Marvel Tokon: Fighting Souls Review

Marvel Tokon: Fighting Souls is a 4v4 tag fighter where players mix-and-match teams of famous Marvel superheroes and villains. Marvel Tokon‘s base roster is solid, with heavy-hitters like Wolverine, Spider-Man, Hulk, Doctor Doom, Magneto, and more accounted for. There are some puzzling exclusions, like not including The Fantastic Four in a 4v4 game, but what’s here is good enough that there shouldn’t be too many complaints.

The classic Marvel characters are given new life with Marvel Tokon‘s stunning anime-inspired art style, boosted by its top-of-the-line animations. Marvel Tokon fights are fast-paced blurs of combos and special attacks that look nothing short of incredible. The game takes full advantage of its stylized art to deliver a take on its characters that is both familiar and totally fresh at the same time.

Marvel Tokon is Easy to Play, But Tough to Master

Once players have assembled their ideal Marvel Tokon team, they are free to jump into the various game modes and put their skills to the test. I highly recommend new players spend some time with Marvel Tokon‘s combo challenges and character lessons before going online, though, as the game is one of the more difficult fighting games to master. On a scale from someone that mindlessly button mashes to a pro player, my own skill level in fighting games lands somewhere in the middle. I’ve played countless hours of Mortal Kombat, Street Fighter, Tekken, and Injustice, yet I still find Marvel Tokon to be overwhelming at times. But if you put in the work to learn the combos and how to best utilize the full team of characters at your disposal, it can be an incredibly rewarding experience.

The skill spectrum in Marvel Tokon: Fighting Souls online matches is one of the widest I’ve ever experienced. One match I will decimate my opponent with ease, the next I will be humbled by someone that can pull out seemingly never-ending combos that hardly give me a chance to think much less react. There’s a lot to learn, but those that dedicate themselves to the game will be rewarded with some of the most fun multiplayer fighting game action there is.

Most Marvel Tokon players will spend the bulk of their time in online fights, whether through the matchmaking system or lobbies. Unfortunately, Marvel Tokon has some connectivity issues that are still being ironed out. There have been times when it’s taken forever for me to find a match, and other times when the connection between myself and my opponent has been abysmal, causing severe chugging and ruining the fight. Steps have already been taken to improve the online experience and the vast majority of my matches run without any issue, but it still happens enough to be notable.

Whether it’s Casual or Ranked, the straightforward online fights in Marvel Tokon are the main attraction and they deliver. Marvel Tokon supports local multiplayer as well, which is always appreciated, and it’s a blast, too. Marvel Tokon‘s core fighting gameplay is phenomenal and strong enough to make it an easy recommendation to genre fans by itself. Unfortunately, some of the other game modes are lackluster and keep the game from reaching its full potential.

Marvel Tokon’s Other Modes Are a Mixed-Bag

Arcadia Rumble is one of the most head-scratching modes in Marvel Tokon: Fighting Souls. In it, players run around as their customizable chibi avatars and ram into people to get points. Every once in a while, this “action” is broken up by proper 1v1 Marvel Tokon fights where the goal is to win as many times as possible to get even more points. The problem is that these 1v1 fights are entirely inconsequential. I was able to get first place in Arcadia Rumble despite getting absolutely pummeled in the 1v1s by simply standing near points of interest in the chibi portion and smashing into people. That being said, it is nice that Arcadia Rumble has an offline variant so it will remain playable when the one playerbase has abandoned it, which I don’t think will take too long.

And then there’s the All-Star Arena, which comes in a couple of different flavors. There’s the standard, shorter mode where players move along a grid, fighting opponents and choosing between branching paths, and then the Survival mode, which injects roguelike elements into the mix. There’s a great deal of replay value with All-Star Arena, and it offers a genuinely compelling solo experience that’s a little more than the typical ladders in other fighting games. It’s a good thing that All-Star Arena is as solid as it is because the rest of the game’s solo content isn’t particularly compelling.

Marvel Tokon: Fighting Souls‘ single-player story mode is the weakest part of the game and a big disappointment overall. In it, various Marvel characters form teams of four to battle the cosmic threat known as The Champion and his quirky assistant, The Promoter. Each team gets its own version of the story, split into Episodes, told through anime cutscenes and motion comics. The anime cutscenes look fantastic but repeat from one episode to the next, and while the stories told in the motion comics are solid and the art is great, the presentation is bland.

The first episode is boring because it’s so pathetically easy, though the subsequent episodes get tougher and more fun as a result. While they feature different characters and stories, each Marvel Tokon: Fighting Souls Episode follows the same basic structure: the team is formed, the team fights the other teams, the team eventually fights The Promoter and The Champion. This makes the whole thing super repetitive, and it can be a serious slog.

While there’s fun to be had in All-Star Arena, solo players likely won’t get much out of Marvel Tokon: Fighting Souls. It’s the multiplayer where the game shines, with the focus entirely on the exciting, action-packed 4v4 tag battles, gorgeous art and animation, and stellar roster of fighters. Over time, as some of the technical issues are ironed out and new characters are added as DLC, Marvel Tokon: Fighting Souls will become an even easier recommendation for fighting game fans.

Systems

Released

August 6, 2026

ESRB

Teen / Blood, Language, Mild Suggestive Themes, Violence, In-Game Purchases, Users Interact

Publisher(s)

Sony Interactive Entertainment, PlayStation Publishing

Pros & Cons

• Exciting 4v4 tag battles that are brilliantly animated
• Stacked roster of iconic Marvel characters
• Endlessly entertaining multiplayer fights

• Some connectivity issues
• Lackluster story mode

Marvel Tokon: Fighting Souls is available now for PC and PS5. Game Rant was provided with a PS5 code for this review.