Monster Hunter Wilds' massive launch is being dampened by "Mixed" Steam reviews, as hunters report "atrocious" performance issues in the action RPG

Monster Hunter Wilds may have debuted to an enormous swarm of players on Steam, but not everyone is having a fantastic time, as performance issues have dampened an otherwise spectacular launch with "Mixed" reviews.

While the new action RPG hit a peak of almost 1 million players in its first hour on Steam, at the time of writing, only 47% of its reviews are positive. Hunters are reporting "absolutely atrocious performance" and alleging it "runs even worse than the beta," with one saying that despite being an "absolutely amazing" game, it "has the worst optimization I've ever seen."

Ahead of Monster Hunter Wilds' second open beta, Capcom reduced system requirements and released a benchmark tool to allow players to test how the game runs on their PC. While the second beta still wasn't perfect for everyone on Steam, with many seeing the return of the low-poly monsters and characters, this was to be expected as the devs stated that improvements made since the first beta test wouldn't be implemented until launch.

What's surprising now is that many players are reporting that even with the benchmark tool giving them a big thumbs up on whether the game will run well for them, the full version is still causing issues. "How does a game manage to run perfectly fine in the open beta AND I receive an Excellent rating score on the benchmark but the actual product that costs ACTUAL MONEY runs like absolute sludge," one questions. "I have legit never encountered a game that wasn't at worst playable. I have never seen a game run this poorly while still looking this bad."

On Twitter, the official Monster Hunter Status account has advised that anyone "experiencing any initial issues" with Wilds on Steam should "try updating your graphics driver, turning off compatibility mode, and then readjust your settings," so if you're one of the players struggling, try giving that a go. Otherwise, hopefully Capcom will be able to make some improvements soon, because as we wrote in our Monster Hunter Wilds review, the game itself is fantastic, and "the new peak of Monster Hunter."

If you're playing the new Monster Hunter this weekend, you can check out our guide to the best Monster Hunter Wilds weapons and our Monster Hunter Wilds beginner's guide for some tips.