The core theme of this content is a critical analysis of the Clutch Claw mechanic introduced in Monster Hunter World: Iceborne, arguing that its poor implementation and mandatory nature fundamentally detract from and ultimately ruin the game's combat experience, contrasting it unfavorably with other mechanics like the Slinger and the Wirebugs.
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most Hunter expansions are designed to
add to the base game they bring in new
content like Monsters locations as well
as new features quality of life
improvements that can really make the
entire game more pleasant to play
through as well as substantial gameplay
additions that affect the combat in a
major way for better or worse in this
video we will be discussing what is in
my opinion one of the worst gameplay
additions I am talking about most Hunter
world I spawns clutch claw and how it
[Music]
must answer combat tends to be pretty
grounded you have your weapon your items
your abilities and you have to use them
to take down large beasts in the first
three games the combat was like this
with each new entry providing new
attacks to every weapon to make them
more interesting to use most Hunter 4
introduced vertical elements into the
mix where Hunters could perform aerial
attacks and mount monsters
Generations at its core were used Force
combat but I did six hunting Styles
which dramatically changed the way you
approach the combat it also added
special attacks called Hunter Arts that
did a variety of different things
for Autumn that was my very first game
in the series and generations ultimate
was my second I like the combat of both
games but Generations felt like it was
too centralized on gimmicks they were a
lot of fun but I very much preferred
Thor's more grounded approach upon going
back and playing previous entries and
later fully replaying for ultimate I
decided that I liked its combat the most
out of any game it's slightly less
grounded than say Freedom Unite but I
feel like the vertical elements make the
fights feel much more Dynamic it still
feels realistic and very reliant on my
own weapons and abilities furthermore
this game added weapon types that I
really like and certain attacks to
existing weapons that I really enjoy
using most times the world was made
largely by the development team that
made for ultimate and as combat feels
like an evolution there are no hunting
Styles or arts in this game we still
have jump attacks we have new sliding
attacks overall the combat is still nice
and grounded without a Reliance on
special gimmicks yet it still has the
dynamic verticality sealing for ultimate
that adds many layers to each hunt it's
a great combat that is slightly let down
by a boring cast of Monsters
world does have one mechanic that I
would argue is kind of a gimmick a small
device called the Slinger you load it
with Special ammo and can fire it
causing different effects you can
distract monsters you can wash mud
offsets and monsters you can clear away
toxic effluvium you can load up your
flash Sonic and dunk bombs for easy
access you can even shoot certain parts
of the map and cause them to collapse
such as these crystals that fall and
deal heavy damage to wherever is under
them it's an alright mechanic but it's
not something I find myself using after
a while like near the beginning of the
game I'm like whoa I can make wrathian
walk over there that's so cool and then
it's something they never really use again
again
yes I can wash the mud off Barrel to do
extra damage or I can just hit him and
have the mud come off anyway it does not
help that only the sword and shield
could use it unshaved there's also
criticism to be made about how every
single armor piece has this ugly
appendage that often doesn't blend in or
fit very well
that being said prey should be given to
their Slinger as something that you
don't feel forced to use I can
completely ignore it and play a world
like it's for ultimate but people who
Master it have access to more options in
combat this is something that is very
important to keep in mind the Slinger
felt optional Generations various
hunting styles could be powerful but
those who wanted the standard combat
could just use Guild style and in some
cases have access to even more combat
options than the other styles making a
gimmick optional means that those who
dislike it can just ignore it and still
have a good time but those who like it
can reap additional benefits it's a very
difficult balancing act that world
achieved with the Slinger
so I spawn gets announced and they start
dropping information one of the things
they announced is that all the weapons
can use the Slinger unsheet hooray great
change then they announced a new edition
of clutch claw a new expansion of the
Slinger that allows you to grab once or
Monsters you can use this to either
weaken various body parts and make them
take more damage or you can latch onto
their head and unload all your Slinger
ammo into it causing the monster to go
careening into a wall it expands the use
of the Slinger greatly and is even
available for people in the base game
Who purchase iceborn let's cut to the
chase I think the clutch Claw is a
terrible addition that ruined the entire
game here's why [Music]
[Music] foreign
part of the monster you first have to
aim and press the right face button with
how fast the monsters move this can be
quite difficult especially when there's
a specific part in mind for example
sometimes I want to clutch onto
brachios's head and will end up on his
arm the aiming is also inconsistent
despite the reticle being locked onto
one part you'll clutch onto whatever the
floor makes contact with sometimes I'll
clutch onto a monster's head only for
them to suddenly turn around as I end up
on something I didn't intend to it's
quite clunky to use when you're clutched
onto a monster you will be thrown off
and take damage if they perform an
attack and with how fast I spawn
monsters move around and attack this can
be pretty common so until you find a
lengthy opening you'll be dealing less
damage than you could there's also some
real inconsistencies here if baryoth's
tail touches me during his hip check I
do not take any damage or get knocked
back but if I'm clutched onto his tail
it is if the full attack hit me and
there's a lot of cases where this happens
happens
so you have to be quick about
tenderizing and finding an opening to
perform your clutch claw attack each
weapon has their own unique attack at
varying lengths and if the monster
attacks during them you will be thrown
off light weapons like the long sword or
sword and shield or light bow gun have
quick animations while the charged blade
great sword and other heavy weapons are
slower the charge blade attack in
particular is annoying because you
always end up in ax mode and combined
with the speed of its clutch floor
attack it led to me never using the
weapon in this game this means that
light weapons have a clear Advantage
being able to quickly tenderize in and
out while the heavy weapon users are
stuck with lengthy animations that are
more easily interrupted there's a clear
imbalance here that the developers were
aware of and had a solution for light
weapons after clutch claw attack the
theme park twice while heavy weapons can
just do it once instead of say buffing
the heavy weapons to be less of a
disadvantage like giving them faster
animations they instead just Nerf the
light weapons with how fast these
monsters move finding multiple
opportunities in a short space of time
can be very difficult and with how
annoying it is to aim at apart
consistently it makes tenderizing really unfun
unfun
let's discuss another issue and that's
weapon integration some weapons have the
ability to combo into the clutch claw
right after attacks take the hammer for
instance after performing charge attacks
they can press the left trigger to
instantly clutch onto a monster
attacking while swinging in it's fun to
do and allows you more opportunities to
clutch the Lance has a particularly good
counter that combos into the clutch plot
and moves so good people missed it when
it was absent in the next game however
with weapons like the long sword there
are no clutch combo attacks you have to
manually stop and aim every time you
want to do it and there's no cool moves
to integrate into your combos which
makes finding opportunities rather
difficult it makes the clutch claw feel
like an afterthought I mentioned earlier
that it was annoying trying to find
Opportunities use to clutch onto a
monster without being thrown off but if
you use a temporal or Rock Steady
mantles this will not happen and you'll
be able to clutch and attack freely the
issue here is that both tours are only
available in world's post game so you
have to go back to the old content to
access them another problem is that
because the clutch Claw is so reliant on
them other tools are made irrelevant why
bring the elemental mantles or the
health booster when these two in
particular are so much more useful
so the designers were aware that clutch
flooring and attacking monsters could be
quite difficult and they did Implement a
mechanic to help us out
this is the clutch claw stagger or the
clagger as fans dubbed it monsters will
clogger into this position where they
face to the side allowing you to aim at
their parts fairly easily they hold this
position for several seconds and will
reset the timer if you clutch onto them
almost every monster in the game does
this and it completely breaks the flow
of combat
for starters the monster reels backwards
so far that any melee combo you are
doing wouldn't hit them so you have to
stop if you are performing a strong
multi-head attack and the first hit
claggers them then you've just wasted it
the monster is now so far away that you
either have the sheath and run up to
them wasting valuable time or clutch
onto them which is what the game wants
you to do
the fight completely halts just so the
game can go okay tenderize now base
world was also updated so that even if
you don't have high spawn and by
extension the clutch claw the monsters
will still do this it's a really jarring
addition for sure not to mention how
unnatural it looks so those are all the
major issues with the clutch claw and
I'm sure you're thinking at this point
if I don't like it then I shouldn't use
it and you would be right I wasn't too
big on the Slinger and I didn't really
use it but the clutch Claw is
implemented very differently in the next
chapter of the video I will explain how
I spawn actively punishes you for not
using it and how that ruins the whole game
now personally I didn't find World all
that difficult to be honest I thought
rise was more challenging the reason for
this was that wild monsters tend to die
really fast so iceborn comes along the
master rank expansion featuring much
higher difficulty they also introduced
the clutch claw which allows for you to
deal higher damage this could make the
game easier could it not let's do some
maths real quick the chaster stage
showed the health of certain monsters in
4 and 4 ultimate as well as rise in
sunbreak if you're wondering why Verizon
Sunbury costume absurdly High compared
to the other game is because we have
access to stronger and faster abilities
in that game so all that is taken into
account this is also only the solo
scaling for Ultimate Health pools are
also a generally lower than average but
are compensated by faster monster speeds
and higher attack power but some getting
off topic
if you divide the expansion Health by
the base game Health you can see that
sunbreak multiplied Rises Health by 2.4
and 4 ultimate multiplied its base game
by 1.8 resulting in the numbers you see
now rounding up and down respectively
thus roughly an increase of double the
health so let's look at World these
Health pools are pretty low across the
board and a kind of attribute well as
non-existent difficulty to them and if
we look at I spawns Health pools whoa a
pretty massive increase wouldn't you say
doing the math from earlier this is the
biggest increase of all being over
triple world's Health the reason for
such an increase is the clutch claw you
see it allows us to deal much more
damage to monsters and the developers
probably realized oh no the monsters
will die fast like they did in world so
they cranked up the monster's Health to
compensate not only this but they nerfed
monster hit zone so that they take even
less damage by this point I shall
probably mention the war Banks they deal
roughly two percent of the monsters
Total Health and damage they do massive
power heartbreak damage and they knock
down the monster on top of that it's
free damage everywhere you can only do
it when the monster is not enraged and
this means that if you play optimally
must have spent half the fight on the
floor and the other half absolutely Furious
Furious
do you see why they increase the health
so much now if you actively use the
clutch claw the way it's intended your
hunts will last normal lengths if you
refuse to use it though they can often
end up much longer you see the
tenderizing and the Damage felt through
wall Banks adds up and I find that hunts
can take over 25 minutes which was never
the case in the base game I want to
remind you all that world was clutch
claw free and you didn't have to use a
Slinger if you did it gave you an
advantage but not a huge one now you
basically have to use the clutch claw to
get the results you used to I should
also mention that the clutch Claw is
available to use in the base game and if
you do use it then it basically destroys
the monsters since they clearly weren't
designed with it in mind another problem
from this is that because the claw was
available in the world from the start
and breaks the game a little bit people
who start playing might get the
impression that like the Slinger it's a
neat little bonus that they can use
occasionally but overall they can get by
just fine without it and they would be
right but once they hit iceborn that's
tool becomes necessary in order to
achieve the same hunt times they could
in weld the entire game changes and
because the tool is horrible to use it's
for the worst the armor skill weakness
exploit was also nerfed so that a
monster part has to be tenderized for
you to receive the full effect this also
applies to the base game which punishes
people who didn't buy ice spawn I also
just hate the effect it has on the fight
when the monster isn't tenderized you
know that every single hit isn't as
damaging as it could be when the monster
goes down in every other game The
Natural Instinct would be to start
beating them up but in iceborn you will
look around for the tenderized parts and
if there were none you'd waste the
opportunity by tenderizing instead I'm
not a person who speeds runs or cares
about getting up to more damage I don't
even make mixed sets the fact of the
matter is that it's not fun to be aware
that you're not using your full
abilities to do maximum damage but on
the other hand using the mechanic isn't
really fun either and the worst part was
world's combat did not need fixing or
changing like this it was great and
probably my favorite combat in the
series since it's an evolution of 4
ultimate's Combat all the game needed
was higher difficulty and better
monsters which iceborn provided it
actually gave weapons some pretty cool
additions the universal ability to use
the Slinger and shift was good but some
weapons also got useful combos like the
great sword being able to skip to the
true charge slash by firing a Slinger
burst that stuff was cool and it was all
that was really needed iceborn then
proceeded to actually ruin the combat
with the claw and that honestly just
stings the game was so close to being
perfect for me and then they just messed
up forever you can't even play the best
game without being reminded of the claw
since musters still do the clagger it's
just permanently tarnished no other
Mustangs a game received such a huge
addition that completely changed the
combat like this with the expansion and
it actually made me worried for the
future my biggest hope for stun break
was not more monsters or more difficulty
no My Hope was that they wouldn't ruin a
perfectly good combat system with a
needless Edition again so I've discussed
why the clutch claw sucked and how it
ruined I spawn for me in the next
chapter of the video I am going to
discuss the wire bugs and how they
the wire bug is a movement and combat
tool introduced in most times arise it's
basically a grappling hook that lets you
swing from anything including the air
itself Hunters can also use wire bugs
for certain attacks Nuno silk binds
in general they're a huge parts of this
game so how do they avoid the problems
the clutch claw had while the wire bugs
are much better integrated into the
Hunter's move sets with three different
buttons the hunters can swing up
forwards or in any direction they desire
and once you get the hang of it
traversing the maps can be really fun
but the wire bugs are also really nicely
integrated into the weapons with the
clutch claw you had 14 different weapons
all trying to perform one specific
action in one specific way and some were
better at it than others some even had
more options than the rest with the rise
every weapon has two silk bands at once
and each can be used by pressing the
left trigger and the face buttons some
are used for high damaging attacks some
are used for Mobility some are used to
buff your weapon and some are used for
both these silk binds are custom
designed for every weapon and this makes
them fun to use since they mostly have
meaningful effects though the spiritual
successor of Hunter rights essentially
now here's the second reason which is
related to why the clutch claw was such
a poor addition rise was designed with
the wire bugs in mind the game's locales
were designed around them when designing
each weapon they were also designing
their silk bind attacks and how they
functioned most of all they could also
design the game's difficulty around it
which is why ariser's Health pulse was
so much higher than worlds earlier I
criticized iceborn for making the clutch
floor more or less mandatory now
arguably the wire bugs are mandatory in
the same way but if you don't use them
you're not dealing anywhere near optimal
damage and your hunts will take a lot
longer yeah I don't have an issue this time
time
the reason for this is that the wire
bugs are integral to Rider's identity
they were a part of the game from the
very beginning if somebody doesn't like
using them they'll know that perhaps the
game isn't for them but if they do like
them they'll most likely enjoy the whole
game and its expansion now if you recall
I really liked world's combat for what
it was it was simply you your weapon and
your abilities plus a Slinger if you
felt like using it
I spawn changed it by forcing the clutch
clear on me and now suddenly the whole
game is sent at around tenderizing and
warbangs in order to deal good damage
thus changing the combat flow massively
and for the worse with ryze I like the
wire bugs from the beginning so them
feeling mandatory wasn't an issue
because I like using them and I have a
good time if you look up world and I
spawn together as a complete experience
World lies to you by saying you don't
actually need the clutch claw only for I
spawn to pull the rug from underneath
rise is honest to you about the wire
bugs from the very beginning the biggest
issues with ryze were the weapon balance
with some being way too strong partly
due to their silk binds and why even
riding basically being mandatory
sunbreak fixed the weapon balance issues
with Nerfs and Buffs where needed I made
wyvern riding optional sunbreak did
introduce a new tool that drastically
changed the combat in the form of the
switch skill swap but this doesn't
change the flow of combat nor did they
literally need to rebalance the entire
game around it to be honest you don't
even need to use it all it does is allow
Hunters to switch play Styles and allow
for greater combat possibilities there's
no concern about it breaking the base
game either because it only unlocks when
you're in master rank I believe most of
the issues with the clutch claw are a
result of it being introduced in ice
Bond if it was designed for a world they
could have made it fit better with the
rest of the game
they could have integrated it more with
weapons and changed the monster's
function to incorporate it better with
an expansion they could have rebalanced
it further ispawn's final update doubled
the tenderize time from 90 seconds to
180 and introduced a decoration that
allowed light weapons to tend to rise in
one hit good additions that slightly fix
the mechanic but are ultimately too
little too late I have zero doubt that
if World received another expansion on
top of I spawn it would have rebalanced
the clutch floor so that like the
Slinger in the base game it would have
been a nice bonus and not something you
had to do
the lesson here is that huge mechanics
like this should not be introduced in
expansions especially if they change the
combat to such a degree that the base
game has to be rebalanced to account for
them furthermore I don't think the main
Series team should try these huge
experimental editions they should focus
on making raw grounded combat that's not
relying on gimmicks while incorporating
the best parts of the portable team's
experimentation I say that because it's
exactly what world did but combat is
largely grounded but several of the new
weapon attacks are taken right from
generations rebalanced and retooled to
work with this combat and it makes them
really fun to play the next game should
have worlds combat but maybe with
ryzer's switch skill system that would
be really good
the title of the video is how the clutch
claw ruined iceborn and so you're
probably thinking did it really make the
game bad this one edition when playing a
monster hunter game for me the two most
important things are the quality of the
monsters in the game and how fun the
combat is that's not to say that other
things don't matter like the story
pacing or end games but the main point
is that if a game can't pass those two
simple checks then I won't enjoy playing
it everything else is secondary in the
case of for ultimate Generations
portable third I like the combat and I
like the monsters so those games are good
good
I like world's combat but I find the
monsters rather boring there isn't much
variety and a lot of them fight in the
exact same way there's only three that I
would consider to be memorable
now if we look at iceborn the muscles
are good with some great returning
monsters and some genuinely cool
subspecies of wild monsters that I found
boring the originals are also really
creative but because the act of fighting
them is unfun it tarnishes the whole experience
experience
I enjoy fighting zunoga brute tigrex
volcano or bambarro I do not enjoy
fighting them with a clutch claw playing
such a huge role and because combat is
such a huge part of monstanta it does
ruin the whole game for me I like
sunbreak significantly more than I spawn
but without the clutch floor the
situation would be similar to 14
Generations what I consider the one to
be best than the other just slightly I
still think I'd like sunbreak more
overall because I spawn has a lot of
problems that sun brake doesn't have but
that's better than me just outright
the clutch claw ruined must turn to
World in several ways it took some of
the best combat we've had in a series
over centralized it around a poorly
implemented gimmick and therefore
changed the entire game for the worse
some of you might be wondering I spawn
is a bit old why make a video now the
answer is that I made a few digs up the
clutch claw in my underwater combat
video where I compare two bad mechanics
with each other some commenters were
curious as to why it was bad and I
wanted to talk about this in detail for
a while now particularly why the wire
bugs are better
I'm sure some of you might suggest
trying out the ice spawn Community
Edition mod since it reportedly does
rebalance the clutch claw to be
something of a bonus rather than
mandatory at the moment I'm not really
interested but maybe in the future
that'll be all for today
I hope you enjoyed this video
do you dislike the clutch floor or
better yet do you actually like it let
me know why in the comments because
either way I do want to know your
thoughts remember to like And subscribe
and have a good day [Music]
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