Monster Hunter 3 Ultimate

(See also the page for Monster Hunter Tri)

• If you're playing on the 3DS, the Circle Pad Pro is NOT REQUIRED. There's a new addition that adds lock-on functionality to combat that works pretty good in most circumstances.

• Also in the 3DS version, you can choose to turn off 3D rendering entirely in the options menu. Your mileage may vary, but for me it significantly increased the framerate, while for some of my friends it did nothing it all.

• When making combinations, hold down 'A' after making the first one to rapidly create more of the same item. Really useful for items you want in bulk, like potions, bombs, or bowgun shots.

• For the love of god, look up your charm tables as soon as you can. A Google search for 'MH3U charm tables' should give you a good explanation of what they are and how to determine yours, but the short version is that, depending on the timestamp when you create your save file, you potentially screw yourself out of useful charms and items, like the rust - and ancient-shards that are used to create Dragon-elemental weapons.

• Be prepared! Be sure to make sure you have everything prepared for your quest before you go out on it. Always make sure you have potions, paintballs, and whetstones. If you're aiming to capture monsters, make sure you pack a shock and/or pitfall trap and tranquilizer bombs. If you're harvesting, bring plenty of mining picks and bug nets. Hunting in an unstable environment? Bring dung bombs. Low-rank quests give you a ton of supplies at the beginning of every quest so if you forget something, chances are it's provided on-site, but the game will eventually stop doing that, so it pays to get used to it beforehand.

• Be sure to use your hired hunters whenever you can. On the 3DS, you get them via StreetPass (Don't know about WiiU), and you can meet them in Port Tanzia and hire them to do quests. It's relatively cheap and in my experience they succeed more often than not, so it's a cheap and easy way to get extra carve items from annoying monsters (Gigginox )

• A quick and easy way to make some money and advance time is to do the 1-star quest to deliver 2 Kelbi horns. They're common carves off of the Kelbi (deer) right outside of the village, and one of the rewards for completing the quest is two more Kelbi horns, so you can repeat it indefinitely after the initial two carves. This is probably the fastest way to advance time for the fishing fleet, farm, and hired hunter quests as well.