The Monster Hunter Wilds beta isn't even live yet, but over 23,000 fans on Steam gather to stare at its start-up screen

The Monster Hunter Wilds beta hasn't even begun on PC, but thousands of players have congregated to stare at its start-up screen early while excitedly rubbing their hands together at the prospect of making pants using the skin of the poor, poor, titular monsters.

Monster Hunter Wilds' beta officially kicks off on November 1 and runs through November 3 - PS5 players had a brief early access period, which is over now. That hasn't stopped so, so many hopeful PC players from downloading the taste test early and jumping in to... wait around? Since the servers haven't gone live just yet, all you can currently do with the beta is change the language settings and pre-load the game itself.

According to SteamDB, almost 23,000 people are running the beta client right this second. I've had to update that number twice while writing this very paragraph, so that already bonkers crowd should balloon to an even more absurd size in the hours leading up to its release. Monster Hunter is, ahem, monstrously popular, after all. 

The hack-and-looting series' popularity shouldn't really be too surprising anymore, however. Slaying big beasts in search of increasingly stronger loot was already a hit formula on handheld consoles back in the day, but Capcom's action series hit new heights with Monster Hunter World and Rise, which together contribute to nearly half of the franchise's 100 million sales record. Even in the last six months, the series lured in three million newbies with the sweet scent of monster leather, so Monster Hunter Wilds will probably pull in even more wild numbers. I told you: monstrous. 

Prepare by checking out the best Monster Hunter weapons available in the beta and how to change your appearance.