How Hard Is Hunting Without HUD? (theHunter: Call of the Wild)

TheHunter: Call of the Wild is a pretty realistic game when it comes to a hunting simulator, but it still has its limitations when it comes to realism. There are plenty of HUD elements, highlighted tracks, sound clues on the screen, etc, that break that realism and you realise that you are playing a game after all. I know these hints and clues help gamers not get completely lost because hunting is a game of patience, and with the way animals behave in the game, it is good to get any help the game gives you.

It makes for a fun gaming experience. But today, I decided to make it more realistic and turn off all the external aids the game gives you. Thankfully, there is an option to disable almost every HUD element. No icons to point to where the sound came from exactly, or highlighting the animals and tracks. Not even knowing which way the wind is blowing or how many bullets you have left before you need to reload. This was certainly an interesting idea.

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Since these changes make the game a lot more difficult, I had to choose a fairly easy map. I didn't want to roam around for an hour without getting any kills. That would be boring. So I chose, Emerald Coast, Australia map. It has plenty of big animals, easy to spot and kill each with a very healthy population too, especially the Banteng and Crocodiles towards the east coast.

It was a beautiful morning with a clear sky. Still very early in the morning, but those Bantengs were running around already. I saw a big one trying to get out. Somehow, it sensed me before I saw it.

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I took a shot with my rifle, but I think I missed the vital organ. When they get attacked, most of them start running away, but some become aggressive and charge towards you. This was one of the aggressive ones. Perfect for me because I would not be able to chase it without the highlighted tracks. It would be quite difficult.

Taking a close-up shot without a scope is fun. That's why I love to hunt them here, they are not too afraid of you when they come for your life. Bisons do the same, but they are not in this map.

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A nice gold to start the session. Things started better than I expected.

I have a companion dog, Sheru. He helps me track wounded animals and is going to be super important without the HUD elements. At least I can follow him if an animal is hit and starts bleeding.

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But this bugger scared me a couple of times. I almost shot him once, too. There are some foxes in this area, and I mistook him for a fox. Thankfully, you can't shoot him. This is all happening because I turned off his icon and outline as well.

I found a big group of Banteng and took my shot from more than 100 meters away. Not knowing if their vital organs were hit without seeing the blood on the ground. The amount of blood tells you if it was a vital organ hit or not.

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If it is a big splash like the above, that means it was a vital organ hit, and the animal is about to go down soon.

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Another one became aggressive and came towards me. Another easy kill!

I killed two more from the same group after some struggle. Had to chase them and stalk them before getting a good angle.

One of them was a gold, and the other one was just a female with no trophy.

The landscape was looking good too. I took some photos without opening the camera. This is exactly how I see the game, with no filters, not even an in-game camera. Just a screenshot from the gameplay. Pretty nice...right?

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I reached a place with a great view of the ocean. This was a proper visiting spot with benches and even a toilet.

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With the HUD elements turned off, I had no clue if there was a point of interest here and where to press 'E' to view the info about this place. Luckily, I spotted an informational board and just spammed 'E' there. Yup, that was it. With the HUD elements turned off, even a trivial thing like this is difficult, haha.

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There were some caves near the ocean. These are formed naturally by the ocean chipping through the bedrock slowly. They provide some good shelter for animals.

I was enjoying the views, but it was disturbed by some noises. These were very close. Turned out there were more Banteng, probably trying to go back to their places since it was calm now. This time, I decided to take out my handgun. They were close enough that using a rifle felt unnecessary.. But just after one shot, I was out of my handgun bullets. I forgot to restock my bullets and ran out of them.

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Well, it was back to the rifle then. I had plenty of bullets in my Empress Magnum.

I took down two out of the three that I spotted here. I feel like I wiped out a big group of them from this place. None of them were diamonds, just some golds or lower trophies.

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I was getting bored with them now and tried to change my focus towards Crocodiles. These are usually found resting on the beaches or in the shallow waters of the ocean.

They were slightly harder to spot. Once in a while, one of them will peek out of the water, but they don't want to come out.

I had to walk along the coastline and see if there were more out of the water.

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They make Sheru nervous, and he starts warning me when they are close. One of them came charging towards me and just went past me without attacking, towards the ocean. It was resting somewhere in the bushes, on the sandy beach. I took a couple of shots with my bow.

By the blood, it looked like a non-vital organ hit, but it died quite quickly.

Look at this bad boy. This is not even one of the big ones.

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I saw a massive one some time after this catch. I didn't take a risk and shot it from the rifle to be more accurate. But I missed both my shots. I won't call the second hit a miss because it hit the vertebrae, giving me a quick kill, but sadly, the game doesn't consider it a 'vital' organ, so I didn't get the full reward for this monster.

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I saw the harvest screen, and it weighed over a ton. Wow, that's massive. In comparison, the first one was just over 500 kg.

When you don't have the HUD and animal highlights, the game becomes much more difficult. Everything looks like an animal. For example, this piece of food in the water looked like a crocodile head to me.

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I killed a few more Banteng after these Crocodiles. Nothing special, all of them were females, so not even gold trophies.

I was constantly getting lost, and keeping track of the direction without the compass and minimap was a bit tough. But I liked the overall experience. It was as close to reality as you can get a game to behave. I don't recommend it to beginners for sure. They will hate the game if they play like this. It is already hard enough when you are starting, don't try disabling the HUD if you don't have much experience with the game.