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The Latest Breaking News from Katsura Hashino

Before Persona veterans decided Metaphor: ReFantazio had to be a fantasy JRPG, they had "talks about making a science-fiction universe"

We could've had Metaphor: ReSci-Fitazio

GamesRadar

Metaphor: ReFantazio director Katsura Hashino is already working on a new game

Atlus' Studio Zero knows no rest.

PC Gamer

Just one week after Metaphor: ReFantazio's release, Persona director Katsura Hashino says he's already cooking up his next JRPG

It's not Persona 6, though

GamesRadar

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Metaphor: ReFantazio's director does the smart thing, avoids reading comments as much as possible: 'Constantly looking at reactions isn’t good for your mental health'

Everything in moderation.

PC Gamer

Persona and Metaphor: ReFantazio director "tries not to be that conscious" of feedback, as "looking at reactions isn’t good for your mental health"

He stays off social media, too

GamesRadar

Director of stylish JRPGs Metaphor: ReFantazio and Persona 5 isn't excited by "highly polished games that look like they were designed by a bunch of people in a CEO boardroom"

Atlus' Katsura Hashino clearly values originality and creativity

GamesRadar

Metaphor: ReFantazio's director looked to classic fantasy like Lord of the Rings before deciding doing that 'would lack that originality that defines us'

Atlus decided to "abandon" its fantasy research during development.

PC Gamer

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Games that 'look like they were designed by a bunch of people in a CEO boardroom' aren't exciting or interesting to Metaphor: ReFantazio's director

Katsura Hashino wants a game "to give me a glimpse of the humanity behind it".

PC Gamer

Metaphor: ReFantazio is yet another 80+ hour JRPG from Atlus, but its director says the studio "didn't want to bore our players by keeping it the same the entire time"

The game is admittedly "pretty voluminous"

GamesRadar

Lord of the Rings initially inspired Metaphor: ReFantazio, before Atlus "threw out" all its fantasy research to preserve "the originality that defines us"

Katsura Hashino decided that Atlus' own ideas are what makes its games special

GamesRadar

Metaphor: ReFantazio's original fantasy world gave the Persona 3, 4, and 5 director "freedom" to work on ideas "that we couldn't put into other games"

Persona's high-schooling setting put a "limit" on what was possible for Atlus

GamesRadar

Metaphor: ReFantazio combines real-time and turn-based battles because its director wanted to integrate "the idea of manga and movie-style combat"

"That balance of the tempo of fast and slow is something that we brushed up in terms of the combat system in our previous games"

GamesRadar

Persona series director says Atlus's flashy menus are 'actually really annoying' to design

Sometimes we suffer for our craft.

PC Gamer

Hungry for Metaphor: ReFantazio, I spent 97 minutes fighting a single godforsaken boss that the JRPG's director made 21 years ago

Now Playing | This is a cry for help

GamesRadar

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GamesRadar

Metaphor: ReFantazio borrows Persona's iconic calendar system, but devs say players don't need to "worry about missing out on activities due to time constraints"

The team "didn't want players to feel limited by time"

GamesRadar

For fantasy JRPG Metaphor: ReFantazio, Persona director gave himself a crash course featuring classics like The Lord of the Rings, but "if we tried to copy that it would just be a copy"

Director Katsura Hashino wasn't as familiar making fantasy worlds, so he studied the best

GamesRadar

Persona director and JRPG veteran says the amazing menus in Metaphor: ReFantazio were "really annoying" to make, just as Persona 5's were "impossible to read at first"

Never underestimate the power of a good menu

GamesRadar

Persona director explains why Metaphor: ReFantazio's cast awakens their powers in the most brutal way: "The big theme of this game is anxiety"

The JRPG continues Atlus' trend of brutal battle animations

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news in one place.

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GamesRadar

Persona's modern high school setting is "sort of limited," but going medieval fantasy with Metaphor: ReFantazio gave the JRPG's devs "a lot of freedom to explore"

Atlus has created "a whole new world" for its upcoming JRPG

GamesRadar

As Persona devs dove into fantasy with Metaphor: ReFantazio, the JRPG's director got advice from Neon Genesis Evangelion's designer: "Don't let yourself be hemmed in"

"I ended up meeting up with a bunch of different Japanese fantasy creators"

PC Gamer

PC Gamer at Tokyo Game Show 2024 Day 3 report: Square Enix, Bandai Namco and Sega booth deep dives

Here's what Bandai Namco, Sega, and Square Enix are showing off at TGS 2024

GamesRadar

Metaphor: ReFantazio leads thought it would be shorter than Persona 5 but just kept adding content, so now we're matching the fan-favorite JRPG's 100-hour runtime

A (welcome) war on my free time it is, then

TechRadar

Metaphor: ReFantazio preview: an interesting setup but a slow-paced opening act

I went hands-on with the first hour Metaphor: ReFantazio at Gamescom 2024. While the opening of the game isn’t exactly action-packed, it sets up an intriguing mystery.

GamesRadar

Atlus' new JRPG Metaphor: ReFantazio won't include romance, but its bonding system will "give you a new experience unlike any you have had" in the Persona series

Some Archetypes only unlock via the bond system

GamesRadar

Metaphor: ReFantazio is one of the few JRPGs I want more than Persona 6, and it might have one of the coolest job systems in years

Hands-on | Shin Megami Tensei and Persona creators take on a JRPG staple with unsurprising style

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