It's fun playing with friends who own the game, but taking on monsters single handed by yourself will take you hours.
With the series being huge in Japan, it never does well over here for some strange reason. But it's an enjoyable Action RPG game, unlike other Capcom games like Mega Man and Resident Evil, Monster Hunter is all about hunting monsters in different locations kinda like an online RPG game like World of Warcraft but on the PSP. There's no story you are just hunting monsters and going on quests and getting certain items like a rare egg or a certain liver from a monster.
Gameplay: While your killing and hunting monsters you can choose the weapon you want to use like swords, bows, lances or hammers. But some monsters you'll be hunting you'll need to think on how are you going to take out the monster.
But if you have friends who own this game yes the fun begins, Monster Hunter is based on teamwork working togethor and taking on many monsters over 4 players all at once. But you will need get 4 people who have a PSP and a copy of the game. To play with other players you'll need to go to the bar in the village and connect to wireless internet and then you'll be able to play with your friends.
There a few other mini features as well if you want to earn money like fishing where you can catch and sell fish or mineing searching for rare rocks/crystals which you can sell or use them for armor pending what it it.
Graphics and Sound: The graphics for Monster Hunter on PSP look amazing for action RPG close to games like FF7:Crisis Core or God of War it's well detailed. If you have played Animal Crossing, this is more of an adult version where there is no anime cuteness but crossed over with Jurrassic Park if you think about it. The locations in the game are jungle/desert but each part of every area there will monsters coming from every direction so do keep your eyes open while hunting.
For your created charcter you can customise your charcter by buying and choosing armor and a good weapon making you feel like your the top hunter in village or the weakest or silliest warrior.
Soundtrack for Monster Hunter is epic if you have played through the series on Playstation 2 you'll feel welcomed and probably had experince from killing monsters in the past but on the PS2 version. But also some music is quite Japanese but very fantasy.
Overall: Monster Hunter is one of those series that some people will enjoy alot and some people would not be interested but it's more of a challenge if you want to take on monsters single handed with out anyone helping you. There's no story so by all means take your time, don't rush the game you can spend much time as you like you'll probably be spending hours sorting your equipment out and killing random monsters.