In an already stacked year for fighting games that included the likes of 2XKO, Invincible VS, and Avatar Legends: The Fighting Game, there was no denying the most anticipated of the bunch was Marvel Tokon: Fighting Souls. The IP alone carries decades of prestige in the fighting game scene, albeit under a different developer.
Still, a Marvel tag fighter in 2026? Fans were excited.
Before continuing, I owe readers an important disclosure: this review is based almost entirely on the PlayStation 5 version. That said, poor PC optimization has affected console players too, as crossplay matchmaking is virtually unplayable.
Even after a recent patch aimed at fixing core issues, ranked play with crossplay enabled remains a frustrating mess. While Arc System Works will likely iron out these issues, I can only review the game in front of me today, and this technical friction inevitably affects the final score.
Now, onto the game itself.
Marvel Tokon is a clever subversion of the tag-fighter subgenre. On the surface, it looks like a chaotic 4v4 extravaganza. In practice, it plays like a traditional 1v1 fighter, with three assist characters. It is explicitly tailored to accommodate newcomers who feel intimidated by having to master multiple characters just to keep up.
While high-level play ultimately demands full utilization of your entire team, Tokon remains remarkably accessible: you can pick your favorite Marvel hero from the 21-character roster, mash autocombo, and have a blast with friends.
Mechanically, Tokon’s biggest innovation is this 1v1 framing. Unlike virtually every other tag fighter, there is only a single health bar, allowing you to focus completely on keeping your point character alive. It lets you grow at your own pace without forcing constant tags just to survive. 2XKO attempted something similar with its Fuse system, but in Riot’s fighter, playing a single character often felt like a self-imposed handicap.
In Tokon, you never feel inherently disadvantaged while learning.
While it might sound monotonous to commit to a singular character, each one of them (or, for the most part) has the sauce. Universal mechanics aside, which are a bit undercooked, Tokon’s roster is definitely small for a 4v4 fighting game, but almost every character I’ve tried has a lot of depth to it. It helps that Tokon’s tutorials are very well made.
I’ve been spoiled by Street Fighter 6’s more in-depth character guides or even Avatar’s combo breakdown system that lets you slowly piece together sequences at your own pace, a feature I wish Tokon and every other fighting game had from here on out, but Tokon’s onboarding process is pretty welcoming to new players. The Startup Battle mode will teach you the absolute basics of fighting games, and there’s even an entire in-game glossary breaking down dozens upon dozens of universal and Tokon-specific concepts. Pick one, and you can seamlessly go to a practice setup to give it a spin. Then, when you get the grasp of things, you can hop on Character Lessons to dive deep into a specific character you’re looking to try out.
By far my favorite implementation available in the training hub is the level-up missions. It feels like putting everything you've learned to the test in a much freer, more flowing way. You see, you start off getting familiarized with each character’s buttons and special moves, then you do an assortment of combo trials to get the juices flowing, and then you hop on special missions with more unique requirements. These don’t give you a step-by-step on what to do; rather, they’re much more open-ended. Some want you to hit a damage threshold; others want you to use certain special moves in a single combo, or hit X amount of damage by using a specific move as the combo starter.
It lets you be free of the often robotic sensation of going through the motions of learning a new character and really makes you think about all the possibilities and tools at your disposal right from the start, which I find incredibly refreshing.
Characters are just overall too fun to mess around with, even if you don’t intend to main them, as they all have very cool character-specific tools. The game has your standard Light, Medium, and Heavy attack buttons, plus a Unique button that, well, is self-explanatory. But to get some examples on the table: Magik can use portals that interact with her toolkit in various cool ways, opening up possibilities for you to mix up opponents or tack on a bunch of damage; Magneto can fill the stage with debris which he can then utilize to trap opponents, making it harder for them to find an opening; Deadpool gets access to an entirely different moveset that is filled with references to other fighting games if he has even a smidge of recoverable health. And that’s just scratching the surface.
Universal mechanics are straightforward. Matches start with your point character, one assist, and a single bar of Assemble Gauge (the green bar beneath your health bar). This gauge powers assist calls during combos or pressure blockstrings. Roster placement matters, as each slot unlocks a different assist option per character, totaling three variations per hero.
The general match flow revolves around unlocking your extra assists early by triggering wall breaks or wall splats. Doing so levels up your assist gauge, builds skill meter for EX moves and Supers, and even extends your total health bar.
However, the wall-break mechanic can be frustrating. Combos sometimes unintentionally trigger transitions when you would much rather maintain corner pressure. This is particularly egregious because many characters lose all setup advantage after a transition, offering zero opportunity for wake-up pressure (okizeme).
Defensively, Tokon stumbles. Crossover, the game’s primary get-off-me defensive option, costs one bar of assist gauge to escape blockstun, but it feels underbaked and unintuitive. In practice, it is far too risky: opponents can easily react with a Perfect Reflect, placing you in a Disassembled state that locks out your assists for several seconds. For a fundamental pushblock mechanic, it leaves much to be desired.
A few other pet peeves would include not being able to link more than four normal moves in a single combo. It makes the fluidity of combos more in common with Guilty Gear Strive than Dragon Ball FighterZ, which is not something you’d think. It’s not a huge issue now that I’ve put over 50 hours into the game, but early on it was frustrating to deal with. If you’re new to the genre, you won’t even notice what I’m talking about, but I just wanted to get that out there.
The biggest draw is Episodes Mode, a set of stories that follow each of the teams available in Tokon. These stories are penned by veteran writer Kieron Gillen, who wrote one of my favorite bits of Spider-Man in comic book history, in which he manages to defeat Phoenix Force-empowered sibling duo Magik and Colossus during the events of Avengers vs. X-Men.
Episodes mix beautifully rendered cutscenes (which sadly are all the same for every single one, so once you’ve done an Episode, you’ve seen them all) and comic book panels drawn by different artists, giving each story its own flavor. If you love Marvel, you’ll absolutely have a blast playing through these, as Gillen captures each character’s personality wonderfully, with particular praise going to the Samurai Outriders and Amazing Guardians as my two personal favorites.
What I found cool is how seamlessly they play off of each other. I don’t want to spoil the major story beats, but there’s a recurring bit with heroes being disappointed with Magneto for opting to join the Knights of Doom that I absolutely adored. Why did he do it? Well, you’ll have to play the X-Men Episode to find out.
They also provide context for why certain heroes made the roster and why others are conspicuously absent, and, dare I say, potential clues as to who could be joining the roster next.
Battles are sprinkled throughout each 45-to-60-minute arc. Replaying episodes on upper difficulties unlocks exclusive character colors and access to the final Champion boss, giving solo players clear incentives to clear the roster.
Outside of story content, All-Star Arena replaces traditional arcade offerings. Its standout mode is Survival, which integrates roguelite power-up modifiers that enable absurd, custom combo possibilities. Clearing Survival rewards you with the best colors in the game, like Deadpool's Gwenpool palette, serving dedicated players rather than pushing microtransactions.
A secondary mode, Arcadia Rumble, blends lobby avatar mini-games with CPU or online battles. Earning buffs as a chibi avatar before fighting feels like a cute novelty, but it lacks lasting appeal.
Still, Tokon's single-player suite consistently rewards engagement. Arc System Works deserves immense praise for tying high-tier cosmetics directly to gameplay achievements; even completing standard combo trials awards unique palettes.
Now, it’s time to talk about online play. It’s not good.
While Tokon features rollback netcode, its implementation is fundamentally flawed at launch. Playing against PC users is miserable; severe optimization issues mean that many PC setups struggle to maintain a stable 60 FPS. As a result, rollback frames regularly spike into unplayable territory (8 to 9 frames), causing severe stutter and input lag.
Disabling crossplay solves the performance stutter, but queue times skyrocket, even at mid-to-high ranks on a brand-new title. When the netcode works under ideal conditions, it feels crisp, but those instances are far too rare right now.
Minor bugs further sour the online suite. Saved team presets occasionally wipe themselves, forcing manual re-selection before jumping into matches. Replays frequently desync, causing characters to stand still or perform nonsensical inputs during playback. These are minor flaws in isolation, but together they drag down the overall package.
One final shoutout I want to give the game is the overall presentation. Not just how it looks while playing, but also the UI. The fact that you can customize aspects of your team to make it your own, such as the displayed name and character portraits, is such a neat touch. The Gallery section oozes love for Marvel, with a whole archive of hundreds of entries, artwork of all characters, a handy relationship timeline, and a music section that has a cute little Baby Groot rocking out to the tunes you play.
Arc System Works has delivered an absolutely great package, with amazing single-player content, really good onboarding tools, and a graphical refinement only the Japanese studio can deliver. The gameplay is almost a one-size-fits-all take on the tag-fighter genre, making this an easy recommendation for newcomers. It’s sadly far from perfect at the time of writing, with terrible optimization issues and iffy matchmaking bogging the game down significantly.
And that’s it. Stick with us at Gfinityesports.com: your go-to source for all things Marvel Tokon.
A code was provided by the publisher for the purpose of this review.