LogInThe game's rating and player numbers suggest that the latest Monster Hunter may as well be the most successful fiasco of the year.
10 million sales in the first month, the best-performing game on Steam in 2025, the fifth-best performing Steam title of all time – no matter how you slice it, it's impossible to call Capcom's Monster Hunter Wilds a flop and a failure without arguing in bad faith. But while those accolades are no doubt important both reputationally and financially, they ultimately matter little to the actual players, and based on their recent feedback, MHW might as well be called the most successful, profitable, and acclaimed fiasco of the year.
Capcom
Over the past few weeks, Monster Hunter Wilds' rating – which was never particularly high, but that's besides the point – took an even deeper plunge, dropping from 62% in late May to 59% as of this writing, with recent Steam reviews marked as Overwhelmingly Negative and a positivity score of just 19%.
While it's not unusual or uncommon for video games to periodically get hit with waves of especially harsh negativity, those waves are typically caused by a developer or publisher engaging in some naughty and unpopular activities, with Take-Two and 2K's recent Terms of Service changes being the prime example.
Where MHW differs is that the negative feedback it's been receiving isn't tied to any specific new event, as most reviews continue to criticize the very same issues present since launch: a lack of content compared to Monster Hunter: World, dismal optimization and performance, and the inclusion of Denuvo DRM, despised within the gaming community.
Speaking of World, another publicly available metric of success – and a point of pride for Wilds and its fans – concurrent Steam players, has also seen better days, with the latter now averaging fewer players than the former. As of now, Wilds sits at a 24-hour peak of 16,900, while World holds a higher daily peak of 26,041.
In the comments, some users attribute Wilds' nearly 99% drop in user numbers to its $70 price tag, noting that World arguably offers more content, is better optimized, sells for $30, and regularly drops to just ten bucks during Steam sales.
And why do you think Monster Hunter Wilds now performs worse than its predecessor? Do you think Capcom will address the optimization issues players are unhappy about? Tell us what you think in the comments!
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