Capcom's Monster Hunter franchise has been growing in popularity over the years, and its last few entries helped it become a household name. Monster Hunter World sold millions of copies as a showcase of its potential on PS4 and Xbox One, and Monster Hunter Rise further improved the series' new open-world traversal elements on Switch. This bodes well as the franchise approaches its 20th anniversary.
The original Monster Hunter released on PlayStation 2 in 2004. In a recent interview with Famitsu, long-time series producer Ryozo Tsujimoto said he is already looking ahead to celebrating Monster Hunter's anniversary in 2024, and that the developer should be starting to make preparations for "various things" soon. Yet he mentioned Monster Hunter Rise: Sunbreak, the game's major DLC expansion, will take priority as Capcom hopes to launch it "in solid shape" come this summer. That should hold true, as it's easy to imagine the developer turning its attention to the "next big thing" and making Sunbreak feel rushed or incomplete as a result.
Monster Hunter Rise: Sunbreak's Path So Far
With that being said, it's unlikely Capcom has plans to release Sunbreak in any kind of "incomplete" state. Complaints were levied against the base game for having less content than its predecessors, even after post-launch content added various Elder Dragons and an official conclusion to the story. However, it set a really strong foundation, and Sunbreak seems to have a long runway to improve upon that baseline.
Monster Hunter Rise: Sunbreak was announced during the September 2021 Nintendo Direct, months after the main game's story was concluded with a fight against Narwa the Allmother. Event quests have been added to the game since Narwa the Allmother in May 2021 - including crossovers with franchises like Okami, Street Fighter, and Sonic the Hedgehog. Meanwhile, Capcom is preparing to launch the PC port of Monster Hunter Rise on January 12. Yet it seems much more attention is being paid to Sunbreak, which promises to expand the game through features like a "Master Rank" difficulty equivalent to prior entries' G Rank.
Some new information about Monster Hunter Rise's upcoming expansion, like the return of older monsters such as Shogun Ceanataur, was revealed during Tokyo Game Show 2021 not long after its announcement. Then fans got their next substantial bit of news during The Game Awards 2021, in which a new trailer revealed the Lunagaron and suggested Rondine would play a bigger role in Sunbreak.
Monster Hunter Rise: Sunbreak Appears to be On-Track, But Shouldn't Slip By
A tweet by Monster Hunter's official social media account let fans know news regarding Sunbreak will not arrive until spring 2022, which should space out its reveals and keep too much information from releasing early. No delays have been suggested thus far, which is good in an era when many projects have been affected by the ongoing COVID-19 pandemic, and this puts Sunbreak in a similar position as Monster Hunter World's big Iceborne expansion before it.
Monster Hunter World released in January 2018, and its Iceborne expansion was announced that December before releasing in September 2019. Iceborne was generally seen as a huge success, invigorating the game and helping to push further console and PC sales as its own roadmap of content dropped through late 2020. Monster Hunter Rise looks to be following that same pattern, starting with a March 2021 release and then putting out a summer 2022 expansion that may have content lasting late into 2023.
If that is the case, the end of support for Monster Hunter Rise should, theoretically, dovetail perfectly into whatever 2024 anniversary plans Capcom has in mind. This would be a fitting path considering Rise's success thus far, being 2021's most-downloaded Switch game in Japan, and no doubt releasing on PC will give it another boost. Hopefully the prep for 2024's anniversary project doesn't get in the way of this, as it would be a shame to see Rise fizzle out at the end while developers are busy elsewhere.
Monster Hunter Rise is available now on Switch, with a PC port releasing January 12, 2022. Sunbreak releases summer 2022.
