Which is really what Iceborne is about, in ways both large and small. It’s not moments after you’ve first set foot in the new area that The Handler, the consistent voice in your ear throughout Monster Hunter World, begins making plans for a new forward operating base. She convinces the rest of the The Commission without much trouble, and you’re tasked with making the chosen area safe by hunting a monster that’s roaming too close. As you finish this quest, the Field Team Leader remarks “This freezing cold place was out here waiting for us the whole time.” This land, wild and untamed, was “waiting,” precluding any sort of natural state without humans. It is here for our use.

The colonialist fantasy in Monster Hunter World was often couched with a weak framing as “ecological study”. We must learn more about the ecology so that we may be its shepards. The Elder Dragons need to be driven out or they could cause catastrophes that would change the “natural” ecosystem, ignoring that much like forces of nature in our world, they are part of that ecosystem. That hedging is gone after the early moments of Iceborne—you’re sent to hunt monsters in order to get clear access to natural resources, or to make sure a trade route to the New World is established enough to send over fortifications. The new base, Seliana, is built in a matter of in game moments, and immediately the new continent is named “the Hoarfrost Reach.” You’re the vanguard in establishing Seliana, and after a certain point, every quest is directly related to the protection of this new settlement.