Metaphor: ReFantazio Impressions - High Fantasy Persona

[CriticalGaming]

So the Persona team got tired of milking four different games out of Persona 5 and have finally decided to make a new game. That game is Metaphor: ReFantazio and it's Persona but set in a fantasy land. Otherwise it's the same damn thing. You're main character has the special agility to gather monster's powers, you have a mascot character that's fucking annoying, and you have to manage yourself in segments of time to complete goals, bond with allies, and power up social stats.

Effectively this is Persona 5 set in a D&D world. However I think by setting the game in a fiction fantasy land the charm and interesting bits of Persona get lost. Part of what I think makes Persona so good is the compelling reality of it. You are typically a young person facing larger than life problems within a real world. And the sort of real implications are easy to understand and help make the super natural shit make sense. However in a fictional fantasy land, It stops mattering because it's all magic and monsters, so the plight is normal for everyone in the world not just your team. Which sort of dilutes the concept, especially when you have to still do the "slice of life" activities. Again in Persona the slice of life works because you have to try to maintain a normal school/life/heroics balance because nobody in the world is aware of the dangers happening. In fantasy land everyone is very much aware of monsters and peril everywhere, so the slice of life stuff doesn't fit as well because you aren't trying to maintain a sort of "normal life".

The game plays great, the graphics are good, the game really loses me conceptually though because it's just generic fantasy game number #1311, and so far as the Demo is concerned (which is about 5 hours of the game), there isn't enough happening that pulls my interest.

Battles work just like Persona, with a bit of a thematic mix-up, so if you've played Persona 5 you know how this basically works. The enemies have more of a break system though, so instead of getting an extra turn by hitting their weakness, you instead may have to hit them with their weakness a couple of times to "break" them, which then grants you an entire round where that enemy can't do anything. This can help you lay out the damage on them if they are the only enemy present, or disable a threat for a turn so you can clear the less enemies in battle. I don't think this really changes anything tactically compared to the Persona games to be honest, it's just another spin on the same idea. It's still a good system though so I don't have an issue with it.

 

[Dreiko]

Galica is fucking awesome, you shall speak of her with respect. The music you hear as you adventure is actually a spell she casts. The localization made her way more annoying than she really is, I think they were trying to go for the fairy in Zelda, that sort of characterization.

And yeah this is a 150+ hour game so the story will take a while to grip you, this is why I think Jrpg demos are not really worth it. You either just get wrapped in the plot and it ends or it doesn't even give you enough time to do so. Metaphor starts off with the orthodox fantasy rpg stuff but eventually is bound to go do its own unique thing that will make it stand out again.

 

[CriticalGaming]

Galica is fucking awesome, you shall speak of her with respect. The music you hear as you adventure is actually a spell she casts. The localization made her way more annoying than she really is, I think they were trying to go for the fairy in Zelda, that sort of characterization.

And yeah this is a 150+ hour game so the story will take a while to grip you, this is why I think Jrpg demos are not really worth it. You either just get wrapped in the plot and it ends or it doesn't even give you enough time to do so. Metaphor starts off with the orthodox fantasy rpg stuff but eventually is bound to go do its own unique thing that will make it stand out again.

I mean Persona 5 grabbed me quickly. FF7's opening bombing mission is incredible as an introduction to the game. I don't think JRPG's having a slow burn is much of an excuse for having a boring opening to the story. You have to make your game interesting, the "it gets good 20 hours in" is not really valid imo.

 

[Dreiko]

I mean Persona 5 grabbed me quickly. FF7's opening bombing mission is incredible as an introduction to the game. I don't think JRPG's having a slow burn is much of an excuse for having a boring opening to the story. You have to make your game interesting, the "it gets good 20 hours in" is not really valid imo.

Persona 5 has an 8 hour intro before you even get to the main game loop man, I'm not sure what you mean XD.

But yeah basically it depends on what you're trying to depict. Metaphor is intentionally tackling orthodox fantasy, meaning it has to actually be orthodox and thus can't be that novel right away, or it will not feel impactful when it does its own weird thing since it's been weird all along. This gives me an attack on titan vibe so far where there's this seemingly medieval society but we have a lot we don't know about it. Like the monsters being called Humans is a hint of that, but they first have to establish that orthodox medieval fantasy setting for a bit before they can start turning it on its head. Attack on titan took multiple seasons to do so.


This is more of a case of "it's already pretty good, and it gets GOTY material good in 20-50 hours", since that quote originated from FFXIII which was only a 50 hour game lol, this game is described as being at least as long as p5.

 

[Dreiko]

Famitsu review is out, 9/9/10/9. We eating good here.

 

[BrawlMan]

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[meiam]

They do DnD persona before adult persona, sigh...

The fantasy slice of life could be fun if it leads to you doing different kind of activity and it allow for unique world building style, different from the usual "you are the chosen hero, the world will end in a few weeks".

 

[Dreiko]

They do DnD persona before adult persona, sigh...

The fantasy slice of life could be fun if it leads to you doing different kind of activity and it allow for unique world building style, different from the usual "you are the chosen hero, the world will end in a few weeks".

I think most of em are adults, they just look youthful. Like the protag is some sort of halfling-inspired race for example, he's 18 despite looking young. And persona without the school setting wouldn't really be persona either lol. I think this is both adult and fantasy persona, simultaneously.

And yeah the game is basically you running for king by helping people and building a following. You're not the chosen hero Dragon Quest style but you still have some special power at the same time.

 

[CriticalGaming]

I had to force myself to finish the demo this weekend and I'm pretty much soured on the game entirely. I don't like the fantasy setting, I think what they've been is whole uninteresting and feels like generic anime plot number 567. The fact that I was moving through the demo actively plugging Persona 5 things into like like, there's Igor, this is the velvet room, same bond system, same day/night cycle, same dungeon layout ideas, it made me upset that I wasn't just playing a Persona game.

It's especially bad because unlike with Persona, there is very little story before shit goes down and you have a party of characters. In persona games you get to know these people before they become part of your group, but there is a moment in the demo where one of your party members get's yeeted and is instantly replaced by another girl who's just like, "Fuck it yeah I'll join whatever." (she's a guard and lets you join her actually because she's got no other choice at the moment, but after a short dungeon, she does just join you because you was friends with her friend). I just feel like if been thrown into a world with a bunch of people whom I don't know, expected to care about a protagonist that I also don't know, and then I'm expected to care about this world or it's people, when the game also does nothing to give me any reason to worry about any of what's happening.

Essentially there is a guy who murders the current king and the Prince is trapped in a limbo'ed slumber that's slowly killing him. Or something like that. We start of on a mission to assassinate the king killer, because that was a bad thing and if he becomes king it would maybe suck. But it's never really shown or told to us why this matters to us, why should we care. I assume the King Killer is evil but he doesn't really do anything evil besides trying to take the throne for himself, which again I don't know how it would affect anyone's day to day life. So the set up is bad because you meet up with your main character and he's just on this mission to find a guy to get the real mission which ultimately becomes killing the king killer, but there is nothing else know about you.

Compare this to Persona 5 where you kind of know who you are as a character from the jump, you are a student who stepped in to help a women against a bad dude, but the bad dude is actually a political figure and he ends up getting you in trouble and forcing you out of town. You then meet your first friend Ryuji who was a track star but got hurt and you don't really know why but he has something against the coach, and you begin to learn about the coach being an evil dickhead at the same time your powers start to develop and you get trapped in the shadow realm with Ryuji where you awaken to save him and things go for there.

Persona's typically have a slower burn but this pays off because it gets you invested before it hits you with the anime crazy shit. Metaphor doesn't do that, you are thrown in and the game treats the mission as something you should give a shit about without ever giving you a reason to give a shit about it. Maybe the full game goes into back story later, but because this demo IS the full game as you can continue from your demo save with the rest of the game when it launches there is no potential for something in the demo to have been cut out for the sake of more action up front. All the questions I have about the story and these people would be presented the same way with the full game, so if it does explain things or try to make you care about people later, then IMO it's too late after a 5 hours introductionary section. It might be one of those RPG's that gets really good after 20-30 hours but I'm not really interested in putting that kind of time into a story I already don't like these days.

 

[meiam]

Essentially there is a guy who murders the current king and the Prince is trapped in a limbo'ed slumber that's slowly killing him. Or something like that. We start of on a mission to assassinate the king killer, because that was a bad thing and if he becomes king it would maybe suck. But it's never really shown or told to us why this matters to us, why should we care. I assume the King Killer is evil but he doesn't really do anything evil besides trying to take the throne for himself, which again I don't know how it would affect anyone's day to day life. So the set up is bad because you meet up with your main character and he's just on this mission to find a guy to get the real mission which ultimately becomes killing the king killer, but there is nothing else know about you.

On one hand, from reading other review, it sounds like the king killer want to abolish class altogether, so that sounds pretty good... meaning the game will justify him being the bad guy by making him outlandishly evil for no reason.

On the other hand

Compare this to Persona 5 where you kind of know who you are as a character from the jump, you are a student who stepped in to help a women against a bad dude, but the bad dude is actually a political figure and he ends up getting you in trouble and forcing you out of town.

This part of P5 is completely irrelevant for like 95% of the game, so its not like Atlus put the super slow build up to any real use.

 

[CriticalGaming]

This part of P5 is completely irrelevant for like 95% of the game, so its not like Atlus put the super slow build up to any real use.

Well i hard disagree because he is the final villain of the normal game and it all sort of built to him.

Furthermore even if you don't think the pay off was worth it, in this instance it's the set up that matters because that alone got me invested in my character and even set my mindset for how i would pick roleplay options throughout the game. Even if it doesn't ultimately matter, the setup is important to give you some attachment to your character which Metaphor fails at.

Clearly people disagree with me because the game is the highest rated/reviewed game of the year so what the fuck do i know?

 

[Dreiko]

Well i hard disagree because he is the final villain of the normal game and it all sort of built to him.

Furthermore even if you don't think the pay off was worth it, in this instance it's the set up that matters because that alone got me invested in my character and even set my mindset for how i would pick roleplay options throughout the game. Even if it doesn't ultimately matter, the setup is important to give you some attachment to your character which Metaphor fails at.

Clearly people disagree with me because the game is the highest rated/reviewed game of the year so what the fuck do i know?

I think it's just that the demo doesn't contain the full game, and the reviews are actually from people who played the full game not just the demo, so that's what they're rating, not the demo but the entire game.

 

[PsychedelicDiamond]

I rather enjoyed the demo. I'm probably one of the few people who are playing this without having played Persona or any other Shin Megami Tensei games before but I'm having fun. The combat is very fast paced for being turn based, I enjoy the real time elements, I like the characters so far and while so far the plot is kind of generic fantasy RPG there are hints of something weirder and more complicated there. Also, man, those Hieronymus Bosch inspired creature designs are sick.

 

[Dreiko]

I rather enjoyed the demo. I'm probably one of the few people who are playing this without having played Persona or any other Shin Megami Tensei games before but I'm having fun. The combat is very fast paced for being turn based, I enjoy the real time elements, I like the characters so far and while so far the plot is kind of generic fantasy RPG there are hints of something weirder and more complicated there. Also, man, those Hieronymus Bosch inspired creature designs are sick.

The turn based gameplay and part of the social sim mechanics are the only elements from persona here, the rest of the stuff is pretty new and unique. It's more of the same philosophy as persona, where instead of photorealism they achieve visual flare through gorgeous art direction that is both stylish and mysterious. Also the archetypes being like classic Jrpg jobs is totally new for Atlus as well. It's one of the selling point for me cause it's like bringing together final fantasy and persona in a dreamy (or nightmarish with some of those Human designs) new packaging.

 

[CriticalGaming]

 

[Dreiko]

So I'm like 65 hours in and the spoiler twist I won't mention happened as I was expecting it would, and man is this game amazing or what. Also playing it on hard has been the best Jrpg experience I've had since dragon quest 11. This is prolly getting my game of the year win. I'm barely half way through the game either as I am doing a completionist run.

 

[CriticalGaming]

So the frustration and boredom of not having something new to play got me and I bought the game, replayed the entire opening though to give it a second chance.

And it isn't much better now that I'm 12 hours into it. I think for me it is the characters, the people you bond with have very little going for them besides their baseline story point. This might develop more later for them as there is usually a twist or realization by the characters by the end of their bond, but the people just feel so boring.

They even lack general personality quirks besides high fantasy people. The most interesting person is the pilot for your Gunrunner ship thing.

The mark of a good jrpg for me is being able to like the characters in your party. Having personalities and banner and all that. This is the first rpg I think I've played where the cast has no chemistry between them, like a bunch of decent actors who don't click with each other in anyway.

When the cast isn't good then the main story and combat or meaningless. It is persona turn based combat, and it is good. The main story is okay but again they've really tried to make me not like the villain without the villain doing anything at all. He would just be bad for reasons.

But my main gripe and the thing keeping me from being invested is the main cast stinks. Especially that pointless, useless, stupid fucking fairy. Oh.....that sounds really bad outta context.

 

[Dreiko]

Yeah it's a slow burn in the first few hours for sure in terms of char development. Basically you're running for your life from one thing to the next in the early bits of the game so you don't see much char development until later. As for Louis, he cursed the prince who is your childhood friend and killed gramps and the old king too, what else do you need to hate him lol. Though this too will take a very cool turn later on with how the plot unfolds and you get your chance to see more sides of him.

And are you playing it in English or what? Cause Galica is a darling. Her localization just made her annoying for no reason but in JP she's very sweet and considerate.


But yeah, just got the sixth party member, one more left for a full group!

 

[CriticalGaming]

I think the problem is that none of that is shown. The cut scene where the prince is cursed doesn't show our character nor does it show Louis.

There is a small cutscene where we hang with the prince but there is very little to establish our relationship nor is there little to establish who we are.

While I'm sure this is revealed later, the problem is that there is nothing to relate too for dozens of hours. Like I need motivation, I need something to latch onto and they've offered me nothing.

The later half of the game better blow me away because I don't know what game people are playing that earn this thing 10/10.

 

[meiam]

I think the problem is that none of that is shown. The cut scene where the prince is cursed doesn't show our character nor does it show Louis.

There is a small cutscene where we hang with the prince but there is very little to establish our relationship nor is there little to establish who we are.

While I'm sure this is revealed later, the problem is that there is nothing to relate too for dozens of hours. Like I need motivation, I need something to latch onto and they've offered me nothing.

The later half of the game better blow me away because I don't know what game people are playing that earn this thing 10/10.

Its kinda weird seeing someone have that reaction to another atlus game cause that's exactly how I felt with P5, the main character is a blank slate with no story to speak of and the main story is disconnect from what you do playing it.