The Monster Hunter Games You Can't Get In America

The original Monster Hunter hit the American PlayStation 2 in November, 2004, roughly six months after its Japanese release. It wasn't a hit. The game received mediocre reviews, and its multiplayer servers didn't survive past 2007, negating one of its main selling points (in Japan, Monster Hunter's popularity kept the servers' lights on until 2011).

That's probably why we never got Monster Hunter G, an expanded version of the original game, which came to the PlayStation 2 in 2005 and the Nintendo Wii in 2009. Mechanically, Monster Hunter G is virtually identical to its predecessor. It's the extra content that makes G special: new quests and new monsters (many of which are resized and/or recolored versions of the original game's quarry), an updated skill system, and Felyne chefs—basically, anthropomorphic cats who cook meals that provide players with stat bonuses. The game later moved to smartphones as Monster Hunter i, a stripped-down port that removed multiplayer and added a monthly subscription fee. Most of Monster Hunter G's innovations found their way west in the PlayStation Portable's Monster Hunter Freedom, which brought Monster Hunter G onto a portable system, but American fans who want to play this pseudo-expansion on the big screen are still, sadly, out of luck.

Multiplayer, whether through the internet or via ad-hoc local connection, has always been a key part of the Monster Hunter franchise, but few Monster Hunter games are fully-fledged massively multiplayer online role-playing games (think World of Warcraft). Monster Hunter: Frontier Online brings Monster Hunter's core gameplay into a living, ongoing virtual world that players can access through their PCs or Xbox 360s. Remarkably, while many MMORPGs have crumbled and disappeared over the past decade, after ten years Monster Hunter: Frontier Online is still going strong.

In fact, it's so successful that it has not one but two sequels. Monster Hunter: Frontier G started as an expansion pack for Frontier Online before it turned into a stand-alone title. Monster Hunter: Frontier Z, the game's latest iteration, moved the franchise onto next-generation consoles with a PlayStation 4 edition.

Sadly, Monster Hunter: Frontier Online is only officially available in Japan, Taiwan, and Korea (although some tech-savvy players have found their way around the game's regional restrictions). Connecting is only half the challenge, of course. To play on Japanese servers, you'll need to put up with a $14-per-month subscription fee. The Korean version of the game is free, but unless you have a Korean social security number, you're out of luck. In 2013, Capcom hinted at a Monster Hunter: Frontier G release in western regions, but so far, nothing has come of it.

"Cute" isn't a word that's usually associated with Monster Hunter, and yet, Monster Hunter Diary Poka Poka Felyne Village is downright adorable. Starring the Felyne, Monster Hunter's helpful anthropomorphic kitties, Monster Hunter Diary Poka Poka Felyne Village forgoes the series' lush and detailed graphics for a friendly and cartoony graphics that resemble Nintendo's Miis, with hints of Animal Crossing in both the art design and gameplay.

In Monster Hunter Diary, players manage a village full of Felyne who can be sent on quests or partake in mini-games like fishing, mining, and a fairly robust pig racing simulation. While questing, players won't control their party directly. Instead, they issue instructions to the Felyne using the PlayStation Portable's controller buttons, which tell the kitties to move forward, burrow underground, or perform context-dependent actions like attacking or playing the flute. The player's main Felyne and various parts of the village (including the Felyne's house) can be customized with cute furniture and decorations. Monster Hunter fans can even sync Monster Hunter Diary with their Monster Hunter Portable Second G save files to unlock special items.

Monster Hunter Diary Poka Poka Felyne Village is a big departure from Monster Hunter's rigorous track-n'-slash gameplay, but it proved popular enough to spawn both an expansion pack (2011's Monster Hunter Diary Poka Poka Felyne Village G) and a Nintendo 3DS remake, which came out in 2015 as Monster Hunter Diary Poka Poka Felyne Village DX.

Monster Hunter is huge. Pokémon is, too. Adding the two together would create the biggest, most popular game of all time, right? That's just simple math.

In Monster Hunter: Phantom Island Voyage, players didn't really hunt monsters. Instead, they hatched and raised them, trained them, and then pitted them against one another in battle. Players could compete head-to-head, or could team up to take on gigantic boss monsters. Basically, Monster Hunter: Phantom Island Voyage sounds like the Monster Hunter and Pokémon mash-up of fans' dreams, but things didn't quite work out. Not only was the game a Japanese exclusive confined to mobile phones but, judging by a rough translation on the game's official site, the entire service was shut down in 2014. Bummer.

Japanese role-playing games and collectible card games go hand-in-hand. Final Fantasy VIII introduced players to Triple Triad, a card-battling mini-game that proved so popular that it's been featured in both Final Fantasy XIV and a standalone mobile app. The second Kingdom Hearts game, Kingdom Hearts: Chain of Memories, replaces Kingdom Hearts' action-heavy combat with a card-based battling system that remains controversial among fans. The World Ends With You uses cards to drive combat (at least on one of the two Nintendo DS' screens), as does the cult-classic Baten Kaitos.

Monster Hunter is no exception. In the mobile-only game Monster Hunter Big Game Hunting Quest, players hunt down monsters using a deck of cards, which grows more powerful as the game progresses. Monster Hunter Big Game Hunting Quest features a competitive multiplayer challenges, collaborative fights involving up to 50 players, special timed events, retro-style graphics that evoke classic Super Nintendo JRPGs like Final Fantasy and Chrono Trigger, and, in a franchise-first, an all-female cast.

The Monster Hunter series has spawned multiple titles on consoles, handhelds, desktop computers, and mobile devices, but there's only one official Monster Hunter game that's playable directly in your web browser. That's Monster Hunter Mezeporta Reclamation, a strategy game co-developed by Tencent and Capcom. In Mezeporta Reclamation, players must save Mezeporta (the main town in Monster Hunter G) by recruiting hunters—all of whom happen to be cute anime girls—and strategically deploying them against some of the series' signature beasts. As the village grows stronger, players do too, and correctly managing both the hunters and the city's resources is crucial if you want to restore Mezeporta's lost glory.

Monster Hunter Stories is a Monster Hunter game without all of that pesky monster hunting. According to Monster Hunter producer Ryozo Tsujimoto, many fans are as interested in the Monster Hunter's fictional setting as they are in tracking and killing beasts. For them, Capcom made Monster Hunter Stories, which takes the focus away from the hunters and puts it on the monsters themselves.

In Monster Hunter Stories, players control a monster rider who steals monster eggs, raises the hatchlings, and then uses the creatures for both travelling and combat. Instead of the action-heavy combat of past Monster Hunter games, Monster Hunter Stories uses a turn-based battle system sort of like Pokémon's, complete with a rock-paper-scissors-like system of strengths and weaknesses. Naturally, there's a big focus on Monster Hunter lore in the game: according to Tsujimoto, the story is "enjoyable [to] a broad range of generations," and anything that the game doesn't cover is handled in the Monster Hunter Stories anime, which debuted on October 2, 2016—less than a week before the game.