The announcement of Marvel Tokon: Fighting Souls in 2025 felt like a much necessary breath of fresh air for Sony’s portfolio of exclusive games. I’ve said time and time again, I’m somewhat getting kind of sick of their excessively expensive AAA outings, as their development costs are so sky-high they need to become a bit too generic in the gameplay department in order to please as many demographics at once. That is not the kind of stuff you expect from an Arc System Works-developed fighting game, so it felt great to see Sony endorsing something more niche and competitive-driven, yet still massively appealing due to its licensed brand recognition.

To my surprise, a handful of Marvel Tokon demo kiosks were available at Gamescom Latam 2026, as part of ArcSys’ small booth alongisde the already-released Damon and Baby, so I jumped into the opportunity. A sizeable demo, containing more than a dozen characters, mind you. And off I went, playing a few rounds, testing all possible characters, and trying to understand how Marvel Tokon: Fighting Souls‘ 4-versus-4 fighting system works. It is a bit more complex than expected, but it’s something you can get used to after a while. Not something you’d master in a demo, of course.

More complex than FighterZ, more accessible than Guilty Gear. Perfectly balanced, as all things should be.

In essence, I could choose between two different gameplay styles. The classic one has you playing as a single character, with your three teammates acting as assists. Call them up with the press of a button, cover unsafe moves, extend combos, and so on. It’s the kind of tag team gameplay you are already familiar with, just with the addition of an extra fighter, unleashing pure chaos. The other system essentially strips the leader of said role, having all four characters jumping in and out of play with a button. Since they all share the same lifebar, you’re not doing this to save health, like in other tag fighting games; you’re doing so to, well, wreak havoc, I suppose.

I found this game to be more complex than, say, Dragon Ball FighterZ, yet less demanding of your attention than your average Guilty Gear. It took a minute to understand how the shared lifebar worked, as well as figuring out each fighter’s special moves, but I feel like I was getting a hold of this madness after a round or two. Then again, by the time Marvel Tokon: Fighting Souls comes out, I can only assume the roster will be much larger than the dozen or so fighters I could choose from.

I still can’t get over how cool Iron Man looks in this game.

From the current roster, Iron Man felt like the obvious rounded-up choice: easy controls, a mixture of ranged and close attacks, projectiles covering like half of the screen, and so on. Oddball choices like Peni Parker felt too big oscreen, too slow, too clunky. Basically, the Potemkin of this game. I did notice some characters being a bit worse to play as than others, but none stood out as too broken, too overpowered. Considering the game is still months away from release, that’s a good sign; Arc System Works is taking care of balancing way before people get their hands on the finished product.

As for the rest, it looks great, runs well enough… the kind of stuff you already expect from an Arc System Works fighting game. There’s no doubt in my mind that Marvel Tokon: Fighting Souls will be a hit. It’s a Marvel fighting game developed by possibly the best fighting game developer in the planet, with the infinite money pool that is having Sony as your publisher and financer. I played it for a while, had a lot of fun with it, but will need some time getting used to its intricacies. I’m also curious about the size of the final roster. Those will be some exciting pre-release months…

Marvel Tokon: Fighting Souls is slated for an August 6th release day on PS5 and PC.