Metaphor: ReFantasiait has been a long time in the making. It was announced in 2017 Project Fantas againy said very little through a strangely long video. Since then, Atlus has changed the Project to Metaphor and scoured Google Translate for a nicer way to say “fantasy.” He’s also made a massive fantasy JRPG – and after going through the demo at Summer Game Fest last weekend, I’m itching to play it.
ReFantazio It is the first original title by Studio Zero, a relatively new division of Atlus headed by Katsura Hashino. As the director of the third, fourth, and fifth Persona games, Hashino is responsible for turning the Persona series towards social simulation elements. After finishing Personality 5Hashino left P-Studio to work on entirely new titles unrelated to Atlus’ Shin Megami Tensei and Persona series.
Atlus and Hashino are better known (-) more grounded urban fantasy than wizards and elves and ReFantazio in this sense, it represents a big departure. It’s an epic, sprawling story that spans an entire nation, the United Kingdom of Euchronia. The king of Euronia has been killed and the people of the country must elect a new one (!?).
Eight “tribes” (fantasy races) live in Evronia, and our hero tries to reunite them. There’s also a cursed princess that everyone thinks is dead, a royal tournament for the throne in six months, and monsters everywhere. To make matters worse, Euchronia is invaded by hideous, Hieronymus Bosch-inspired creatures called humans, who act as the game’s bosses. People, huh? I wonder if this is… a metaphor?
Broad strokes, given Atlus’ storytelling ReFantazio will probably make more sense than moment-to-moment beats. Best to let it wash over you.
The game takes place over the course of six months, and you’ll travel across Euchronia in the Gauntlet Runner (a cool ship designed by the Evangelion mechanic) trying to gather support for your participation in the royal tournament. Each town in the game has a tavern where you can eat and gather information, a recruitment center where you can receive guests, various shops and an inn where you can rest. Completing quests and making friends along the way will earn you followers among the various tribes, which is key to both the main story and combat.
Atlus’ Summer Game Fest demo was split into three 15-minute parts. The first was a training sequence of sorts that was heavy on story and light on combat. It mostly felt like a showcase ReFantazio‘s cinematics were spectacular, although the TVs in the demo area had interpolated frames. Atlus has a tradition of showcasing high-quality anime in their games, and the demo clips were among the best I’ve seen. What I appreciated more than the quality of the animation was how well the character designs and the vibe of the game matched the cinematics.
The voice acting is also memorable. For the English-language cast, Atlus is picking up Euchronia’s “United Kingdom.” many seriously, he had an absolutely over-the-top British accent like everyone else I’ve ever met. As someone with an English accent, I found the characters out of the theater, but I enjoyed them nonetheless. At one point in the show, I met a hyper-Cockney catgirl who could audition Oliver.
In another segment, I battled an adorable one-eared man from fantasy Liverpool. . If none of that excites you, the Japanese voice cast is shooting for a typical fantasy vibe. Personally, I can’t imagine playing this game in anything other than English at this point.
no everything sounds — as in many JRPGs, the main lines and conversations are fully acted, but many interactions will be limited to text, with the voice actors having a bit of emotion for flavor. As a speed reader, this is perfectly fine with me.
The second segment was all about dungeon crawling – Time for a Persona comparison! The setup here will be familiar to fans of Atlus games: It’s a turn-based JRPG with a variety of physical and magical attacks, status effects, and ailments. ReFantazioA version of the classic JRPG class system is Archetypes – there are 14 lineages of over 40 unique Archetypes, including some familiar roles such as Mage, Thief, Knight, and Healer.
There’s also a tactical element to party composition, with front and back ranks playing a role in combat, and Synthesis moves that allow you to combine your party’s Archetypes for more powerful attacks. There’s a bit of Persona and SMT to everything – you control Archetypes in the Academy (similar to the Velvet Room), they can evolve through experience, and their skill in battle depends on your relationship with your followers.
A twist on the classic turn-based formula – and one I’m very pleased with – is the Quick Battle system. When you face an enemy, you’ll be able to gauge their strength before engaging in battle. A quick system allows you to target a specific enemy and shoot them; it can kill weak enemies, allowing you to avoid turn-based battles entirely while grinding low-level enemies. For stronger enemies, you can use Fast to oil them up and start a squad fight with advantage, but if you mess up on that mark, you can start a turn-based fight on your ass. Other Atlus games have a similar risk-reward system that allows players to gain an advantage, but this one is more nuanced and satisfying.
The interface to all of this is a typically gorgeous menu system and UI that feels more elegant than ever. Simple gestures are assigned a face button on the controller, which means less time spent on menus. It’s all pretty intuitive, and by the end of my short demo I was already speeding through turn-based combat without wondering which button did what. Taken as a whole, the combat system feels like a natural evolution of the classic formula that Atlus is known for.
The final demo section begins inside the Gauntlet Runner. It’s a claustrophobic space, more submarine than superyacht, but it’s full of things to do. There are people to talk to, activities to participate in, and routes to choose from. Like Persona, the game takes place over a period of time, meaning you won’t be able to do everything you want and instead have to decide how best to spend your time each day. You can try to level up one of the main character’s five traits – courage, wisdom, endurance, eloquence and imagination – or maybe you can focus on fighting monsters or earning money. I was playing to write and read books, unfortunately not enough to raise my courage from “brave”.
My cozy book session immediately led to the main show: face-to-face with the giant man. It started with an anime sequence that gave way to a classic four-on-one fight. The human designs in this game are terrible. It was called “The Sea Horror Homo Sabara” and here are the Cliff’s Notes:
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Long purple beard and eyebrows.
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One yellow eye, one white eye, both glowing.
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12 ears arranged in two rows? Nervous piercings.
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Crown of Thorns. Actually, make two crowns of thorns.
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The upper half of the head is skinned. It seems that a human heart is coming out.
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Also, eight giant ornamental tentacles as weapons.
It’s not like I’ve never seen crazy bosses in a JRPG before, but these eight dudes were a lot of fun to fight. There wasn’t Major Challenge: Pull out tentacles, cry on body, tentacles regenerate, repeat. But it hit hard and the demo took me to success. It’s easy to see this guy wipe out your team if you don’t come in properly prepared.
Of all the things Atlus crammed into the short Summer Game Festival, human combat was the most memorable. From the lore drip-fed to fans, it appears that humans are actually from our world and enter Euchronia as these mixed-up monsters. Here’s hoping many of them made it.
First blush ReFantazio For Hashino, it feels like a real author moment – as if after world success Personality 5, he was basically given a blank check. Hashino’s Persona titles bend over backwards to show you how cool and edgy they are, but the only thing that bothers them ReFantazio how high, confident and unique it can be.
Yes, there are elements taken from almost every Atlus RPG you can think of, but they’ve all been remixed and refined. I left my short time with him ReFantazio filled with a warm familiarity unlike anything I’ve played before, with this wonderful atmosphere of nostalgia and surprise.
Metaphor: ReFantazio Coming to PC, PlayStation 4 and 5, and Xbox Series consoles on October 11.
Find out all the news from Summer Game Fest 2024 here!
