The Electric Playground crew took a few minutes to talk to Kramez about one of our biggest games releasing this year, Monster Hunter Tri. Kramer gives a run down of some of the big ways we're changing Monster Hunter, and how that experience is making the most of the Wii. Everything from tons of customization, beautiful and huge environments, awesome monsters, and fully loaded online play. 

This week I managed to find a few items I was hanging on to, then forgot about until now... So first up, here's a little pack to get you ready for your date night: A SFIV headband to add +10 coolness, MvC2 mints for fresh breath, and a set of rare SFIV trading cards from China to play with when your date walks away. 

We also had a two volume set of the Ryu Final manga tucked away safely in a draw. If you're looking for some Capcom manga, look no further. 

Once more, we've perfect way to impress the ladies... A Resident Evil money clip, with the seal of the Raccoon Police Department! (results of impressing ladies will vary) 

And I always say this just in case you happen to be new to auctions, but it's pretty simple. You get Unity Points for free by being a member here, you can then spend those points on the auctions page and if you win we ship the swag to you, for free!

Being a fan on Unity = Unity Points = Free Swag!

Capcom and Nintendo have been teaming up all this week to host Monster Hunter Tri schools all over Europe. There's been a few stories popping up about the events, but one caught our attention at spong.com. 

See some pictures from the event, new screens, new info, their impressions, and more right here. 

We're very proud of our community here at Capcom-Unity, and we strive to get you fans involved with our games as much as possible. Recently we had a contest for you to design weapons exclusively for the western release of Monster Hunter Tri, and the results were fantastic. One of the winners designed the new Switch Axe, Sinister Saints. The artist, Shawn M. Mallette (Shawnzy), recently took the time to talk to me about his inspiration behind the new weapon:

"Right from the start I wanted to do a Switch Axe. Really like the idea of them. But I actually went through a number of concepts before settling on a sort of light vs. dark theme. I got the idea to try and make a weapon that was a bit more "artsy". Something that was more like a sculpture. I figured in a setting as rich as the Monster Hunter world, there'd be a good number of artisans and sculptors. So I took the basic idea of a light/dark, good vs. evil concept. Which fit nicely into the dual nature of the Switch Axe. I wanted the "dark" side to be sorta visceral, made from monster skin and bones, while the "light" side would be ores, gold, and prettier materials.

Read the whole interview the jump!

After I had the basic idea for it, I started working out how to piece it together. Since the Switch Axes are a bit more complex, I had to break it down into pieces, and make sure that it would look ok in all forms. A lot of tweaking went in to make sure pieces lined up properly, while at the same time trying to not make it too complex so that it would be too much work for the developers. Which in the end they took some liberties with it, which I'm fine with cause they really made it fit into the world of MH better than my initial concept. I had gotten complaints that it didn't look like it fit into MH that well, and I understood where they came from. It was funny though, because as soon as I sent my entry in, there seemed to be hundreds of things I wanted to change and make better. In the end, I was thoroughly surprised I won, because I thought I could have done much better on it.

It makes me really happy to hear that the Monster Hunter team loved it, because I've been a huge Monster Hunter fan ever since we recieved the first PS2 game here. For me to be able to become even a small piece of that means the world to me."

One of the cutest parts of Monster Hunter is definitely the Chacha. Not only does he help you in your hunts, gathering items, and even using his various masks to help out, he also has tons of fun dancing!

Unity favorite and pro hunter, MoisesL, has put together a cute and funny video of the Chacha reacting to your gestures while on a quest. Enjoy!