Recent reviews by AqueousAblution

A neat little idle game, great for folks like me who grew up playing with those marble tower sets as a kid. I had a lot of fun fitting together pieces to make an interesting course, even as someone who's not super into idle games!

[Note: I've marked this as "received this product for free" since I got it as part of the Discord promotion, but I'd 100% have spent money for this particular part of the set if not for that]
It's a very cute scarf, and easily the best part of the Fall set. In case you were wondering, the Elgado-themed pattern is a separate pigment that can be hidden by making both pigments the same if you want the whole thing to be all one color, which looks quite a bit better IMO.

While this hairstyle looks quite nice in isolation, in practice the braid tends to clip through a LOT of armor because it's so low on the character's head. If you're okay with only being able to wear it with a few things (or you plan to have your hunter run around in their skivvies 24/7), I'd recommend it, but for everyone else I'd say consider using a different hairstyle instead (for example hairstyle 29, which I believe comes with Sunbreak, is quite nice as someone who likes braided hair).

Before I get into my personal opinion about Sunbreak, a few important things to note regarding the negative reviews on this expansion, which are basically all whinging about the excessive amount of paid (cosmetic) DLC:

1. Everyone's saying "this started with World but now it's getting worse!" which isn't true. This started with Frontier (where it was WAY worse, like letting you buy stuff that actually affected gameplay), which is now shut down, and as such Capcom is looking to keep milking that DLC cow. But because Frontier is gone, they now have to milk the mainline games if they want to keep up the profits. It's understandable that my fellow westerners would be unaware of this since Frontier was Japan-exclusive, and that might also explain why the Japanese playerbase is a lot less bothered by this "new" trend (because it's not actually new for them at all, and is actually less egregious than what they put up with in Frontier). If it ever starts getting as bad as Frontier then yes, you should absolutely boycott the series, but right now we're in the spot every game with extra DLC should be in, where everything is optional cosmetics. Some of it's a bit overpriced, and paid character edit vouchers are vile (but they were vile in base Rise, Iceborne, and base World, too), but I don't think that's enough to tell people to stay away from the game as a whole.
   
2. None of this paid DLC actually requires you to own Sunbreak, which means that if you're going to leave negative reviews for Sunbreak, you should also be making your review of MH Rise negative as well (if not only leaving negative reviews on base Rise and not on Sunbreak). If you leave all your angry reviews here and not on the base game, new players will see that Rise's recent reviews are still "very positive" while Sunbreak's are "mixed", and then just buy the base game alone without necessarily checking to see why the expansion is getting so many negative reviews compared to MH Rise (and then probably go ahead and buy cosmetic DLCs anyway, rendering the whole point of the protesting moot).

Now, with all that out of the way:
Sunbreak is great. Base Rise was already pretty damn good, but there were some little things that I didn't love, like having to do rampages (which I hear aren't too bad with a group, but as a primarily solo player I found them quite stressful and annoying); weapon layering being limited to the rampage weapons (which aren't even that great mechanically); Kamura Village having loading zones between the gathering hub, smithy, and buddy plaza (where all your between-hunt farms are located); and not really getting to spend much time with the NPCs, resulting in me not feeling too attached to them as characters. Sunbreak fixed all but the layered weapon problem at launch, and now even that is fixed as of the second title update, which lets you use Outfit Vouchers+ to create layered weapons that work just like layered armor. I've only ever had to do rampages to get things from High Rank that I missed (like certain apex monster materials for decorations), which are made a lot less annoying by having Master Rank equipment; the only loading zone you have to worry about once you've unlocked Elgado Outpost is fast traveling back to the Buddy Plaza every 5 hunts to loot the cohoot nest there (which isn't a big deal since you can keep it synced with the one in Elgado by gathering from both at the same time, so you just have to look at the one in Elgado to know if you need to head to the Buddy Plaza); and Follower Quests/Support Surveys let you go out hunting with various NPCs (including some characters from Kamura), making them feel much more alive. I do wish they'd let you take followers into more quests than just the rather limited selection of offline-only quests (and the occasional urgent quest where best character Casca Ser Mercedes Dame Fiorayne accompanies you), but at least there's a plugin for REFramework that lets you do so.
Speaking of, the modding scene for Rise is still alive and well in Sunbreak, but that's really moreso something I should reserve for a review of Rise itself, so I'll just say it's quite easy to install mods and there are a lot of great ones out there.
A lot of people talk up Switch Skill Swap, and admittedly for some playstyles it's a real game-changer (I used it quite a bit when I mained Sword & Shield), but I find with Switch Axe I'm fine with just one loadout. Even so, it's a very good option to have, but maybe not the biggest selling point for everyone. I'm also a bit annoyed that the type 2/feminine/female armor designs are still needlessly showy (it's not a big deal if the whole set is a bit skimpy, like with the Kulu Ya-Ku set, but the amount of sets that are otherwise reasonably armored that then have a boob window or short shorts is tiresome), but this has been a longstanding problem with the series as a whole and is hardly unique to Sunbreak, and also once again mods save the day. I should note that if this is your first time in Master Rank/G Rank, you'll definitely experience some growing pains as you get used to the intensity of the monster fights, but I'm now at the point where the vast majority of faints feel like my fault rather the game being unfair. Lastly, a lot of people complain about the special monster type that makes up much of the endgame afflicted monsters having bloated HP, but honestly outside of when I first unlocked that quest type I haven't had much of a problem. I find they take about as long to hunt as MR monsters did when I was just starting Sunbreak, which isn't a big deal to me.

Admittedly Rise is my first MonHun game, which makes Sunbreak my first MonHun expansion, so I can't really say how it compares to Iceborne or any of the previous games' expansions where it was "G Rank" instead of "Master Rank", but I can say with confidence that Monster Hunter Rise: Sunbreak is one of my favorite games of all time. Perhaps that will change if the paid DLC situation gets worse the way the doomsayers claim it will, but until then, this expansion gets a hearty recommendation from me. Also Fiorayne best girl now and forever

Quick edit: since Steam doesn't show playtime for DLC reviews as far as I can tell, I currently have 672 hours in Rise as a whole, though when Sunbreak came out I had a little less than 100 hours, meaning I have well over 6 times the playtime in Sunbreak compared to Rise (at least on PC, I also own the Switch version of Rise where I had somewhere in the neighborhood of 150 hours, which is still a lot less than Sunbreak on PC). Make of that what you will.