Physics or Metaphysics?

Sometimes it seems that almost any subject works in the context of this series on 'The Sociology of Chess'. Take this video, for example.

"Physics and Chess" by Richard Feynman (2:41) • 'Physicist Richard Feynman introduces a strange and exciting analogy between chess and physics.'

For a transcript of the monologue, see Feynman: Using chess to explain science (chessbase.com). It starts,

One way that's kind of a fun analogy to try to get some idea of what we're doing here to try to understand nature is to imagine that the gods are playing some great game like chess. Let's say a chess game. And you don't know the rules of the game, but you're allowed to look at the board from time to time, in a little corner, perhaps. And from these observations, you try to figure out what the rules are of the game, what the rules [are] of the pieces moving.

Is this physics or metaphysics?