Okay, so quick recap...
Monster Hunter - 4
Gods Eater Burst - 5
Lord of Arcana - 3
Equipment
Okay, so I could be totally lazy, count the types of weapons and armor and just call it a day, right? Well, unfortunately, I can't. The equipment in each game is not only different, but have a certain synergy with one another. So with that said, let's compare the equipment in each game.
The Gunlance. Eat your heart out, Squall!
To start off with, Monster Hunter has eleven types of weapons. All of them have a characteristic that gives them strengths and weaknesses. The most popular classes of weapons here are the Greatsword and Hammer. They do extraordinary amounts of damage, but in return they are slow and hard to use. There are also two different types of armor - Blademaster armor and Gunner armor. The Blademaster armor offers more protection than the Gunner armor, but logically, it can only be used by melee weapon classes. The ranged weapons are the bow, light bowguns, and heavy bowguns. The only way to describe a bowgun is, for the light one, the rocket launcher and the heavy is an entire artillery cannon. Yes, you heard me right. Still, with the prey you're hunting, such powerful weapons are gonna be necessary.
And the game's setting is medieval fantasy!
However, the thing about heavy weapons like greatswords, hammers, and heavy bowguns make you a good deal slower, leaving you a sitting duck if you don't use them right. You're a strong but still ordinary human - lugging these things is not gonna be easy for anyone, even if your career is hunting monsters that can chew you up and spit you out every other day. That being said, some weapons come with shields or can block in some way, but certain weapons you can't block at all - like the dual swords, long swords, or any of the hammer classes (i.e., the hammer and war horn classes) so you rely on agility in order to avoid damage.
Apparently, you can't block with this baby because it's too delicate.
As you can only use one weapon per mission, and can only change weapons between hunts, you usually have to make do with what you have. This strict restriction on weapons is to further encourage co-op gameplay, as your teammates can draw some of your target's fire as well as cover up for your weaknesses, like if you're using a ranged weapon, you have some people up front that can tank for you. Also, each weapon comes with certain skill points, and you normally have to have the complete set to get the skills (or anti-skills) they come with, whether it's doing more damage, more stamina, or even just sharpening your weapons faster. You have to change equipment to whatever your target is weak to, etc etc etc.
Gods Eater Burst is somewhat simpler yet more complicated to talk about at the same time. There are three categories of equipment, divided into subcategories - the sword, the gun, and the shield. For the sword, the classifications are the Short swords, Long swords, and the Buster swords. For the guns, there are the Assault, Sniper, and Blast. The Shields are Buckler, Shield (derp), and the Tower Shield. So, everything is neatly divided into subcategories, right? Well, here's where it gets tricky...
"It costs $400,000 to fire this gun for twelve seconds."
See, unlike in Monster Hunter, you can have one sword, one gun, and one shield equipped at the same time. This way, you're completely covered in terms of equipment - it's just a matter of preference and the prey you'll be fighting. For the swords, the Short sword is fastest and can do piercing damage, but suffers from a short reach and limited power. The Long sword is the happy medium, doing purely slashing damage. The Buster sword has the longest reach, can be charged up for a massive strike a la greatswords from Monster Hunter, and can also do crushing damage, but in exchange, it's slow and cumbersome, require some practice before it can be wielded.
This is a short sword. They only get bigger from there.
The guns are purely aesthetic, but they have their damage specializations. Assault guns are the jacks of all trades, capable of rapid fire. Snipers do great piercing damage, and Blast guns do excellent crush damage. The shields aren't so specialized. Bucklers instantly deploy and block a good amount of damage. Shields take about 0.2 seconds to deploy and block most of the damage. Tower Shields take half a second to deploy but block all the damage. Now I know what you're thinking. 'Pf, half a second, big whoop,' you're all thinking. Well, trust me, these guys hit hard, hit fast, and generally are somewhat hard to predict. That half a second could mean the difference between surviving their attack or being KO'd.
Like to see anything get through THIS!
One of the most unique aspects of Gods Eater Burst is their Bullet Editor. See, you can load different kinds of bullets that do different kinds of damage into your gun. You can even take your enemy's powers and use them as bullets (which I'm not going to get into because this comparison is long enough as is without going on a tangent). However, Bullet Editor allows you to create and 'program' your own bullets to use in combat. I've tried it and, well, let's just say my results were relatively lackluster. Once you get a handle on it, however, some of the things you can do are pretty amazing.
Gotta admit, these are pretty awesome.
As for armor... well, you get customizable outfits and certain upgrades you can buy or craft, but there's no armor. Your only armor is your shield and upgrades. The outfits are purely aesthetic, so yes, going out there in a bikini is the same amount of protection you'd get from going out wearing a full suit of samurai armor. And I'm not kidding, both of them are outfits you can get throughout the game.
Lord of Arcana is probably going to be the shortest section here. They only have five kinds of weapons - the one-handed sword, the 2-handed sword, the mace, the polearms, and the firelances. You can only equip shields with the swords. Now then, the weapons don't really even have any special effects or anything - they only increase your attack and/or defense stat (or lower them, if you're switching to a different type of weapon) and have different affinities. Basically almost bare-bones weapons that you'd get from an RPG. Because the dodging mechanism is so finicky, not having a shield is quite the bane, and because you can cancel your combo with the 2-handed sword to block... okay, you can see where my preferences lie, but honestly, there's not much I can say here.
Sword and shield - stop staring at her cleavage.
Quite honestly, compared to the amount of customization and the kinds of upgrades you can do in Monster Hunter and Gods Eater Burst, this feels significantly lacklustre. The upgrades and skills you can get only come from orbs which you can then insert into your armor... if your armor or shield HAS any sockets. Sure, this allows for freer customization and upgrades, but in the end, it's just cumbersome and lacks the detail or effort the other games put into their own equipment.
So in short, I'll have to give 2 points to Gods Eater Burst because of more flexibility with its weapons and how to use them, 1 point for Monster Hunter for its diverse range of weapons and armor, and 0 for Lord of Arcana because it's just too limited.
Current tally:
Monster Hunter - 5
Gods Eater Burst - 7
Lord of Arcana - 3
Monsters
Let's face it, the monsters in each series are the real stars of the games. We're much more in awe of them than we are of our characters or any side characters. And because of that, it just feels that much sweeter when we take them down a couple notches. So, let's see who has the best monsters around.
Yuan Kut-Ku. Don't let its appearance fool you - it'll kill the unprepared hard.
Monster Hunter is known for its creatures. They are not only diverse, but each of them are unique and challenging, yet still seem fair (though at times they do get a bit cheap...). You can be fighting giant apes to dragons to wyverns... and when you have a game where raptors are rank-and-file mooks and the beginning bosses who are barely challenging, you know that it's going to be awesome.
Congalala and Blangonga - two monkey cousins, and respectively, the fat slob and the fit boss.
Eventually, the monsters will fall back on palette swaps that are stronger, but even if you take out the palette swaps, there are so many different types of monsters, and it's really just crazy how many there are and how unique they can be. Some monsters take their cues from mythology, others from a certain theme and element... it's just nuts.
Gods Eater Burst, I'll admit, isn't nearly as diverse. It really doesn't take long before they fall into a regular set of monsters, then just do palette or graphics swaps the whole way through. The monster designs are certainly unique, though, as they take cues not only from mythology, but also from technology. Their designs are still pretty damn awesome.
The Quadriga - part elephant, part tank, part missiles, all death.
That being said, there really is no excuse for the limited number of monster types that you can face before they switch to simple graphics swaps. Aside from the mook monsters, off the top of my head, I can count about nine different types. They all have about three, maybe four palette and/or graphics swaps. Yeah, Gods Eater Burst, I'M NOT FOOLED. I can see that you more or less copy/pasted their monster types and either just buffed them, changed their elemental design, or gave them a few new attacks! Seriously, it's a total buzzkill when you have to fight against the same monsters over and over and OVER.
The Vajra family line. Honestly, when you get down to it, there's no difference.
Now then, Lord of Arcana at least has a BIT of more diversity... though still not much. Square Enix has an addiction to taking cues from ancient mythology and incorporating them into their games, from weapons to gods to monsters. There is no exception here.
Awesome design. Now if only the boss fight was more exciting...
While very visually impressive, most of the boss monsters suffer from chronic slowness - you can easily run to the other side of the arena and they'll be shambling about to catch you. Grendel, who's shown right there, spends most of his time flying in the air, occasionally attack, rinse and repeat. To damage him you have to attack his sword, which he sends to the ground occasionally for attacks. That's not to say that the bosses aren't challenging, though. Each boss is unique, having different designs and tactics so you every creature requires their own strategy and equipment to bring down.
It's a huge, angry centaur. Do I even need to say 'run'?
The mooks make a great deal of the game, however, so a good deal of design - and mythology - are behind them as well, from your standard goblins and slimes to your minotaurs and those goddamn griffins. And at least they have their own unique features (albeit small ones) so they don't feel like carbon-copy mooks each and every time. So not a great amount of diversity, but still pretty good.
So, in conclusion, I'm giving Monster Hunter two points for its diverse and many monsters and creatures, Lord of Arcana gets one point for its use of mythology for both is mooks and big cheeses, and Gods Eater Burst gets zilch because they repeat their own creatures FAR too much for their own good.
Final tally:
Monster Hunter - 7
Gods Eater Burst - 7
Lord of Arcana - 4
In Conclusion
Okay, all three games do have their merits. In the end, though, I feel like Gods Eater Burst has done enough to merit as its own game, rather than just being a copy of Monster Hunter. Monster Hunter is the originator of all these series so it takes top spot, though Gods Eater Burst is definitely a close second. Lord of Arcana, on the other hand, feels like a greedy grab at Monster Hunter's audience and while they do have a few interesting concepts in there, poor diversity and controls as well as some questionable decisions make it the lowest game on this list.
This is Kenji, and thanks for reading the whole way through. Or at least skimming. Or even looking at it.
...
Now go back and read all of it if you haven't. >_>
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