No Kotaku Pointing fish? This makes me sad...

Does the arrow mean "YOU could be here!"?

Best GT ever. I'm sad I missed it.

Would anyone care to translate the blog?

It's a tarp!

This sounds familiar. I thought I read a story about men using Craig's List for anonymous meetings ... wait, maybe that story was about something else. Suspiciously similar, though.

Awww man. How did I NOT hear about that one? That musta been about the coolest thing since sliced bread. No, wait. I'm gonna go all out. It looks even cooler than sliced bread. Yeah, I went there...

A utter lack of long cloaks/coats, long, winded pre-combat speeches of their motives and fights for justice, and look! It is a construction site! a perfect battle field and they are just using a corner! What kind of Japaneses monster battle is this?!

Wow, I actually know where that exact street corner is in Akihabara. There was no tournament going on when I passed it though. :(

They used all the pointing fish up covering the naughty parts on this story
[feeds.gawker.com]

I still don't understand why there's such a huge following for Monster Hunter. I REALLY wanted to like this game, but I just couldn't. The controls are atrocious, and it just didn't strike me as fun. Has anyone else tried this game and really liked it? I'd be curious to hear why.

wow... japan is so cool!

I dont know whats going on here.

What is so special about it anywayz? At Hong Kong there is monster hunter meeting everyday at different location. Only US is so lame that has no meeting at all. I even saw some cute chicks at those meeting too ^^

@Dakkonfire: This is all about coop man. Helping out each other and fight together is way more fun than anything else on earth.

Are you saying we should create our own little events for games and gather together to play and discuss our love for that game? Bah, I would not even bother going outside, too lazy. :p

@Dakkonfire: It's one of those odd niche games, and that niche happened to be Japanese gamers. Sure, the camera is whack, there's no lock-on, and the controls are 'sluggish' because we're all used to God of War's instant weapon animation.

The game's appeal is that it's Pokemon for adults, just replace catching cutesy Pokemons with hunting monsters for body parts, collecting herbs and mining ores, all of which can be used to craft weapons, armours or cooked to increase your character' stats. Kinda like Diablo sans-magic.

And there's also the very Pokemon-esque satisfaction you get when you finally beat those huge-a** drakes - y'know, the whole man's triumph over nature and David vs Goliath thing.

@Dakkonfire: Yeah, the camera's wacky, and the controls are sluggish, but the sluggish controls are part of the game (camera controls less so).
In Monster Hunter, you're not a uber-god pwnage machine, you're an above-average human, with all a human's frailty and weakness, but you still manage to triumph over gargantuan beasts due to cleverness, dodging, and preparation. It really gives a sense of achievement when you finally kill that Rathalos that killed you 20 times in a row.
Plus, not to mention, it's rather realistic that the weapons move slowly, I mean, you aren't going to be able to swing a sword the size of a Tacoma with much ease, are you?
Not to mention, the atmosphere in the game and the little touches just add a nice little charm to it.
It really is a fringe title, and not for everyone, but there certainly are quite a few reasons why one would like it.

@DranzerKire: I'd be down. Maybe a "Official Kotaku Kontrol Map" to show where all the readers are based. You could volunteer to have your city put up and use the friends/feedback system here to get people together for stuff. As it stands, besides my everyday friends I think I've got McWhertor here in Los Angeles and thats it:P

@Dakkonfire: It's probably because of the VERY steep learning curve. MHF2 for the PSP is my first MH game and it took me a large amount of time before I got accustomed to it. Now, I can't let go of it! LOL.

You probably just gave it a few hours so you didn't like it. I agree, this game is not for everybody. But it sure is a great game.