Metaphor: ReFantazio is shaping up to be a much bigger game than Persona and I’ve already fallen in love with its high fantasy twist on traditional RPGs
If you were to describe Atlus’ upcoming game Metaphor: ReFantazio as “Persona with elves,” you wouldn’t be far off. Being compared to such respected and popular games is far from a bad thing, as the modern versions – namely Persona 3, 4, and 5 (and their various versions) – are widely considered to be some of the best RPGs around. However, Metaphor: ReFantazio is far from a high school student in wizard garb, and it has several qualities that will help it stand on its own.
Few things in the world get me on the RPG bandwagon faster than the words “job system,” which in Metaphor’s case is conveyed through archetypes. I recently got to try Metaphor out extensively, and this particular twist on the genre might turn out to be my favorite part of the game.
Party on
As I begin my preview, it’s clear that Metaphor’s setting is one of prejudice and fear. When the king of the United Kingdom of Euchronia is assassinated, the people are forced into an election to choose their next ruler. As the protagonist – a member of the Elda tribe, considered tainted by most people – you join your fairy partner Gallica on a mission to lift a curse from the land’s prince, who is believed to be dead. But when things spiral out of control (as they often do in RPGs), you’re drawn into the action and forced to take up arms in the race for kingship. To do so, you’ll need to utilize one of Metaphor’s defining features: archetypes.
Archetypes are mysterious manifestations of a person’s values and heroism. They’re summoned as dramatically as a Persona from the team’s previous games, when characters pull a mechanical heart from their chest, awakening high fantasy classics like knights and mages. Although we start with the Seeker archetype, the protagonist and other characters can unlock new ones by meeting and recruiting new party members and other special people from across the kingdom, known as “followers.” Once you’re recruited, you can visit More, Metaphor’s enigmatic stand-in for Igor and the author of the mysterious book the main character carries, to unlock the archetypes for the rest of your party. Visiting More also lets you read more about the kingdom’s heroes these archetypes are based on, which hints at all kinds of interesting lore to discover.
In the traditional fashion of the job system, each archetype brings its own set of skills, passive abilities, and spells to learn, and also provides boosts to various stats of a character wielding that job. Metaphor lets you further customize jobs and make them your own, adding some of the skills you’ve learned from other archetypes to someone else’s arsenal. Fans of challenge runs (myself included) will be pleased to hear that Metaphor also allows you to assign the same job to multiple party members at once—assuming they’ve purchased access to it—so get ready for some wild solo archetype runs. As a nice bonus, Atlus has gone so far as to make each character’s version of that archetype look unique to that person by giving them their own color palette.
Job systems like this may not be new to the RPG genre, but Atlus manages to put its own spin on many of the existing, tried-and-true formulas. Archetypes seem to fall into different “lines” that fulfill different roles (like tank, offensive wizard, healer), and to unlock the higher-level jobs you must meet certain criteria. These requirements may include reaching a high enough level with the previous role or reaching a certain rank with your followers. I didn’t try any of these advanced archetypes during my time with Metaphor, but I hope that each job feels unique and not simply a replacement for what came before. I want there to be a reason to use previous archetypes too, rather than just the hot new version with slightly better stats or the next level-up spells.
Elsewhere, special team attacks known as “Synthesis Attacks,” which act a bit like Chrono Trigger’s Duel Techs, are another nice addition that makes your party composition important. During your combat turn, depending on the archetypes your characters have equipped and the skills they’ve learned, you can spend extra actions to have your characters team up for flashy special attacks. It was a feature I always relied on when my party was outnumbered – seeing my party work together to turn small single-target spells into larger multi-target attacks never got boring, and bigger explosions are always Cooler.
For Persona players, these archetypes feel familiar to those games’ deities while also offering enough fresh ideas to attract people more familiar with other titles’ job systems. With over 40 of them promised, it seems like they’ll offer immense replay value for fans who want to try out as many compositions as possible.
“After my few hours with Metaphor, I came back with even greater anticipation than I had before.”
As much as I love the job system, it wouldn’t be worth much if the world, from its dungeons to its towns, wasn’t meant to be explored. Whereas the Persona games traditionally have you explore a single town and occasionally take an excursion, Metaphor expands the scope to an entire kingdom. That means you’ll experience a lot more variety than in the developer’s other titles, and even in my brief demo I traveled from open deserts to grandiose castle towns. In one particular area, a deep mine adorned with glowing crystals, there’s a large sleeping dragon guarding a sparkling treasure chest just beyond. There I was given a choice: should I risk waking the dragon for a chance at his precious horde? Or should I take the safer (and more responsible) route and head for the exit? I was a coward and headed straight for the exit, but unless I’m pressed for time, that treasure is will Be mine.
As this is the team’s first real foray into something of Metaphor’s scale, it looks impressive even at first glance, while the few side quests I’ve dabbled in have teased me with promises of the game’s larger world and the secrets to be uncovered. Ever since the game’s first concept art was revealed all those years ago, featuring the purple-haired elf in armor, I’ve been all in, no matter what journey Atlus wants to take me on. Everything I’ve experienced so far hasn’t dampened that excitement, and I’ve come away from my few hours with Metaphor even more excited than before. I’ve never been more ready to trade in my school uniform for some armor—October 11th can’t come soon enough.
Metaphor: ReFantazio will be released on October 11th for PlayStation 5, Xbox Series X|S and PC via Steam. To keep you entertained until then, here are the best open world games You can start playing immediately.
