Monster Hunter:

promised PC port has finally appeared, and it’s set to reignite that discussion.

When it first arrived on Xbox One and PS4, I wrote:

“World takes a dramatic leap into a look, feel, and size that feels truly new, simultaneously staying true to the series’ ideals by maintaining the addictive loop of combat, intimidating monsters and meaningful upgrades that fans love. The sheer depth and commitment required is still intense, but it clearly isn’t Capcom’s aim to court a casual crowd. This is as all-consuming and incredible a ride as ever.” Read our original Monster Hunter: World review.

Brilliantly, Monster Hunter’s first western foray onto PC is a near-perfect recreation of that console experience I fell in love with last winter.

Every IGN Monster Hunter Review 12 IMAGES

Those hoping this release would be Capcom’s excuse to add the much-loved G-rank challenges will be disappointed, but this remains the stupendously generous game it always was, with hundreds of hours of play in store for those that become entranced by its web of quests and upgrades. In fact, those returning having dropped off from playing earlier console versions will find a more welcoming experience. Months of updates saw Capcom fixing some of our few complaints about the launch version, from being able to sort the endless lists of Investigation quests to changing text size and adding more options to farm certain useful items. It’s not drastically different, but it’s definitely more efficient.

While all the console versions’ quality of life improvements have made their way across, PC players will have to wait a little while to get the content updates that came post-launch. New monsters like Deviljho and Lunastra will be added at a later date - but in a game that takes at least 100 hours to finish the basic storylines, that isn’t a huge problem.

The true benefit of playing on PC is, predictably, in the performance. Playing the game at the ‘Highest’ level of quality doesn’t outstrip what we’ve seen on PS4 Pro and Xbox One X but, as you’d expect, you aren’t forced to choose between higher resolution, graphical quality and frame rate here. The result is a game that looks as good as on the most powerful console, but runs without a hitch (and, with an uncapped frame rate option for those with beefier machines, even better than the original). Read more about Monster Hunter World's performance on PC.

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While it’d take a more powerful PC than mine to run with every setting maxed, in hours of play at 1080p, 60 FPS at max quality with a GTX 1070, I’ve not seen a hint of the frame rate dips that hit every console version. Capcom’s hinted that it may release a PC-exclusive graphical improvement patch post-release but, even without, this is no slouch.

Speaking of patches, you may have heard about a pre-release version of the port crashing regularly. Thankfully, a pre-release fix seems to have eliminated that issue. Despite suffering multiple crashes pre-patch, I’ve had none in the hours I’ve played of the release version.

PC’s other major addition is keyboard and mouse play. While this works far better than I’d assumed it would, and feels like something of a novelty, I’d still recommend a controller. Monster Hunter’s combat requires pinpoint timing at the best of times, and using its more complex weapons can feel like more of a dance across a keyboard than it perhaps should. That said, with some input remapping, I can see the game’s ranged weapons becoming more usable on keyboard and mouse, offering real precision, but the default control scheme just isn’t there.