Monster Hunter is easily one of the biggest franchises that Capcom has going on at the moment. At least in its homeland of Japan. Meanwhile, interest in the series elsewhere has been tepid to put it mildly, despite the publisher's best efforts.
Then again, the platform on which the games have primarily thrived in the east, aka the PlayStation Portable never really took off either. Whereas many believe that without Monster Hunter, the PSP would not be nearly as popular in Japan as it is today.
And the most recent console version of the game, for the Wii, was hindered by the fact that playing anything online with that particular home system is so foreign that hardly anyone took interest.
The upcoming 3DS and Wii U ports of that particular game, which will be called Monster Hunter 3 Ultimate, are headed to the Americas later this month. And, according to Joystiq, Capcom is determined to make its return visit a success.
In Boston, for PAX East, Capcom will erect a booth that is entirely dedicated to Monster Hunter. Plus there will be one at both Wondercon and C2E2 thereafter.
Furthermore, there are events planned at Capcom's office later down the road, along with a tour of some kind that will cross the country sometime this summer.
There are also plans to release a patch shortly after the game's launch that will allow plays among those in other parts of the world, specifically Japan, where the game is again most popular.
According to senior product marketing manager Laili Bosma:
"Capcom is very dedicated to the brand, obviously in Japan being as huge as it is. But, the team is also dedicated to trying to make it work here in the US."
But Bosma acknowledges that it won't be an overnight thing. Hence all the outreach:
"My goal here is to try to get as many people to experience it first-hand, and for us to answer those questions as much as we can, and then hopefully grow that audience one person at a time."
