When Monster Hunter Worlds turned the game franchise into a worldwide sensation, one of the most appreciated details in the game was the food and cooking animations. Now, Monster Hunter Wilds developers are doubling down on that kind of culinary appreciation– something to rival Studio Ghibli and Hayao Miyazaki films with the depiction of food and how they’re made.
In an interview with IGN, Capcom developers Kaname Fujioka and Yuya Tokuda talked about how much more love they’ve given to Monster Hunter Wilds‘ food system after the community appreciation for the first game’s cooking animations. One of the biggest changes was how you can now cook anywhere and see the cooking cutscene instead of only having a cooking cutscene in the base or at camp.
In turn, this mechanical change opened up more opportunities for the developers to show off some of their mouth-watering cooking animations. All of them seem to have been improved drastically from Monster Hunter Worlds, as is shown in the interview:
Even something as simple as plain fish or wild cabbage was given some careful cooking and eating animations. One of their main reasons for the big change in the field cooking system was that “if you were going to eat, the food might as well look delicious.”
Monster Hunter Wilds Devs Added Their Favorite Dishes in the Game
Thus, the devs have tapped into their personal favorite comfort food recipes for their realistic 3D in-game depictions. So food cooking animations are not just limited to cat chefs now but are also something players can do. Moreover, there’s a better mix of meat, veggies, and fruits now. Still, the devs still swore by meat as their favorite.
“We haven’t announced this yet, but there’s even more extravagant meat in the game. Having seen the game’s food for so long, it all looks tasty to me. But this extravagant meat was enough to make me feel like, ‘Ok, you can’t beat red meat after all,'” recalled Yuya Tokuda.
As for what kind of “extravagant meat” that would be, it would be fair to assume that monster meat is not off the menu. You’re already taking off their skins and horns to use as weapons, so why should the meat go to waste?