We covered Monster Hunter Wilds: Ascendance when it debuted during Summer Game Fest, though Capcom kept the specifics light and mostly let the trailer speak for itself. A follow-up developer message has since filled in the blanks, with director Takuro Hiraoka and producer Ryozo Tsujimoto breaking down the announce trailer. Slipped into that same video, rather than given a spotlight of its own, was arguably the bigger news: Monster Hunter Wilds is now in development for Nintendo Switch 2.
There’s no release date or even a release window for the Switch 2 version yet, with Capcom only saying that more details will come in the future. Monster Hunter Rise played very well on the original Switch, a game I sunk hundreds of hours in, so it makes sense for Monster Hunter Wilds to get a Switch 2 port. The obvious question, though, is performance. Monster Hunter Wilds stumbled at launch on that front, the PC version in particular, so watching it head to hardware weaker than the consoles it already runs on will be interesting.
As for what the developer message actually showed, the expansion centers on a new locale called the Skybound Eyrie, a stretch of floating, ruin-covered islands suspended above the Forbidden Lands. Traversal is built around gliding between the isles on your Seikret mount, a natural extension of how you already get around in Wilds. The other big addition is the Boost Bracer, a new piece of equipment that layers fresh attacks, combos, and mobility options onto all 14 weapon types. It sounds a bit like the Clutch Claw that Iceborne added to Monster Hunter: World.
On the challenge side, Ascendance brings Master Rank, the higher-difficulty tier that has turned past expansions into the real endgame, the way Iceborne and Sunbreak did for World and Rise. The new story unlocks after you clear the 7-star quest “Awaking from a Dream,” and it builds toward the mystery of why Elder Dragons are suddenly turning up in the Forbidden Lands. The trailer teased a new monster pack that fights with coordinated aerial attacks, along with the return of fan-favorite Elder Dragon Kushala Daora. Capcom is keeping the rest of the roster under wraps for now.
One smaller note from the message: the developers said seeing the Elder Dragons again had them reflecting on how the creatures were handled in Monster Hunter Stories 3: Twisted Reflection, which we just reviewed and which is out now with a free trial that carries your save data over. Ascendance itself is a long way off, planned for 2027, but the base game, which I reviewed last year, is cheap right now, as low as $29.39 on PlayStation 5, XBOX Series X|S, and PC.
