Omega Force’s Wild Hearts is the latest monster-hunting game to be published by Electronic Arts for their EA Originals lineup, the game is set to release in a few days, but we got a hands-on preview.
Wild Hearts is a stylish hack-and-slash game similar to the Monster Hunter series. There is almost no focus in level-to-level progression or fighting smaller enemies, boss fights compromise almost the entirety of the game, and Wild Hearts absolutely nails it from what we’ve seen so far.
We had some hands-on time with the game and its safe to say that Omega Force outdid themselves, Wild Hearts is a fantastic game on a genre that is incredibly hard to perfect. This was seen with the Toukiden series, which had many flaws of their own.
The game’s monsters this time are Kemonos, large mythical Japanese beasts that can change the landscape entirely when rampaging, which leaves humanity in charge of hunting them, before the planet becomes inhospitable.
Wild Hearts has a huge emphasis on mobility and fast paced action, especially through the game’s building system, the Karakuri structures. These are made of spiritual fiber can be used for the player to dodge, cross great distances or launch into insane jump attacks.
The game’s first chapter gives us access to a whole host of unique weapons all with their own playstyles, abilities, and both strengths and weaknesses.
Weapons include: the Karakuri Katana, which doubles as a whip when powered up, the Nodachi, a giant charge weapon, the Bow, which has two types of ammo, one that gets lodged in the monster and the other that blows up the lodged shots, the Maul, which is a standard hammer weapon that extends in range for giant wide swings, and the Bladed Wagasa, which is a high-mobility weapon that gives the player a parry.
Omega Force absolutely nailed the feeling of the weapons. They all have very in-depth movesets and the necessary impact to make gameplay an absolute joy. It’s the care that went into making every weapon unique and satisfying that make the game so fun to play.
The environments are all beautifully detailed and fighting the Kemono on these beautiful locations that get drastically changed by the fight never gets old, especially with the more effect-heavy changes that some of the Kemono make on the game’s environment.
Wild Hearts is full of likeable and charming characters, and you can watch the first story trailer below:
It’s needless to say any fan of giant spectacular boss fights and difficult monster-hunting gameplay will have a blast with the game’s challenging hunts in Wild Hearts.
We will be posting a full review for the game in the next days, so stay tuned for a more in-depth look at Wild Hearts.
Wild Hearts is set to release February 16th, 2023 on PlayStation 5, Xbox Series X|S and Microsoft Windows (through Steam or EA).
