Arguably, two of the biggest JRPGs of the year are Square Enix’sFinal Fantasy 7 Rebirthand Atlus’Metaphor: ReFantazio, with both titles receiving numerous nominations at the 2024 Game Awards. While the success of both titles shows what a great year 2024 has been for JRPG fans, there is still room for the more recent of the two titles to improve its quality-of-life features. Specifically,Metaphor: ReFantazioshould look towardFinal Fantasy 7 Rebirth’s party preset feature to enhance its ease of party management in a future update.
A core aspect of the JRPG genre is the makeup of a party, with games likeFinal Fantasy 7 RebirthandMetaphor: ReFantazioboth boasting a large cast of playable characters. As such, managing the party to best fit whatever situation the game throws at the player is a crucial part of finding success in the genre. AlthoughFinal Fantasy 7 Rebirthgives players the tools to easily swap their party setup to fit their current situation,Metaphor: ReFantaziomakes things a bit more complicated and could really benefit from borrowingFF7 Rebirth’s approach.
Metaphor: ReFantazio Could Make Great Use of Final Fantasy 7 Rebirth’s Party Preset Feature
How Final Fantasy 7 Rebirth’s Party Loadout System Helps Balance its Large Cast
With players getting to expand their party from the previous entry in theFinal Fantasy 7 Remakeproject inRebirth, Square Enix included a useful feature to ensure players can make full use of the game’s entire roster. From the Edit Party menu,Final Fantasy 7 Rebirthplayers can create three separate party presetsthat they can swap between as needed. This feature makes it so much easier to customize different loadouts to adapt to any situation without the hassle of going in and changing every party member’s equipment and Materia individually.
Final Fantasy 7 Rebirthfeatures several instances where certain party members aren’t available to use in combat, so this feature is important to utilize so players can ensure they are regularly rotating through party members as necessary. AlthoughFF7 Rebirthdoesn’t have ajob system like otherFinal Fantasygames, it still allows players to customize the loadouts of its characters to fill certain roles, so swapping between different equipment can get tedious without the use of the party preset feature.Metaphor, on the other hand, gets even more complex thanRebirthwith its party customization options, making it all the more apparent that the game needs some kind of preset-saving feature.
Metaphor: ReFantazio’s Archetype System Means Players Need to Swap Loadouts on the Fly
With46 Archetypesto choose from,Metaphor: ReFantazioplayers have their work cut out when building their ideal team setup. Splitting these Archetypes across seven party members means there are a ton of potential combinations for players to experiment with, especially when players consider which skills to inherit from other Archetypes they’ve studied. As such, fine-tuning a party composition inMetaphorcan be an entire game in itself, and allowing players to save certain party setups would go a long way toward streamlining this process.
After reaching Rank 2 of More’s Bond Ranks, players unlock the ability to study Archetypes from the Main Menu, making this process slightly less tedious than traveling to Akademia each time they want to change things up.
Changing the party setup to adapt to the current challenge is even more necessary inMetaphor: ReFantaziothan inFinal Fantasy 7 Rebirth, as the game even tells playerswhich Archetypes are recommended for combatbefore entering a dungeon. If players could prepare ahead of time and easily swap between preset party loadouts while in a dungeon, it would go a long way toward streamlining the process of tackling the game’s side quests and dungeons during in-game free time.
Metaphor: ReFantazio
WHERE TO PLAY
From the creative minds behind Persona 3, 4, and 5 comes Metaphor: ReFantazio, a unique fantasy world, where your protagonist will journey alongside his fairy companion, Gallica, to lift the curse from the kingdom’s lost prince.Control your destiny, face your fears, and awaken magical Archetype powers that lie dormant in your heart. By awakening to an Archetype, you will unlock the power to channel and combine the abilities of unique job classes. Strengthen your bonds and build your party to take down powerful foes and discover the kingdom’s true nature.
