[PS2] Monster Hunter 2 ROM Download

Monster Hunter 2 ROM Screenshots

Monster Hunter 2 ROM Description

Now if we get too far, let’s first understand a little backstory to the origins of the series. It all begins with Capcom wanting to make games to take advantage of the PlayStation 2’s network capabilities. Three games were made – Resident Evil Outbreak, Auto Modellista, and our game of focus, Monster Hunter. The thinking behind this was that one of the three games was bound to sell a million copies, a bit recklessly optimistic but hey, both Monster Hunter and Resident Evil Outbreak managed to do just that. And thus Monster Hunter was on its way to becoming its own franchise.

That’s as much as I’ve learned about the series’ history so far but just by watching the promo trailer, which by the way that’s what you’re watching right now, I can see that this was a bit of an ambitious project with some ideas that didn’t even make it into the game like pools of blood by downed monsters though I do like how the trailer teases an elder dragon at the end. That’s something you could still find in Monster Hunter trailers to this day.

I was first exposed to Monster Hunter in middle school. A friend of mine played the game and would tell me about it while showing me notes he had made about item combinations. I was intrigued – fighting monsters, combining items, and exploring locations sounded like a cool idea to me so I found my own copy of the game and would play it for the next few years. The question I want to answer today is how well has the game aged and is it still worth going back to play?

Story and Quests

There really isn’t a story to this game; it’s just some newcomer to the village and the elder helps you on your way to becoming a proper monster hunter. That’s it. This is something I don’t mind. The point of the game is to make you feel like you’re now part of this world so it works more as a way to introduce you to the world of Monster Hunter. Though very slowly, because of this, there aren’t very memorable moments and there really isn’t much context to why you’re doing these hunts. I mean there is some but it’s kind of forgettable.

So what exactly is Monster Hunter? Well to be honest it’s pretty self-explanatory – you play as a hunter, you get to hunt monsters, gather materials, and use these materials to make items, weapons, and armor. We’ll take a look at these in a little more detail but first we should talk about the single-player versus online. When you first start up the game you get to choose which mode you want to play in. Though with the servers being down I haven’t ever played the online mode so we’ll be taking a look at the single player.

In the game you will have a hub like area being Kokoto Village. Here you have a house where you can store items in the item box, change and manage your equipment, and save the game. There are two shopkeepers who will sell you different items. The traveling merchant will sell you things like hunter’s notes and special items. Personally I like the hunter’s notes as these give you a slight idea of the monsters in the game and can give you some hints about them as well.

Then we have the armory and blacksmith. At the armory you can buy weapons and armor though this is not the best place to shop since a) the equipment here is very expensive and b) he has a very limited variety. Instead you’ll be spending most your time with the blacksmith who can make you new weapons and armor as well as upgrade your weapons which is absolutely necessary.

The issue here is that he won’t do anything unless you have all the materials in your personal pouch. So even if you have enough iron ores in your item box he won’t upgrade that sword unless you’re carrying them with you. It’s annoying but thankfully early gear doesn’t use too many different materials.

I should mention something that the game never brings up – that by equipping your hunter with certain pieces of armor they will get a special buff. For example equipping the Velociprey male and greaves you will become immune to stun. This is nice but these benefits only work if you wear the right gear. If you gave yourself a helm in that set then you’d lose that buff which is a little stupid. So how do you know what kind of armor set you should make?

Well the game won’t tell you and the only way I learned about this was through the Monster Hunter strategy guide. There are multiple different weapons you can choose from like great sword, sword, shield, lance, hammer, and crossbows. Plus by upgrading certain sword and shields they become dual blades. Each weapon plays a little differently from each other with some focusing on damage and others focusing more on small damage but better evasion.

Personally I like lance the most in this game but sword and shield is good too though I’m not huge on slow weapons like great sword and hammer. Then lastly we have the village elder who you need to talk to as he’s the one who gives you the quests.

There are three different kinds of quests in this game: gather quests, hunting quests, and capture quests. Now at the start of most quests you will begin at the hunter’s base where you can rest up to heal yourself. There will be a blue box that will supply you with some extra items for the quests like maps and a red box where you can deliver gathered goods.

This takes us to gather quests which you will have to explore a map looking for materials like special mushrooms or getting horns from kelbi. These quests are usually a bit more relaxed so you want to use these to spend time gathering for extra materials like stocking up on herbs, mining ores, just be sure to bring the pickaxes. And to do some fishing – fishing is a bit annoying and you’ll need worms or any other bait to fish but it’s a good way to get some zenny which is the game’s currency by selling the fish at the stores.

Gathering materials is not just good for making weapons and armor but also for making useful items like potions by combining blue mushrooms with herbs. You can only combine items you have in your pouch so you want to be carrying a combo book since they can increase your success of combining items. Because of this, gather quests can be longer than they really need to since you’ll be spending time getting other stuff as well. Not to mention that there are some super rare materials at the early moments of the game like earth crystals which are going to be needed. Even honey is rare in this game.

This might have something to do with how they made the game. You see in single player you were given lesser item drops and rewards than if you were playing online which really hurts the solo mode. Then we have egg quests which are awful. In these gather quests you have to transport an egg from one area to the base while not being able to attack and having your movement restricted. They just suck so much. Not to mention that the first egg quest has you running past a Rathalos which is one of the scariest moments I’ve ever experienced in the series.

In hunting quests you will either have to slay certain amount of small monsters or hunt a large monster and we can finally talk about the main focus of the game – hunting large monsters. Hunting is all action-based as you need to respond to a monster’s movements and attacks to keep from getting hurt and attacking them when there’s an opening. At the same time you need to bring items to manage your character’s health and weapon sharpness as well as the antidotes and other status healing items for certain monsters and items that can help make hunts easier like paintballs for keeping track of the monster and sonic bombs.

It’s quite fun in concept but there are a few things that suck about the combat in this game. First off hit boxes are a bit off like those goddamn hip checks and second some of the monsters hunt with tons of smaller monsters who will be chipping away at your health, messing up your strikes, and interrupting your healing – Balfangos being the biggest offender of this.

Healing by the way you will almost always need to go to a different area to heal since your character takes three seconds to heal thanks to an unnecessary flexing animation after taking a drink of a potion that leaves you wide open to attacks. It’s god-awful. Plus making well-done steak sucks ass too thanks to a super-tight timing to keep the meat from burning.

There are at least some cool monsters to hunt in the game like Rathalos, Diablos, Gravios, and Yian Kut-Ku kinda and some annoying monsters as well like Kut-Ku, Cephalos, Gendrome and Giaprey with the Giaprey being the hunt that ended it for me due to how off-balance this game is. What I mean is if my weapons would often bounce off of a monster despite being upgraded as high as I could get them. Not to mention combat in this game is actually really limited.

This is because you fight using the right analog stick which seems to really limit your combos and attacks as well as just being awkward to use. Because of this the camera is rather clunky since you can only center it or move it around with the d-pad. Oh and by the way there’s no lock on so have fun. Because there is no more online mode you can’t hunt certain monsters in the game like Lao-Shan Lung, Fatalis, and Kirin, all these being Elder Dragons by the way.

Graphics and Audio

There are some other cool ideas when it comes to hunting monsters though like breaking off body parts and chopping off the tail and a monster limping away when they’re getting weak. Capture quests will supply you with a trap and some tranq bombs so you can capture monster when it’s limping away by having him fall into the trap and putting them to sleep. These kind of quests can be a bit tricky since when a monster is low in health it will be limping but not all monsters seem to limp right away and you accidentally kill them. But at least there aren’t too many of these.

For the PlayStation 2 the game looks very good. First off character models while pretty simple work pretty well and have some decent animations especially when it comes to the great sword. Your character’s swings are so slow and weighted it’s done so well you can feel every impact yourself. There may not be a lot of variety the maps that you can visit but there is some great attention to detail here and each of the areas in the map look a little different from each other.

Then we have the stars of the game themselves – the monsters. To begin with the level of detail on these monsters is great as you can see individual scales on some and the grooves of the skin of others. The monsters also have some nice animation that make them feel like real animals like how they limp away when they’re injured. Though you can tell that there are many monsters who are using the same base structure with small changes in their attacks. And a few of the monsters look very similar like the Gravelord and Basillos.

Then we get to the music which I can’t help but to love. The actual music tracks sound like well orchestrated pieces that just pull me into the world even further. Not only is there great music in this game but there’s also ambient noises that help make you feel more like you’re in a natural environment. It’s a small detail that I quite enjoy. Basically this game has a great fantasy soundtrack and I would highly recommend people give it a listen to even if some of the pieces of music are reused.