RPG Metanoia is a 2010 Filipino animated epic comedy-drama film directed by Luis C. Suárez in his directorial debut, from a story solely written and screenplay co-written with Jade Castro and Tey Clamor. Produced by Ambient Media, Thaumatrope Animation and Star Cinema, RPG Metanoia is the first feature-length Philippine animated film presented entirely in 3D CGI (as of 2025, the only film to do so). With a budget of ₱100 million, it became the most expensive Philippine animated film to date until Zsazsa Zaturnnah.
The film blends elements of science fantasy and action-adventure genres, traditional culture, and online role-playing video games, along with certain themes of friendship and resentment. The film follows Nico (voiced by Zaijan Jaranilla in his film acting debut), an introverted boy who is obsessed with playing an MMORPG game along with his friends when a virus starts infecting the game and spreads into the real world, and Nico and his gang are tasked to stop the infection and save their world. The film features an ensemble cast including Eugene Domingo, Aga Muhlach, Mika dela Cruz, Jairus Aquino, Basty Alcances, and Ketchup Eusebio.
RPG Metanoia premiered in Philippine cinemas on December 25, 2010, as an official entry at the 2010 Metro Manila Film Festival, which received twelve nominations (the most of any animated films at the festival) and won four awards including the title for 3rd Best Picture, Best Sound Recording and Best Original Theme Song, as well as the Quezon City's special citation for animation in Most Gender-Sensitive Film. Despite its critical success at the film festival's awards night, the film was a box-office disappointment with a total of ₱33 million against a ₱100 million budget.
Contents
Plot
An introverted boy named Nico plays Metanoia at midnight, accesses as a mysterious boy under his playable character Zero goes on an underground hidden stage where the special item "Helm of Destiny" is located, soon to be discovered was inside of a three-headed metal boss. One day, Nico and his gang (Bryan, Mark, Bobby, Daniel, and a new friend May) are tormented by Andrew and David to challenge for Metanoia's worldwide tournament in exchange of playing Metanoia again if his gang win the tournament; otherwise, they will get banned from entering an Internet cafe "Bomb Shelter". At night, his mother promises him to not play Metanoia one day and instead he will join her for a game of badminton at the park during his last summer week.
The next morning, Nico forgets his promise and goes on to the Bomb Shelter for his sake. In the midst of the tournament, his gang (Mang Ernie, Ahdonis, Sumpak and K'Mao) infiltrated the stages and Nico took the blue orb to access the winning point but are defeated by a mysterious player under his playable character Sargo, and fell off a special item to the ground. Saddened by the loss, Nico is reluctant to go with his gang and plays Metanoia one more instead to get a slime species named Jiglie, but it is caught by a new player, Cassandra, May's playable character. Nico feels disappointed over the loss of worldwide tournament and ban of Bomb Shelter led to his friends' resentment as May decided to play outside games with their gang rather than Metanoia to regain their friendship. As the gang keep up playing traditional games over a few hours, his mother felt relieved over his enthusiasm and Nico fulfills her promise to join badminton at the park.
Meanwhile, Sargo took the special item found on the final stage of the tournament Nico fell, and wears it at the top of the tower, becoming more belligerent and manipulative. Sargo's manipulation process infiltrates various channels and infects every stronger players in Metanoia and become an army, leaving other players offline.
In afternoon, Nico felts frustrated over the gang's mockery and teasing as May's potential boyfriend, causes his tension by ranting against the gang as well as his envious over May led to her resentment, breaking up their friendship. Nico then betrays Bryan for his decision to let the Bomb Shelter into playing Metanoia with Andrew and David despite his ban, leaving Bryan frustrated. As Sargo and his army's infiltration continues, Bryan follows his gang to the Bomb Shelter and found out Andrew and David have been infected by Sargo after Bryan safely goes offline while in infiltration. After realizing a devastating news, Nico plays Metanoia one last time and assembles the gang to fight off the infected players. Unbeknownst to Nico, his gang find out a special item Nico took it earlier was actually a Trojan Horse, its subliminal signals through the game's graphic interface which causes the entire game to infect not only players or computer system itself but in real people's brain; it was revealed that a European program developed a subliminal reality system as an experiment to make volunteers unconscious to keep out from going insane and taps into dreams, but was backfired as soon as volunteers were mentally lobotomized by the system as a result, the program re-purposed and sold the system as a game engine, branded the name Metanoia. Upon realizing the other players are in grave danger, Nico announces everyone in Metanoia through a world message to assemble the gang as a whole, aiming to destroy the virus to reverse its consciousness.
Production
Development
RPG Metanoia took five years to make. Luis Suárez stated that the idea for the film came from his time with his nephew during summer (March–May). He asked his nephew what he wanted to do and he said he wanted to play online RPG games, so they went to a café and Luis spent the whole day with his nephew inside it. He then wanted to make a story for him for his nephew to see what he is missing in life. Originally titled RPG, he added with the term Metanoia, means "change or evolution", and in gaming terms, "leveling up!".
Suárez detailed the interview about the main characters, "All the lead characters were based on people I know. Nico was inspired by my real nephew, who at one point in his life was in pretty much the same situation as the character in the movie. I used my best friends from grade school as the template for Nico’s friends. Though some of their looks, characteristics and attitudes were adjusted for better storytelling, the group dynamic remained intact. More often than not, the script was driven by what the real person would probably say or do when faced with the same situation. May was mostly inspired by my girlfriend Jenny who used to make her own jewelry and loves the color purple, which is evident in her avatar’s accessories. She also pushes me to do my best in the things I do just like May does for Nico in the movie."
Pre-production
Thaumatrope Animation began work in 2006 and Ambient Media serve as a production company for the film, features a mix of professional and amateur staff members from storyboard and initial rendering to the dubbing process. According to Robert Charles Chien of Ambient Media, they have around 26 animators who worked on. The design of local Metanoia server was inspired by Spanish colonization in the Philippines, particularly the walled city of Intramuros, along with the floating islands, were inspired by side-scrolling video games.
In August 2009, Ambient Media officially partnered with ABS-CBN via Star Cinema.
Casting
When Star Cinema came on board, they provided guest child actors from the children show Goin' Bulilit and reality competition Star Circle Quest including Basty Alcances, Jairus Aquino, Mika dela Cruz, and Zaijan Jaranilla. Film regulars from Star Cinema including Vhong Navarro as the main antagonist; Eugene Domingo was Suárez's only choice for her role as Nico’s mother; Aga Muhlach eventually get into his part as Nico’s father in the film.
Music
The original film score was composed by Ria Osorio and Gerard Salonga, with the Filharmonika Orchestra performing their composition.
Album
RPG Metanoia: The Album is the official compilation soundtrack album of the film published by Star Music. The theme song of the film "Kaya Mo" was sung by Protein Shake featuring Ney of the band 6Cyclemind and Kean of Callalily; the song is the album's single. An accompanying music video was made for the single and will be launched on August 19.
Release
In 2008, a teaser trailer for the movie (then titled "theRPGmovie") was shown at Level Up's Ragnarok Online event at the World Trade Center.
In June 2010, it was announced to be an official entry for the 36th Metro Manila Film Festival. In August 2010, RPG Metanoia's official website was launched. The Cinema Evaluation Board gave the movie a Grade A. MTRCB gave the film a rated G (General Patronage).
The film was released on DVD on April 26, 2013, by Star Home Video.
The entire film was made available for streaming online through user-generated content website YouTube on December 21, 2025, although, like most Philippine films, drew copyright songs were replaced to the sound library.
Reception
Box office
Following the MMFF's premiere, RPG Metanoia earn a total of ₱33 million for four-week release but it was a box-office disappointment over its production cost of ₱100 million, like the previous three animated features.
Critical reception
Julius Edward B. Penascosa of The Philippine Star gave RPG Metanoia a positive review, praising the film for its originality, characters and plot, also noting its depiction of Philippine culture and for not relying on star power as seen with mainstream MMFF entries; the film's voice acting however was criticized, likening the actors' performances to a typical Tagalog dub of an anime series.
Philbert Ortiz Dy of ClickTheCity.com declared the film worthy of comparison to animated features released by Pixar, the studio behind animated films such as Toy Story 3, Up, WALL-E, and Cars, stating: "Regular readers are probably aware of how highly I regard Pixar and their work, and so it should taken as high praise when I say that I would proudly hold RPG Metanoia up against even the best of Pixar. The film is simply extraordinary."
Accolades
RPG Metanoia garnered twelve nominations at the 2010 Metro Manila Film Festival including Best Picture (the first animated film to do so), the most of any animated films at the festival, receiving four (including a runner-up): Third Best Picture, Best Sound Engineering, Best Original Theme Song and Most Gender-Sensitive Film; its four awards for an animated film jointly ties with Dayo: Sa Mundo ng Elementalia. It also won Best Sound at the 29th Luna Awards and nominated six categories at the 8th Golden Screen Awards including Best Motion Picture (Drama), winning Best Visual Effects.
Internationally, RPG Metanoia was nominated for Best Animated Film at the 2011 Asia Pacific Screen Awards, the first Philippine animated film to do so.