User blog comment:BannedLagiacrus/Monster Appreciation Week: Banbaro/@comment-4969421-20200116201227

When Banbaro was first revealed, I remember I was instantly reminded of Gammoth. Judging it that way would be really unfair however, and with time it came clear Banbaro does more than enough to differentiate itself and carve itself a niche in the ever-growing roster of the franchise. I still miss Gammoth a lot however.

Anyways, Banbaro is a perfect inhabitant for the Hoarfrost Reach, and it's really no wonder they chose it to be one of the first three monsters to reveal the area with. Much like the region it originally hails from, it's a gigantic, tundra adapted Brute Wyvern. Being heavily mammalian inspired, with fur all over and a majestic pair of antlers reminiscent of a cervid's, Banbaro is pretty much Monster Hunter's version of a moose, except with the body type of a dinosaur. The design overall I like, despite the couple odd choices here and there, such as the enlarged spikes on rage mode or the third horn on its nose, which is actually more like a rhinoceros beetle's than a deer's.

Gameplay wise, no big complaints here either. Being an introductory monster, its moveset is simplistic, but that doesn't prevent it from having a couple neat looking tricks. Its charge has a wide hitbox and may be tricky to avoid, and has different endings depending on what it has picked up. However, you can also take advantage of its most used attack by wounding its legs. Its moveset is completed with things you'd expect like horn sweeps, head slams, hip-checks and so on, making it movepool wide enough it's not too boring.

However, the good things stop there. As everyone here has already mentioned, Banbaro's role as an invader is where the monster falls under its own weight. Banbaro just shouldn't have been one. First things first, it is indeed a design that feels horribly out of place in anywhere other than the Hoarfrost Reach. Having a monster that draws most of its inspiration from animals people traditionally associate with cold zones, making Banbaro appear in all the biomes of the game is a questionable decision at best. For it to feel much less jarring, its design should have been more neutral, like the concept art where it appears more like a bull or essentially a big Gastodon. It's not only the visual design, but also its size. A monster that big shouldn't be an invader, period. Banbaro takes up 80% of the area merely by existing. You can say, well Deviljho is also huge and he's basically the quintessential invader (actually Banbaro is larger than Jho by quite the margin). Jho can get away with it because his legs are slender and his tail is held up high. Banbaro is not just big, it's also very wide. It's basically guaranteed to clip through walls or the ground in basically any area with the slightest amount of uneven terrain. It not only looks incredibly sloppy, but it can actually easily prevent you from moving or transversing from one area to another. Its moveset also becomes a problem: while manageable on its own, it becomes more than an annoyance when fighting another monster. And that's assuming it actually decides to fight, because often it will just stand there roaring and being a waste of space. Basically, everything that makes Banbaro, Banbaro, is at the same a big red flag for being a good invader (if such thing can exist), yet the choice of making it one still went through anyways. And it's basically on every hunt, specially during the earlier portions of the game. Invaders are largely overplayed in Worldborne already, and all Banbaro does as one is make the gameplay worse. It doesn't add anything to the fight, it's just there to make prevent you from having fun. And as long Banbaro keeps being this way, I just can't bring myself to like it.

I would be perfectly okay with Banbaro if it actually stuck to the area it's supposed to live in, but unfortunately that's not the case. It being an invader kills any sort of positive opinion I could have about this monster. A shame, really, because Banbaro had potential.