Metaphor ReFantazio has five difficulty options, including 'Storyteller' for casuals and an ultra-hard ‘Regicide’ mode for you absolute masochists

Atlus games have something of a reputation for being very, very hard. Veterans of the series might recall such ‘skill check bosses’ as Matador in Shin Megami Tensei 3: Nocturne, or the Minotaur in Shin Megami Tensei 4 on the 3DS. Each of these foes act as early-game walls that many players ran aground against, terminating a save file and making people rethink their RPG choices.

The games, from there on, don’t get much easier, either. The MegaTen series and the Persona series are both home to some pretty tough battles that can easily undermine even a seasoned RPG player if they haven’t been paying attention to the fussier mechanics of the game they’re playing.

Of course, things have gotten a little easier lately - the re-release of Shin Megami Tensei 5 had an optional ‘Safety Difficulty’ download that basically allowed you to deal 10x more damage from the off. And the Persona games have been getting easier and easier since 3, with Persona 5 particularly being a walk in the park for players that know their SRPGs from their JRPGs (if you still want to call ‘em that).

It looks like Atlus is keen to pull on all areas of its experience with its upcoming Metaphor ReFantazio release, though. The game - the developer’s first brand new RPG in generations - feels like Shin Megami Tensei doing its best Final Fantasy impression (not a bad thing), but with one key difference: there are a selection of difficulty options at the start of the game.

I clocked a few various modes in the game. The ‘Storyteller mode’ difficulty will assumedly be like Safety in SMT5; allowing you to experience the narrative without really having to worry about getting your proverbial arse handed to you in combat.

Then Easy/Normal/Hard will be your usual triptych of difficulties in games: variations on a standard experience that will have you get hit harder, deal out less damage, and need to make use of the amazing ‘Press Turn’ system in order to overcome even the most standard mob encounters. I had to move the difficulty in the demo down from Hard to Normal in order to progress in the time we were given; Hard enemies soaked up more damage and seemed to target party weaknesses more. That’s an anecdotal experience at the moment, but I’ve reached out to Sega PR to try and glean more about the differences in the various modes.

There’s another mode, though, that caught my eye. It was grayed out and unselectable for the demo. It’s called ‘Regicide’. If you’re unfamiliar with the word (and clearly not a Halo player, therefore), it means “the action of killing a king”. It’s unclear whether this will just make enemies more spongy and liable to kill you in one go, or if there are more meaningful differences in the game (like new bosses, and so on).

Either way, it’s good news for players that want to really experience that rock hard ‘oh my god, how the hell am I even supposed to beat that?’ vibe Atlus has become known for over the past few console generations. I’m at least going to give ‘Regicide’ a go when I boot up the game, even if I only make it a few hours before giving in and turning it down. It’s authentic, right?

Atlus has been pretty inventive with its approach to difficulty modes in the past. My favorite example of its creativity with difficulty comes from Shin Megami Tensei: Devil Survivor: Overclocked, in which you had to use points earned by completing achievements in the base game to ‘purchase’ New Game+ features in the new mode.

Will we see yet another mode added to the game when you clear the title for the first time (much like we did in SMT5:V with ‘Godborn’ mode?) It remains to be seen. For now, at least, I’m pleased to see Atlus catering to the more casual crowd it attracted with Persona, and the horrible RPG masochists like myself in one fell swoop. It gives me confidence that the developer knows exactly what it’s got in this game, which - as I say in my preview - really is something special.

Metaphor: ReFantazio launches October 11, 2024 for Xbox Series X/S, Microsoft Windows, PlayStation 4/5 and Steam.

This piece was written based on gameplay and presentations given during a special preview event for the game in New York, USA. Travel and accommodation for VG247 was provided by Sega for the duration of the event.