Monster Hunter Wilds hype fuels Monster Hunter World to its highest Steam player count in 3 years

(Image credit: Capcom)

Monster Hunter World has seen a giant player spike on Steam following Capcom's campaign to revive the game's online scene.

Last week, we reported on Capcom's new campaign for Monster Hunter World. Dubbed '#ReturnToWorld,' the initiative beckoned players back to the 2018 game in an attempt to revive the online scene, and basically give fans something to do until Monster Hunter Wilds rolls around in 2025.

It's not just old players that are apparently flowing back to World on Steam. Steam has Monster Hunter World in its top-sellers chart at the time of writing, which means the huge 67% discount Capcom put on Steam for the #ReturnToWorld campaign must've prompted a lot of newcomers to dive in.

World seeing this huge player spike goes to show how players view Wilds as a follow-up to Monster Hunter World, and not Monster Hunter Rise. With what looks like a huge, sprawling map and photorealistic graphics, Wilds looks like it's taking after World in the huge MMO-like approach to the Monster Hunter franchise.

In fact, some sleuths think Monster Hunter Wilds might be the first fully open-world game in the series. This would be an absolutely monumental undertaking for Capcom's developers, as anyone who's played the series before will know, but there's still a lot of hope out there among fans that this game could be different in that regard.

Hirun Cryer is a freelance reporter and writer with Gamesradar+ based out of U.K. After earning a degree in American History specializing in journalism, cinema, literature, and history, he stepped into the games writing world, with a focus on shooters, indie games, and RPGs, and has since been the recipient of the MCV 30 Under 30 award for 2021. In his spare time he freelances with other outlets around the industry, practices Japanese, and enjoys contemporary manga and anime.