monster Hunter’s ancient civilization used the constructs.

Unlike in Monster Hunter though, it was the machines themselves that turned against humanity via the Faro Plague. As humanity’s extinction drew near, Project Zero Dawn was enacted to rebuild the world once the plague had destroyed it using, primarily, machine constructs designed to mimic living animals. If the connections weren’t already obvious enough, the big twist in Horizon Zero Dawn is the reveal that it is in fact a post-apocalyptic story, seen from the perspective of the primitive society that emerged centuries after the fall of man – just like in Monster Hunter.

I’m impressed that the Monster Hunter series is finally indulging in some deep lore, and what Capcom has cooked up feels both revelatory and appropriate for Monster Hunter, but it definitely takes some of the punch out of Wilds’ story when you realize how similar it is to Horizon Zero Dawn’s – especially when you consider how much more nuanced and well-plotted Horizon’s story is. I’d like to think Capcom has been laying the groundwork for Wilds’ narrative for decades, but at the same time, it’s sad to think Guerrilla Games accidentally beat them to the punch a full eight years earlier.

Released

February 28, 2025

ESRB

T For Teen // Violence, Blood, Crude Humor