Former Monster Hunter producer Shintaro Kojima recently took to X to talk about the difficulties of creating underwater battles in games. This comment hints at why the Monster Hunter series has never brought back Monster Hunter Tri’s aquatic combat.

Before he left Capcom in 2019, Kojima worked on various entries in the Monster Hunter series, starting out as a planner on the first game in 2004 and serving as producer on Monster Hunter Generations and Monster Hunter Generations Ultimate. Notably, he was the Assistant Producer on Monster Hunter Tri (Monster Hunter 3), the game that introduced underwater battles to the franchise. Originally released on the Wii, Monster Hunter Tri and its various iterations like Monster Hunter 3 Ultimate, was the only generation of Monster Hunter games to date to contain underwater combat. This might be why:

水中戦。
これは地上戦があるゲームだと別ゲームをもう一つ作るのと同じ。
大変なのである。
本当にめっちゃ大変。
— 小嶋慎太郎 (@kozyex) August 24, 2024

Post translation: Underwater combat. If the game already has ground-based battles, then it (adding underwater combat) is like making a separate game. It’s difficult. It’s really super hard.

The underwater sections in Monster Hunter Tri allow players and their companions to swim around and engage in combat. Like in many games with underwater sections, Monster Hunter Tri allows players to move in all directions, including vertically, as they explore the environment.

Monster Hunter Tri underwater advertisement — Monster Hunter Tri and Tri Ultimate’s advertising images featured the underwater element.

Just looking at Monster Hunter’s gameplay on the ground, it is easy to see how difficult this would be to create. Even though more recent Monster Hunter games have you jumping off ledges on land and using aerial combat to try to take down monsters, Monster Hunter Tri’s on-land gameplay was mostly limited to moving horizontally. Not to mention that the developers had to convincingly simulate how the density of water, which is greater than that of air, makes it harder to move through.

The Monster Hunter devs also had to adapt the combat mechanics to work underwater in the game’s active battles. For example, kicks become shoulder tackles, and the in-battle actions were given specific new animations. Shock traps and bombs would float in the water instead of being placeable on the ground.

Despite the beauty of the environments, potential for dramatic battles (like the one against the elder dragon Caedeus) and extra element of exploration that the underwater sections gave Monster Hunter Tri, underwater battles have never made a return to the series.

In a 2017 interview with Gamespot, director Kaname Fujioka revealed that they made the underwater battles in Monster Hunter Tri as a challenge: “We worked really hard on it, but for the amount of time and effort it takes to make underwater action work, we felt that in (Monster Hunter) World we’re better off focusing on other things.” adding, “As for what the future holds, I’ve got a really strong attachment to it. So, I’d like to try it again someday, but I really can’t say.”

Monster Hunter Wilds underwater exploration — A recent developer livestream at Gamescom showed that it will be possible to swim underwater in Monster Hunter Wilds (Image: Gamescom/IGN)

Many Monster Hunter fans have been hoping that the upcoming Monster Hunter Wilds will have underwater combat. However, a recent interview with the devs suggests that although you will be able to swim underwater, you won’t be able to hunt and fight monsters in the depths (Source: IGN Japan). Instead, players can look forward to dynamic weather, pack-like monster behavior and other factors that will greatly influence their hunts.