Marvel Tokon: Fighting Souls Raises The Bar For Tag Fighters With Innovative Four-On-Four Combat

For longtime fighting game enthusiasts, it’s virtually impossible to look at Marvel Tokon: Fighting Souls without immediately drawing comparisons to the legendary Marvel Vs. Capcom series. The crossover franchise fundamentally defined the tag-team fighting genre, beginning with X-Men Vs. Street Fighter in 1996 and reaching its apex with Ultimate Marvel Vs. Capcom 3 in 2011. For an entire generation of gamers who didn’t grow up reading comic books, these games served as their primary introduction to iconic Marvel characters like the X-Men, the Avengers, and countless other heroes and villains who battled alongside Capcom’s roster of beloved characters.

With the Marvel Vs. Capcom series lying dormant outside of a recent collection release, Arc System Works has stepped into the arena with Marvel Tokon: Fighting Souls, presenting its own ambitious take on the Marvel tag fighter concept. The result is a wonderfully crafted fighting system paired with a flashy new visual aesthetic that quickly establishes its own unique identity. This is a title worthy of standing alongside the giants of the genre’s past, though PC players should be aware that their version hasn’t launched as smoothly as the heroes depicted in the game would hope.

Revolutionary Four-On-Four Gameplay Changes Everything

Marvel Tokon’s four-on-four gameplay represents the most radical departure from traditional tag fighter formats, though not for the reasons veteran players might initially expect. Previous experience with tag fighters would suggest that each player selects four fighters, each possessing their own individual life bar, with victory going to the first player who eliminates all four opposing team members. However, that’s not how Tokon operates. Instead, all four heroes share a single collective life bar, and matches are determined by a best-of-five rounds format.

This fundamental shift represents an ingenious reimagining of how players interact with their team composition. One player might choose to keep their strongest fighter on point while selecting supporting characters whose assists complement that fighter’s particular style. Alternatively, more ambitious players could decide to master all four characters and incorporate constant tag switches into their strategic approach. This flexibility allows newcomers to ease into the tag format gradually, while experienced players can immediately dive into the more advanced elements of the system. Arc System Works has clearly studied the delicate balance required to cater to both new and veteran players, and they’ve absolutely nailed it with Tokon’s fighting mechanics.

Both approaches are significantly impacted by another fascinating design decision. Although players choose four fighters before each match begins, they only start with two active characters: a point character and one assist character. The remaining two assists must be unlocked during the match itself, either by initiating a wall break that sends opponents crashing through stage boundaries and assembling your team in different parts of the arena, or by losing a round and gaining a hero as compensation when the next round begins. While limiting access to selected fighters might initially sound detrimental to the experience, Tokon once again exceeds expectations by using this limitation as a brilliant balancing mechanism.

Accessible Controls Meet Deep Strategic Depth

Controlling each fighter has been simplified significantly, with special move execution adapting the Super Smash Bros. approach of button presses combined with directional inputs. More advanced inputs exist for dedicated players who wish to learn them, but newcomers can perform unique moves using just two buttons from the moment they pick up a controller. Assists function similarly, with the added option to hold L2 when an assist appears to immediately switch to that character and continue combos seamlessly. The phrase “easy to learn, hard to master” seems to have been the guiding principle throughout Arc System Works’ development process, and this philosophy permeates every aspect of Tokon’s design with tremendous success.

The initial roster features 20 playable characters, which is relatively modest by tag fighter standards when compared to Marvel vs. Capcom 3’s 36 fighters at launch. However, this streamlined roster contributes to the game’s overall balance philosophy. New players face a more manageable pool of character matchups to learn, while veterans can quickly identify their favorites and focus on perfecting their skills. The roster blends expected fan favorites with some intriguing deeper cuts, including Captain America, Iron Man, Hulk, Magneto, and Doctor Doom alongside newcomers to Marvel fighting games like Carnage, Star-Lord, Blade, and Loki. The most obscure selection is arguably Danger, the sentient X-Men training facility, demonstrating that Marvel fighting games continue their tradition of introducing players to lesser-known characters.

Deadpool deserves special recognition for his implementation. While his inclusion isn’t surprising given his massive popularity, the way Arc System Works has incorporated his fourth-wall-breaking nature is nothing short of masterful. The character serves as a loving tribute to fighting game history, with references ranging from obvious nods like Scorpion’s spear from Mortal Kombat to deep cuts that will have hardcore fighting game historians grinning with recognition. Personal standout characters include Peni Parker with her arena-controlling drones, Ms. Marvel with her Dhalsim-like stretchy appendages that threaten opponents anywhere on screen, and Shuri’s Black Panther with her satisfying aggressive playstyle.

Comprehensive Modes And Online Features

Tokon offers extensive options for both single-player and online multiplayer experiences. Episodes mode tells five different stories, one for each of the four teams featured in promotional materials, each animated by a different artist. These stories can be completed in roughly an hour each and tell the overarching narrative in engaging ways. All-Star Arena provides traditional arcade-style experiences through its Arena and Survival modes, with the latter offering gauntlets of up to 100 battles featuring health regeneration and superpowered boss encounters at milestones. Arcadia Rumble takes a different approach by mixing standard matches with arena-style challenges where players roam around collecting items for points, creating an enjoyable party-style experience.

The online experience covers all expected bases with ranked matches, casual matches, and custom private lobbies. The Open Lobby feature allows players to explore a chibi-style version of Tokon’s world with customizable avatars, challenging other players at arcade machines scattered throughout the environment. Online connections performed excellently on PlayStation 5 thanks to robust rollback netcode implementation. However, the PC version’s launch has been problematic, with connection issues, choppy performance both online and offline, and various technical problems plaguing players since release. While patches are beginning to address these concerns, PC players have experienced a significantly different launch than console players. Once these issues are fully resolved, PC players will finally experience the game Arc System Works intended to deliver.