I no longer expect video games that tackle the subjects of racism and discrimination through fantasy — as Metaphor: ReFantazio does — to surprise me. Those stories never go beyond well-trodden depictions of “racism is bad,” and I tune them out like so much white noise. But Metaphor: ReFantazio has done the work, and its willingness to go beyond surface-level treatments of tired fantasy tropes to dig at the heart of the real issues with racism and discrimination is exactly what makes it a phenomenal game. Metaphor is a clever evolution of the Persona series, but it wouldn’t be as interesting or outstanding as it is without its refreshingly progressive message.
Metaphor takes place in a world where our reality of “equality” between different ethnic groups is presented as an unattainable-but-nice-to-think-about idyllic fantasy, while discrimination, classism, and the struggle against monstrous creatures called “humans” rule the day.
The world of Metaphor is stratified according to a hierarchy of different tribes classified by their physical characteristics, like wings, horns, or elfin-like long ears. Then there’s the protagonist, who comes from the most hated tribe, which, to our eyes, resemble real-world humans with no distinct physical features. Atlus calling this game “Metaphor” is about as unsubtle as a brick thrown at a protest.
The world is thrown into chaos when the dogmatic king is murdered, leaving behind no heir, as his idealistic son mysteriously vanished years before. His death triggers a nationwide contest whereby anyone, no matter their birth or circumstance, can compete to win the throne, provided they have the love and support of the people. Your job is to earn that love through a variety of contests in the hope of putting that idealistic prince on the throne so that he may change this hateful racist world for the better.
In Metaphor, the characters utilize a job class system called archetypes. Each party member starts with a specific archetype — warrior, healer, mage, etc. — and by developing relationships with other NPCs, unlock more. Like Persona, combat is centered on exploiting an enemy’s weakness while mitigating your own. There’s also an absolutely fabulous overworld combat feature where if you strike a weaker enemy, they simply die, forgoing a transition into a battle scene. However, if an enemy is your level or stronger, you can use overworld combat to surprise attack and weaken them, giving you a serious advantage in the fight to come.
I adore these improvements over Persona’s combat because it significantly cuts down on the time needed to grind experience. It also makes combat harrowing as hell because while you’re able to ambush monsters, they can do the same to you. Metaphor’s combat excels, exceeding its RPG cohort, because it demands that I think more strategically. Arrogantly running around a dungeon or into boss fights with your biggest, highest-level guns blazing is not always the winning strategy, and it’s also a good way to get you killed.
My higher-level party was frequently wiped out by an enemy I’d otherwise mop the floor with simply because they got the drop on me. Conversely, I’ve been able to soundly defeat enemies eight and nine levels higher than me with freshly unlocked level-one archetypes because their special abilities were uniquely suited to exploit a weakness. Metaphor is the only single-player game that made me feel like a raid leader in an MMO like Final Fantasy XIV or World of Warcraft.
Metaphor also feels good from a tactile perspective. The animations that play as you fluidly zip between different options in combat add a kinetic energy that made me feel like I was playing an action game instead of a turn-based RPG. This experience is enhanced by the slick-as-hell, highly stylized menus and the killer soundtrack — especially the main battle music. I don’t know what that man is saying, but the way he says it gets me hype as hell.
But Metaphor is more than just a stylish, dynamic RPG — it’s also the rare fantasy story that tackles discrimination with nuance.
In a lot of fantasy, I’m annoyed by the storytelling conceit of using discrimination against fantasy races as an allegory for real-world racism. Stories featuring this trope usually stop at the “racism is bad” surface level, demonstrating that with ugly over-the-top displays of violence (hey there, Dragon Age) while ignoring the subtleties that make racism so heinous and pervasive. Metaphor manages to incorporate and tackle both aspects of this reality.
There’s a moment when you’re reading a fantasy book with a companion, and they mention that realizing their goal of a world where everyone is treated equally won’t be enough. “Equal competition doesn’t mean equal footing,” Heismay says. It’s the first time I’ve seen a video game acknowledge that simply stopping the big bad evil racist won’t magically make up for the countless generations of oppression. The game does the same with class and wealth. There’s a character vying for the throne who wishes to essentially “eat the rich” and redistribute their wealth at the point of a guillotine. But by virtue of her extremely low status, she sees everybody with more than a few coins to rub together as her ideological enemy. It’s just like when people in poverty lash out at other people a little bit less in poverty when their real enemies are the wealthy powerholders who exploit that animosity. It’s awesome that the game calls that out.
There’s an almost reflexive instinct to call Metaphor: ReFantazio “Persona with swords.” The game has the hallmarks of a Persona, which lend it an air of familiarity, not to mention much of the same creative talent. But this characterization doesn’t feel correct. Those familiar systems have been remixed to feel fresh while the game’s message is vibrating on levels the Persona games brush up against but never quite reach.
The upsetting thing about racism, classism, homophobia, and the like is that there’s a reluctance in the real world to acknowledge that it’s not only the violence of individual actors that perpetuates this oppression but institutions and systems as well. We challenge those individual actors and call them out because that’s much easier and quicker to do than the difficult generational work it takes to dismantle racist systems and build equitable ones. Games with that kind of message do the same — ending with the climactic defeat of the bad guys. Metaphor is one of the first times a high-profile game acknowledges the real, much harder, and less glamorous work of dismantling systems.
And at a time when you can’t even call out the individual actors anymore without getting gaslit to hell and back — it’s moving, as a person of color, to see Metaphor go the extra mile to say, “These systems need to go, too.” That’s what makes Metaphor: ReFantazio so powerful, resonant, and in every sense of a word that’s unfortunately been bastardized into meaninglessness, woke as fuck.
Metaphor: ReFantazio is out now on Xbox, PlayStation, and PC.