Monster Hunter Wilds runs at stable 30FPS on Switch 2 after Capcom's painstaking optimization effort

Monster Hunter Wilds arrives on Nintendo Switch 2 on December 5th with all free DLC updates and local co-op support intact. The port represents Capcom's latest ambitious Switch 2 project, joining Pragmata and Resident Evil Requiem as well-received conversions of demanding titles.

Producer Genki Sunano explained the studio's core philosophy in an interview with Kotaku. "The Nintendo Switch 2 version of Monster Hunter Wilds was developed around the concept of delivering a natural Monster Hunter Wilds experience on Nintendo Switch 2," he said. "In other words, we didn't want it to feel like a simple port, where the graphics or performance had merely been scaled down to make the game run on Nintendo Switch 2."

Capcom aimed to bring the same experience available on PC and console versions to the handheld without compromising what defines Wilds. Achieving that balance proved challenging. "It was this painstaking, and at times seemingly endless, process of making decisions and optimisations one by one that proved to be one of our biggest challenges in delivering a comfortable handheld experience while preserving what makes Wilds feel like Wilds," Sunano said.

The result is a stable 30FPS experience in handheld mode, including during taxing multiplayer hunts. Capcom plans to apply the technical knowledge gained from this project to performance improvements for existing platforms before the launch of the expansion Monster Hunter Wilds: Ascendance in 2027. The publisher continues developing Wilds with the goal of surpassing the popularity achieved by Monster Hunter World.