The manual really didn't explain much, there should have been a tutorial in the demo itself.
The problem with a tutorial would be, "What information should be included?" In japan, they released a guidebook that gives full information on everything in the game. Every item, armor piece, weapon tree, monster data, and game mechanic is given a full explanation and all details. It's 1,200 pages long. Even if they only talked about things in the demo and the bare bones, it would hardly scratch the surface and put most people to sleep unfortunately.
In the full game, they do some tutorial type stuff and give you room to practice in the beginning, but it will then take a couple hours for newcomers before they get to the first boss monster, the Arzuros. I've heard many stories of people stop playing previous games because the beginning, where they teach quite a few of the basics, was too slow and boring.
I'm gonna make a help thread after I get my hands on the game and give all the relevant information necessary to get people started so they don't make the common rookie mistakes, but its gonna be heavily abridged and I'm gonna link to sites where people can get more information. See http://monsterhunter...ter_Hunter_Wiki and look around for more deep explanations of the game, but it's a little hard to browse if you don't know where to look.
Trust me, I wish there was a fast way to explain and get people into the game, but there's not. The fastest way I know of is to have veteran of the series with you for the first few hours to explain everything as needed. It would cut a lot of fat out of the beginning and get you to the important stuff. Unfortunately, there aren't enough vets to go around right now because of all the new people trying the game.
Capcom failed hard body with the demo. WTF is the point of a demo if it doesn't work. Especially if you're attempting to introduce the franchise to a different audience. By that, I mean any Nintendo 3Ds or Wii U owners. I get it, the game actually isn't bad. It takes some workin on it til you get it down.
I don't see why any developers, ESPECIALLY Capcom, would decide to " not look into expanding its audience". It's simply not good marketing strategy. And before anyone retorts as I already know the MH fanboys are flaming right now. Self centered as usual, they seem to think that the dev teams simply create their games for them and not just anyone at all. What you see or hear in the media...isn't always true.
Lastly, getting back on the demo subject. If you are REALLY trying to get into the game, play the demo at least 3 times. I usually make my decision to buy a game after the first demo attempt, but they obviously did so bad a job that you really need the extra 2 times to really explore your character options and control combinations to do...pretty much anything.
As i mentioned in a previous post somewhere, If it wasn't going to be me giving complaints, someone else will do it.
As I've said before, there is just no good way to demo the series. It either throws you to the wolves (like the demo) or bores you to death trying to prepare you for the wolves (like in the full game). You're right, someone will complain no matter what. That's why I'm here to try and help those who have problems with it.
Also, capcom has a very clear vision of how the game is played, and they don't want to change that to increase their audience. It's like if a painter made a painting and many people hated it, but said they would pay him millions if he changed it to exactly what they wanted. Should the artist forget their vision for the art and make money, or stay true to it and make little? That's what people are trying to say when they mean capcom doesn't want to change the series to expand the audience, rather than that capcom only wants to please their existing fanbase. Does that explain it better? There's too many misunderstandings with this series and I'm trying to cover them all, but the series is so different from others it takes awhile to do that.
