Monster Hunter: World’s crossover events bring over instantly recognizable characters to join in on the slicing and dicing. Fresh off the heels of a Horizon: Zero Dawn event, certain players can now unlock Street Fighter’s Ryu for some of the most absurd and monster hunting imaginable.
Players with Street Fighter V save can now play through a quest to unlock a set of Ryu armor that transforms their character into the iconic fireball-throwing martial artist. The quest, “Down the Dark, Muddy Path,” is an arena match that the player can sign up for in the gather hall at the top level of World’s awesome hub world. It’s a match against an absolutely massive Barroth that drops a special ticket to unlock the armor. It takes seven of these tickets to purchase the armor from the smithy. That might seem like a hassle but the result is so absurd that it’s worth the grind.
Running around as a burly martial arts muscleman is initially jarring thanks to the slight clash in art styles. Ryu, with his pseudo-clay textures, appears to be lifted completely from Street Fighter V. It’s pretty wild to see slimy monsters and scale ridden armor right next to a somewhat rubbery chunk-boy but the raw hilarity helps. There’s something awesome about seeing Ryu waddle around with a giant hammer or bounce around with an insect glaive.
After some experimenting to find Ryu’s perfect weapon, I settled back on my preferred arsenal of dual blades. The stabby animations are great substitutes for punches although purchasable gestures in the Playstation Store also allow the player to throw a hadouken fireball or perform a spinning shoryuken uppercut. When the Horizon: Zero Dawn event gave me the chance to deck out my palico companion as a metalic watcher robot, I passed. Ryu punching literal dragons doesn’t seem to be getting old anytime soon.