The number of players in Wild Hearts co-op has been capped to keep the battles balanced

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Four is a lot.

In Wild Hearts, the ultimate goal is to stop the wild Kemono from taking over the land by any means necessary. How you achieve this goal is entirely up to you, as you can not only create your own weapon layouts and unique building instruments, but also play alone or with friends.

If you’re like most people who love the monster-hunting genre, you’ll probably want to get into Wild Hearts either with a group of friends or via online co-op matchmaking. However, once you start playing you might be confused as to why the title only allows up to three players at a time overall.

According to game directors Kotaro Hirata and Takuto Edagawa, this decision was made in favor of gameplay.

“We initially considered four-player co-op, but the tests we ran showed that three players is the best balance,” said Edagawa. “The Karakuri system has a very high synergy effect.

You can use other players’ karakuri and be really creative, but we still wanted the fights to have a bit more attention. So we eliminated having more players. Also, it’s a lot easier to get three players than four!”

Considering how much the developers have reiterated the importance of difficulty scaling in Wild Hearts in co-op play, that statement makes perfect sense, as the addition of a fourth person completely upsets the balance the team seems to have already struck would.

Wild Hearts will be fully released on February 16th, 2023 for PS5, Xbox Series X|S and PC. If you can’t wait for more information about the game, be sure to read our official review where we laud the game as a game changer for the future of the monster hunting genre.