Torvald, the Assault

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Crow, the Trapper

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Sunny, the Support

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Slim, the Medic

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First up is Torvald the assault. His auto shotgun is different from Parnell’s in that the full clip empties after one button press, making it an unwieldy, but devastatingly powerful weapon up close against the monster. He can even toss a shrapnel grenade on the way in, which creates a bunch of weak points in the monster’s armor to blast away at. His mortar cannon is what defines him though. With easy point-and-shoot targeting, he launches a salvo of 4 artillery shells that fly over cover, dealing heavy damage.He lacks the flexibility and utility of some of his fellow assaults, but more than makes up for it with raw damage potential. The mortar cannon is less powerful than Hank’s orbital strike, but it can be used far more frequently, and is far easier to hit with, giving the team a reliable way to punish monster players for standing over incapped teammates. He might struggle against Kraken given the nature of his kit, but other monsters will have to think twice before thinking about staying on one target for too long with Torvald around.Next up is Crow, the character I’m probably the most excited about. As the trapper, it’s his responsibility to find and trap the monster, and his pet batray Gobi is his primary tracking method. At Crow’s command, Gobi can fly up to 200 meters in any direction, revealing the outlines of any creatures along his path before returning to you. His stasis gun slows the monster’s movement speed briefly with every hit, or for an extended period if he charges up before he fires.His primary weapon, a kinetic long rifle is highly unique as well. It offers quick semi-automatic fire at range, but if charged up, fires a shot that ignores the monster’s armor and directly damages its health. This makes Crow a real game-changer, since health damage is permanent unless the monster gets a health regeneration buff. Crow is the most versatile trapper so far, with effective ways of finding the monster, controlling its movement, and making it bleed.Then we have the new support, the spritely Sunny. She’s tiny, but packs a huge punch. Her mini-nuke grenade launcher hits like a truck, but the explosions are delayed so she needs to lead her target in order to hit it. Her support abilities are what really make her stand out though. Her stationary shield drone will automatically project a shield onto one hunter in a radius around it, depending upon who is under fire. Meanwhile, her jetpack booster gives a hunter of her choosing virtually limitless jetpack fuel and double the speed for as long as she stays locked onto them.This is especially useful for flinging the trapper long distances towards the monster to get down a crucial dome, or for giving a cornered teammate a chance to get out of Dodge for free. Both this ability and her shield drone have specific use cases that are different than pretty much any character, making her tricky to get a hang of, but once you do, she brings both a lot of offense, and defense to the table.Last but not least is Slim, the medic. You thought Caira was the combat medic? Guess again. Slim’s Leach Gun not only packs a decent punch, but every hit shortens the cool down on his healing burst. Basically, every three or four shots, his heal burst is ready to go, incentivizing him to stay in tight formation with his teammates, and to keep the monster in his crosshairs.That’s not his only way to heal though. His healing drone can be sent out to heal any teammate to full over time, with essentially global range. The heal is interrupted if they take damage, but with this, teams with Slim can split up effectively and stay healthy. His spore cloud launcher is also totally unique, preventing the monster from smelling from anywhere within the 40 meter radius of the cloud. It’s more disruptive than you think, keeping the monster from seeing health bars, or from making out outlines in the brush. Slim players who can keep this spore cloud up at all tiems while switching back to their leach gun are going to have a big bullseye on their backs for sure.So that’s the skinny on Evolve’s new hunters. I also got my hands on Behemoth, the new monster, which you can read about here . Will these crazy new hunters get you playing Evolve again? Let us know in the comments, and stay tuned to IGN for more Evolve.

Vincent Ingenito is IGN's foremost fighting game nerd. F ollow him on Twitter and argue with everything he says about them.