One of my housemates messaged me today asking if I’d been playingMetaphor: ReFantazio, and said that he’d be playing the demo before deciding to buy it. I told him that the demo wouldn’t be representative of what Metaphor actually is. The fact of the matter is that if you’re not already sold onAtlus’ games,Metaphor: ReFantazio’s first few hours might put you off the game entirely. As someone who’d enjoyed the little they played ofPersona 5 Royal, the first hour of Metaphor had me both perplexed and annoyed.
The game opens with a cutscene that sets up the main plotline – Louis, the main antagonist, murders the king in his bed while waxing lyrical about his own motivations. Immediately after, we see his advisors discovering the body and, appropriately, freaking out a little. I thought this bit of the introduction worked: it succeeds at the worldbuilding it sets out to achieve, introducing you to the important characters while also laying out the failures of the fantasy world players are entering for the first time.
After a bit more fussing, like P5R (and maybe Atlus’ other games, I wouldn’t know), Metaphor forces your protagonist into combat right off the bat. This acts as a sort of tutorial while doing a little more worldbuilding, easing you into the combat mechanics and showing you what the world outside the city looks like.
Unfortunately, this first hour felt particularly slow – if you’ve played other Atlus games, you’re likely already familiar with what the majority of Metaphor will feel like, and you’re eager to be given the reins so you can run around the world freely and do your little tasks. You know what the game will become, and you want to get to the fun part. The opening is decidedly not fun.
But the first five to six hours of Metaphor feel on rails, because this is where all the context is being set up. This is when you meet the first important characters, the main conceit of the game unfolds before your eyes, and you’re given a reason to be emotionally invested in the story at all. Because of that, your goals are set for you, as are your battles and the places you go. You have far less control over everything, but the freedom given to you after those first few hours is where you’ll really get sucked in.
The combat system is pretty boring in the early hours as well – it’s when you unlock differentArchetypesand synergies that it starts really getting layered. The first few dungeons feel incredibly grindy, and if you don’t know what’s coming up, this might be enough for someone new to Atlus’ games to bounce off it.
This is pretty in keeping with the Persona games, to be fair. Atlus’ games have infamously slow starts that take their time setting up the world, story, and characters, trying to give you a reason to care about the game before it lets you start running off willy nilly. These long opening hours also give you a gradual introduction into what shapes up to be a mechanically complex game – throwing you into the deep end, especially with combat, could be very overwhelming.
This is a feature, not a bug, but it also means that a lot of people are going to be put off by the demo – which my housemate might be an unwitting victim of. All I can do is promise him, and you, that it gets better. You just have to put, like, a day’s worth of playing into it first.
Metaphor: ReFantazio
WHERE TO PLAY
From the creative minds behind Persona 3, 4, and 5 comes Metaphor: ReFantazio, a unique fantasy world, where your protagonist will journey alongside his fairy companion, Gallica, to lift the curse from the kingdom’s lost prince.Control your destiny, face your fears, and awaken magical Archetype powers that lie dormant in your heart. By awakening to an Archetype, you will unlock the power to channel and combine the abilities of unique job classes. Strengthen your bonds and build your party to take down powerful foes and discover the kingdom’s true nature.
