A Reddit user has proposed a theory explaining the poor performance of Monster Hunter Wilds on PC, linking it to the game's downloadable content verification process. The discovery came from comparing gameplay on accounts with and without DLC purchases. Video evidence has popularized the idea amid ongoing complaints about the title's frame rates.
Monster Hunter Wilds has faced persistent performance problems on PC since its launch, with frame rates dropping notably in hub areas. A detailed Reddit post by user u/de_Tylmarande, titled “MH Wilds – Bad performance mystery (Solved?)”, shared on the r/MonsterHunter subreddit, offers a potential explanation.
The user stumbled upon the issue while playing on a friend's Steam account. They observed significantly better performance—over 80 frames per second—compared to their own account, which suffered stable drops to 20-25 FPS in hubs. The key difference: the friend's account had purchased all of Monster Hunter Wilds' DLC, while theirs had none.
To test this, u/de_Tylmarande developed a custom mod that bypasses the game's DLC checks. A video demonstrating the mod's effects has circulated widely online, lending credibility to the claim. This is not the user's first such discovery; they previously identified a frame rate fix for Capcom's Dragon’s Dogma 2 in 2024 and informed the developer, with the solution appearing in a subsequent Steam patch.
Players have noted that performance seems to degrade with each update, which typically introduces new DLC. Currently, Steam lists 190 individual DLC items for the game. While the theory accounts for many observed issues, Capcom has not commented on its validity.
u/de_Tylmarande emphasized that the problem is unintentional, stating in an update: “I did NOT mean Capcom did this on purpose. No, no, and again no…it’s just a bug in the code they need to fix.” Observers await Capcom's response, possibly in the next PC patch.