Monster Hunter 4

As with the other games in the series, Monster Hunter 4 has the player take the role of a new Hunter that undertakes quests and challenges to hunt dangerous creatures that inhabit various locales. As they proceed through these quests, they will gain various items, in-game money, and other rewards that are used to craft new weapons, armor, additional gear, and health, restoration, and temporary buffing items that can be taken into later quests. The player's character does not intrinsically improve over the course of the game, but their abilities are set by the weapon and armor they carry into the quests, which improve as the player takes on more challenging quests. The game allows the player to use any of the fourteen basic weapon types in the game, each having unique battle approaches that the player must master, and can switch between these weapons before departing on quests.

When on a quest, the player is taken to a remote location made up of several smaller areas, where both passive and aggressive creatures roam. The player can explore through these areas, taking the time to accumulate materials such as ores, bugs, and plant parts used to make gear and potions, or by slaying creatures throughout the areas. Some quests allow the player to explore the area as long as they want to accumulate goods, while other quests have the player attempt to slay a number of smaller creatures. The bulk of the quests in the game requiring hunting one or more of the larger monsters that can inhabit the areas, and ending the quest by killing or trapping the creature.

The player's character is a fledgling Hunter, on the way to the port town of Val Habar via sandship as to become part of the Hunters's Guild. The ship is attacked by a giant Dah'ren Mohran, a sand dwelling Elder Dragon, and the Hunter is able to protect the ship long enough before the Guild's Ace Hunters arrive to drive the beast away. Safely in town, one of the ship's passengers, the Caravaneer, introduces himself to the Hunter, and describes his Capital Caravan, consisting of him, a blacksmith simply known as The Man, and a guild stewardess. Impressed by the Hunter's capabilities, he invites the Hunter to join the Caravan as they try to discover the purpose of a strange artifact the Caravaneer found years earlier which he calls the Article and is attempting to reach Cathar to speak to their wise people about it. The Hunter helps to enlist the aid of a cook and a merchant as to be able to make for their next port of call, the volcanic village of Harth, the home to the Troverians, a dwarf-like race of blacksmiths.

The Troverians are willing to aid the Caravan to build them an ocean-worthy ship. The Hunter helps to clear monsters that have prevents the Troverians from properly working their kilns, and the Hunter's abilities are recognized by the Ace Hunters as they pass through. As they prepare to leave, the daughter of the Troverian chief offers to come along as to learn from the Caravan's smith, The Man. The Caravan sets the ocean on their new ship, the Arluq, but are attacked by a mysterious black dragon, Gore Magala.

Monster Hunter 4, like previous titles in the series, was primarily developed for a Japanese audience; though previous games had been localized for release in English-speaking markets, no localized version had broken over one million units sold.

On starting the development of Monster Hunter 4 Ultimate, the Westernized version of the game, Andrew Alfonzo, the localization director for Capcom, wanted to strive to make the title appeal to the Western audience more than previous games, and had his team involved early on during the game's development process to provide input and start localization. Alfonzo spent time researching the differences between Western and Japanese players, which showed that Western players tended to be older than those playing the Japanese versions. He further spent time to understand how business decisions are made in Japan as to be able to better communicate his team's suggestions to the lead developers. Some of the team's suggestions required altering some aspects of the game that would meet gameplay expectations of Western gamers, such as changing loading screen information to provide useful tips rather than narrative information, and changing the pace of the introductory quests that act as tutorials for the game.

Upon release, Monster Hunter 4 Ultimate received positive reviews, with numerous critics calling it the best title in the series so far. Review aggregator website Metacritic assigned scores of 86/100. Japanese gaming magazine Famitsu gave the game overwhelming scores. Destructroid gave a score of 9/10 calling the game a hallmark of excellence.

GameSpot praised the game by stating "Monster Hunter 4 Ultimate manages to expand upon the things that people love about the series, while simultaneously making concessions to those getting involved for the first time. It's an absolutely astonishing time-sink, but it rarely feels like a grind; when the game gets its hooks into you, you can expect to find yourself engrossed for at least 80 hours. Those who become truly invested can expect to find their in-game clock running into the hundreds of hours. Sure, Monster Hunter 4 Ultimate isn't without some of the series' time-honoured idiosyncrasies, but it's the most streamlined and accessible game yet, and one that's hard not to truly obsess over."