Monster Hunter Rise Sunbreak Malzeno Armor and Equipment ‘Vampire Knight’ Design Detailed

In a new official Capcom interview, Monster Hunter Rise Sunbreak Assistant Lead Character Artists Kensuke Sakata and Shio Hashimoto discussed the Malzeno armor, weapons, and equipment designs. In short, the goal was a heroic “vampire knight” motif, with an effort made to ensure the flagship monster’s items resembled “Western armor.” The two also went over which “parts” of Malzeno would be used to make different elements.

Hashimoto went over the Sunbreak Malzeno armor detail in full, explaining how the goal was to add a vampiric sort of cape with high color and noble clothing. The artist also noted that red and white were used to make it seem more heroic.

Here is the full quote from Hashimoto regarding the “vampire knight” design.

For the Malzeno series, we based the design on Western armor motifs, to create contrast with the Japanese designs of Monster Hunter Rise, and then we added a “vampiric” element to it, to represent the monster.

We did this by adding a cape with a stand-up collar, using red membrane, to an armor set made of Malzeno’s silvery white carapace. We also looked at tailcoats and the jabots (the frilly things) around the neck of aristocratic clothing, to represent Malzeno’s noble appearance.

We then added some red in between the individual carapace parts, and gave the decorations on the hands and feet the same shape as the monster to make sure that it didn’t just look like regular old Western armor.

It’s basically a sort of “Vampire Knight” motif, but since this is the equipment for the flagship monster, we used heroic colors like white and red, and tried to keep elements of “evil” and “night” to a minimum.

As for the Malzeno equipment, Sakata elaborated on the weapon designs and parts used to make them. Each of them was supposed to also have a vampire element, with Sakata referencing “weapons that draw energy from congealed crystals.” They also used three-pronged protrusions to tie them to the monster further. As for the materials, the claws played a big part. Sakata noted, “They’re made of Malzeno’s claws, which are its primary weapon, and the three spikes at the end of its tail. In the early design stages, some of the artists wanted to include a red membrane as well, but we ended up not using that idea, in order to make the red color of the congealed crystals stand out more.”

The interview also involved a look at concept art for the Monster Hunter Rise: Sunbreak Malzeno armor, weapons, and equipment.

Monster Hunter Rise: Sunbreak is available for the Nintendo Switch and PC. Monster Hunter Rise will make its Xbox Series X, Xbox One, PS4, and PS5 debut on January 20, 2023.