Monster Hunter Stories 3 Goes Full RPG With 200-Year Time Jump — Skip the First Two
After years of reshaping Monster Hunter into an RPG, the team is finally building the role-playing game they want on their own terms.
Capcom is quietly flipping the table on Monster Hunter Stories 3. The new JRPG spin-off jumps way ahead in the timeline, trims some familiar faces, and leans harder into being an RPG on purpose. Also, yes, it was announced about two months ago during the Nintendo Direct Partner Showcase — a reveal that apparently did a number on one fan's underwear. Internet, never change.
Centuries later, brand-new slate
Director Kenji Oguro told 4Gamer (via machine translation) that this one is set far past the events of the first two Stories games — as in, centuries.
'The timeline is set in a future world more than 200 years after the previous work.'
That time jump is why series mascot Navirou is sitting this one out, and why you should not expect any returning characters from the earlier games. Fresh cast, fresh era. The upside: Riders — the monster-taming side of the universe, separate from the main series’ hunters — are now a big deal in this future setting, which lets the game actually dig into rider society instead of treating it like a footnote.
More RPG, by design this time
Monster Hunter series producer Ryozo Tsujimoto says the team deliberately shifted the balance toward RPG systems for this entry.
'To focus more on the RPG aspect.'
Oguro added that the first two games were built with a mindset of turning Monster Hunter into an RPG. This time, they flipped the question.
'We started by asking, 'What kind of RPG do we want to make?''
It sounds small, but it explains why this one is being framed as 'more RPG' than the earlier Stories titles — not just Monster Hunter with turn-based battles slapped on.
Standalone energy, minimal homework
To be fair, Stories and Stories 2 were never tightly connected — a few recurring faces, some callbacks, but mostly self-contained. Stories 3 sounds even more detached from the past, so you do not need to cram before it lands in March.
Wilds monsters are crossing over
Following its Tokyo Game Show showing, Capcom confirmed that some monsters that debuted in Monster Hunter Wilds will show up in Stories 3. No full roster yet, but that cross-pollination is a fun wrinkle for long-time fans who like seeing the ecosystem mix.
Need-to-know
- Set more than 200 years after the previous Stories game; entirely new cast
- Navirou is out, and no other returning characters are expected
- Design pivot: explicitly RPG-first, per producer Ryozo Tsujimoto and director Kenji Oguro
- Monsters that debuted in Monster Hunter Wilds will appear here
- You can jump in cold — no real homework before March
Meanwhile, elsewhere in Monster Hunter land...
Capcom is also going big on Monster Hunter Wilds. The studio is layering in MMO-flavored mechanics through a Final Fantasy 14 collaboration and bringing back Monster Hunter 4 Ultimate icon Gogmazios after 10 years. Different game, same universe, lots happening.