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A kink is a twist in a rope, an unconventional sexual or non-sexual practice, a spasm, a bend that might interfere with smooth operation, an eccentricity, a source of pleasure and revulsion. A kink can be anything, as long as it’s not the done thing. Monster Hunter Wilds, meanwhile, is a game in which you hunt monsters in the wilds. One of the story campaign’s odder beats is that you must continually seek permission to slaughter the creatures (and turn them into weapons and gear) from the ostensibly conservation-minded Monster Hunting guild. Specifically, you’ll need the blessing of your fresh-faced escort, Alma.
Mostly, this happens without the player needing to actually ask the question. “The guild authorizes you to hunt the Doo Doo Bird,” Alma regretfully intones, as you charge in half-listening with your Doo Doo Skin Switchaxe. Sometimes, it happens in a cutscene. You could argue that it’s pageantry without consequence that needs to be edited out – after all, the game doesn’t really punish you for acting before Alma gives her OK. There’s no Call Of Duty-style “friendly fire will not be tolerated” screen. Nonetheless, some players absolutely love getting authorized to hunt the monsters. It’s fast becoming a meme, and maybe there’s something kinky about that. Here are some speculative and contradictory supporting arguments from me, a man with all the sexblogging experience of an Argos tablelamp.
It’s kinky because it’s a power-up ritual
You were already going to slay this monster, but now you’re really going to slay this dang monster. Gonna get your guild papers stamped and slay that thing like monster hunting is going out of fashion, which it isn’t according to the Steam charts. Guild authorisation in Monster Hunter is an orderly raising of the temperature, a canned escalation akin to Popeye sucking down a belt of spinach, or Alucard shedding a few Control Art Restrictions in Hellsing.
The power-up mantra is libidinous simply because it’s an encouragement to abandon all restraint, while also anointing the player as a smoothly-turning cog in the machinery of Monster Hunting. Alma is the hand and you are the blade. It offers both release and the pleasure of being micromanaged by a nice lady who personifies a vast, carnivorous bureaucracy. Which sort of brings me to bullet point 2…
It’s kinky because it’s a wanton, deferred parody of consent
Monster Hunter’s defining dilemma is that sometimes hunting a monster feels, you know, a bit mean. The developers have spun many a yarn via backstory documents about the impact these great predators have on their habitats, and the necessity of curbing their numbers, but no Lion King-esque monologue can offset the suspicion that these large, beautiful animals are essentially minding their own business, and that it’s neither caring nor eco-friendly to endlessly topple and transform them into frilled jackets.
The anxiety about possibly being unkind to some commodifiable wyverns is intensifying because, like many a triple-A series, Monster Hunter aims to be more lifelike from iteration to iteration. Its creatures grow evermore splendidly fleshy and sympathetic in their movements, its professed “ecosystems” evermore fluid and credible in their species relationships. Wilds doesn’t just bump up the naturalism, but weaponises it in the shape of the Wound system, whereby you target wincingly realistic hacked skin for bonus damage.
Needing guild “authorisation” in the moment is evidence that Capcom have never felt under greater pressure to reassure players that what they’re doing is ethical and rational. We need to be careful how we frame this, because it’s openly entangling sex and violence, but it’s kind of a safeword. Alma is both the character who greenlights your butchery and the surrogate mourner who expresses dutiful sorrow for the lives necessarily taken, freeing you to indulge your carnality within the ceremony of the hunt. It could be that her dialogue was even written in response to playtester misgivings. On the other hand…
It’s kinky because it’s perversely pointless and toothless
Again, Monster Hunter is a monster hunting game. To buy a game with that name is to authorise yourself to hunt monsters. If there was a time and place to broach and dissect any qualms about carving up imaginary lizards, it was when you were feeding Steam your card details, or standing at the counter in whatever brick-and-mortar retailer still scrapes an existence in your neighbourhood.
In Capcom’s perfect world, I guess, the cashier staff would be trained to assess the moral character of the purchaser, and compare that against the latest Monster population telemetry. They would have the power to deauthorise you in advance. Imposing such a scheme on retail would lead to commercial disaster, of course, but normal people would sleep easier knowing that the handful of genuinely honourable souls massacring Rathians are only doing it for the good of the species.
Come now, Capcom. The idea that you would buy a “Monster Hunter” game only to willingly pack up your Hunting Horn because the Arkveld is looking a wee bit endangered is absurd. But perhaps the absurdity of the rubber-stamping process, the knowledge that “authorisation” is just for show, is supposed to be titillating. Perhaps the idea is to saucily roleplay the fantasy of having a meaningful choice. At the risk of re-energising the discourse engines, and spoiling the plot of Bioshock, “the guild authorizes you” is sort of a variation on “would you kindly”, isn’t it? A magical phrase to trigger you into deciding to do what you were going to do anyway. Hmm, I think this is the first time anybody has tried to portray ludonarrative dissonance as a kink. That said…
It’s kinky because it suggests an anti-Monster Hunter game
There are scenarios in Wilds, typically during free exploration, where Alma can deny you permission to slay a Monster. The thing is, the game doesn’t actively stop you initiating a fight. It’s left to the Monster itself to enforce obedience to guild statute by disengaging and refusing to be killed. Again, there’s some kind of wonky lampooning of consent going on. It makes you wonder what might happen if Capcom had allowed people to actually play out the experience of turning poacher.
Certain possibilities appear when you dig into the fan wikis and read about the Guild Knights, who go after Hunters who kill without approval. Some of them hide in plain sight as receptionists, smiling and nodding while absently whetting a dagger beneath the counter-top. Yes, this is the kind of secretive monitoring agenda I want from real-life staff at GAME, when I apply for a copy of the latest beast-hammering sim.
The Guild Knights aren’t a playable presence in the games, however. Perhaps they should be a multiplayer faction, akin to a PvP Dark Souls Covenant. I think that would be hella kinky, because what more thrilling taboo to trample on, 20 years down the line, than Monster Hunter’s family-friendly provision against Hunters actually dying.
It’s kinky because you want to have sex with a Rathalos
Graham suggested I add this one because it’s the first thing anybody would think, reading the headline. Hey, no judgement from me.
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Kurt Indovina
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