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W.What I’ve always admired about Japanese RPGs is their unabashed grandeur. The likes of Final Fantasy, Persona, and Shin Megami Tensei aren’t limited to the familiar features of good versus evil, wizards and goblins, swords and magic; They absorb all of those things, and much more, from science fiction, mythology, comics, psychology, classical art, and whatever else their creators are interested in, and build these absurdly ambitious worlds and narratives out of them. The themes are never small, the playing times are never short. Think of them as the operas of the gaming world: a theatrical synthesis of different virtual arts, from storytelling and staging to music and movement. And kind of an acquired taste.
Metaphor ReFantazio, out this week, is the most outlandish example of this genre I’ve played in many years. It’s magnificently exaggerated. In the first few hours, you are presented with a world segregated by a controlling monarchy, army and religion in strict racial hierarchies, where people with cat ears and tails are subordinate to those with horns or longer elf ears. (Your perfectly manageable task? Dismantle all this and bring about a new era of equality.) Characters pull out their own metal hearts, engrave them, and transform into robot-style manifestations of their inner power. You meet your enemies: monstrous and powerful chimeric grotesques, tangles of legs and tongues, spikes and teeth. They are called “humans” and are more powerful and cruel than any of the races in the game. Subtlety is never on the table.
You will quickly find yourself embroiled in a kingdom-wide contest to elect a new king, sparked by the murder of all eligible royal candidates, orchestrated by a cruel man named Louis who has beautiful hair. The complexity of the story threatens, but the style and seductive style of the presentation draw you in. I felt mesmerized watching my team of transforming heroes dart in and out of the battlefield, with their spinning swords and extravagant magic. Metaphor ReFantazio’s fight is both very deep and very easy to enjoy, with a soundtrack of high-speed chants and choral music. You can manipulate the system to give yourself extra damage and extra turns against your enemies, a sort of metagame of handling each encounter with maximum style and efficiency, but whatever you do, it looks splendid.
While braving the dungeons, the blue-haired hero, who comes straight from the bottom of the kingdom’s racial hierarchy, escapes into a fantasy novel about a place that looks suspiciously like modern Japan. Even in the opening hours there are mini-treatises on the purpose of fantasy as a tool for social liberation. His big themes come to light so quickly and so naturally that they cannot be criticized for being obvious. Like the Persona series, it combines philosophical postulates about friendship and power, overcoming social corruption and taking advantage of your inner weaknesses and strengths, with moments of intense strangeness and scandalous style. In short, it’s never boring.
It’s unlikely I’ll find the 80 hours needed to finish Metaphor ReFantazio, but after a few nights of playing it’s already given me plenty to talk about and marvel at. It’s so bold and so well-crafted – the developer, Atlus, has set exceptionally high standards for visual design and music over the years, and it’s impressive that ReFantazio lives up to them. I like that this world is infected with danger, discrimination and violence; this is not a caricature. And even when their themes are harsh, they are also deeply felt and communicated with conviction. That sincerity is an important counterpoint to grandiosity, and it’s what gives this genre its heart.
what to play
Appropriate given our growing proximity to Halloween, it’s been a great time for horror fans. The new version of Bloober Team silent hill 2 It came out this week, and despite fans’ reservations based on previous gameplay footage, its reception has been pretty good. (Disclosure: my partner worked on this game.) AND Until dawnThe PS4 choice and consequences game about a group of children murdered in the woods has also enjoyed a glow, re-released on PS5 ahead of its film adaptation later this year. crow countryMeanwhile, the PS1-style horror adventure game I enjoyed earlier this year because it lets you shut down monsters is coming out on Switch next week.
Any of them would make a great spooky season pick and I’d be on the lookout for a new game based on the horror movie franchise. A Quiet Place: The Road Ahead (October 17), and another retro-style cooler about two teenagers and a Ouija board gone wrong, Fear the spotlight (October 22).
Available in: PS5 (all), PC (Silent Hill 2, Until Dawn), Nintendo Switch (Crow Country)
Estimated playing time: 15 hours (Silent Hill 2), 8 hours (Until Dawn), 5 hours (Crow Country)
what to read
Short-selling firm Hindenburg Research has made a big bet against Robloxreleasing a huge report accusing the children’s gaming platform of inflating its metrics (and therefore its valuation) and also calling it a “pedophile hellhole,” having sought ways to get around its inadequate content moderation.
It was the magnificent horror game. Alien isolationThis week marks the 10th anniversary, and to mark the occasion, developer Creative Assembly made the unexpected and welcome announcement that a sequel is on the way. early development.
343 Industries, the developer who made the latest (not particularly impressive) Halo games, has changed name like Halo Studios, and says it has several games in development. It’s also abandoning its own game engine, often blamed for the many problems during Halo Infinite’s development delay, in favor of the cutting-edge Unreal Engine 5.
Following UbisoftFollowing the recent problems, founder Yves Guillemot and Chinese investor Tencent are considering privatizing the company. GamesIndustry information.
I loved this article by historian Holly Nielsen in Age of Empires II and how it influenced and inspired the millennial generation of history buffs, although I still haven’t forgiven the awful Scottish accents in William Wallace’s campaign. (Thankfully fixed in the 2019 remaster.)
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Question block
A question this week Valley:
“Some games have so many details that they look like real, living places. Are there any games that you think have raised the bar for architectural design within virtual worlds?
Apart from Metaphor: ReFantaziowhich I have already talked enough about, I think Final Fantasy VII is a candidate here (specifically the first part of the remake, set in the city of Midgar), as is Dragon Age; I think fantasy RPGs are particularly good at architecture because their artists are free to fuse science fiction and fantasy with classical, baroque, neoclassical or modern styles and, more importantly, anything they create doesn’t It has to be valid in real life. . dishonor It also comes immediately to mind, for the way its side streets can eat you up and the striking contrast between Dunwall’s slums and its grandeur.
I don’t like him very much bioshock games, but you can’t fault the first one for that amazing art-deco underwater city. oh and transmitted by blood It has the most incredible Gothic architecture I’ve ever seen (that conference building!), and that’s coming from someone who grew up in Edinburgh. Some of the castles and cities of Elden Ring They are even more complex.
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