Monster Hunter World: Iceborne Devs On Dropping The ‘G’, Playing With Non-Owners, And More

Monster Hunter World: Iceborne development team leaders Ryozo Tsujimoto and Kaname Fujioka held an interview at E3 where they addressed things like Iceborne players playing with non-Iceborne owners, why they dropped the ‘G’ naming scheme, and more. [Thanks, 4Gamer!]

Here are the highlights:

On dropping the ‘G’ naming scheme:

Ryozo Tsujimoto, producer: “Monster Hunter World has players connect around the world globally, so from a communication standpoint we thought it better to streamline the title and rank names. This time ‘G’ has been replaced by Iceborne, and G Rank has been named Master Rank.”

Kaname Fujioka, executive director: “Originally, the ‘G’ was just there for the impact.” (laughs)

The concept behind the Clutch Claw:

Fujioka: “One of the concepts of Monster Hunter World is using the environment and creating your own openings to attack using it. The Clutch Claw provides one direct option to do so by yourself.”

On riding small monsters:

Fujioka: “After doing a certain thing you’ll get a flute that will let you ride on small monsters. That’s why you won’t be able to do so immediately after entering Iceborne.”

On playing with non-owners:

Tsujimoto: “You can match up and play cooperatively with non-owners, and if you have Iceborne then you can use the new actions as well. On the other hand, if you don’t have Iceborne, you can’t accept Master Rank quests or use the new actions.”

On triggering the Iceborne storyline:

Fujioka: “If you’ve completed the story of World by defeating Xeno’jiiva, upon installing Iceborne you’ll immediately begin the event of crossing the ocean to Hoarfrost Reach.”

On balancing Master Rank monsters:

Fujioka: “In the past, we only tweaked the status values of monsters, but in recent years if you don’t mix it up people will feel it’s boring and repetitive, so we’ve also added new actions that monsters can perform. If you’ve played recent G Rank games, there shouldn’t be a big difference.”

Monster Hunter World: Iceborne releases for PlayStation 4 and Xbox One on September 6, 2019.