Marvel Tōkon heroes — Spider-Man, Storm, Ghost Rider, and Iron Man / Picture Credit score: Arc System
In case you thought the combating recreation neighborhood was going to have a quiet, peaceable weekend through the Marvel Tōkon: Combating Souls open beta, you clearly have no idea the FGC. Between large regional controversies earlier than the servers even opened, unprecedented participant numbers, stuttering PC efficiency, and professionals screaming at one another on social media over whether or not the sport is a masterpiece or sluggish trash, the beta was absolute pure chaos.
And I used to be personally residing for it. However me.
Even earlier than anybody landed a single jab, Sony managed to ignite a minor firestorm by region-locking the sport on Steam throughout over 100 international locations as a consequence of obligatory PlayStation Community account necessities. However regardless of the geographical lockouts and web outrage, gamers flooded the servers the second they went stay.
The FGC in its fingers
In relation to sheer curiosity, Marvel Tōkon proved that superhero tag-team fighters nonetheless reign supreme. The open beta rocketed to a peak concurrent participant depend of over 33,000 on Steam alone.
To place that into perspective, Road Fighter 6 peaked at round 32,000 throughout its open beta, and Tekken 8 clocked in at roughly 15,000. Garnering extra concurrent beta testers on PC than two of the largest titan franchises in combating recreation historical past is a large assertion.
Arc System Works and Marvel clearly have a monster on their fingers in terms of uncooked hype. However that’s sadly not the complete story.
PC efficiency destroyed the beta
There may be actually no level in having tens of hundreds of individuals in your beta if it doesn’t work. In actual fact, it solely spreads the hate to much more corners of the FGC. That is an unforgiving group that not often lets up as soon as one thing rubs them the incorrect method.
Optimization points hit gamers like a rogue Hulk smash, leaving hundreds of players coping with stuttering body charges, weird shader compilation delays at startup, and lag spikes throughout cross-play matches.
The backlash on social media was loud sufficient that Arc System Works needed to leap on X to launch an official assertion acknowledging the mess. The devs promised day-one fixes for launch on August 6, together with:
Decreasing general CPU pressure to repair body charge drops and mid-match stutter
Fixing startup shader compilation so gamers don’t freeze on the title display
Bettering streaming stability for anybody broadcasting by way of OBS or Discord.
Sprucing up rollback netcode and cross-play connection stability
Tōkon Warriors,What a weekend! Thanks to everybody who jumped into the Open Beta and joined the combat. That is precisely why we run these, to get the sport in your fingers and discover what we will make higher earlier than launch.To our PC gamers, message obtained. The staff is already…— MARVEL Tōkon: Combating Souls (@MARVELTokon) July 28, 2026
Regardless of the in depth apology, the FGC remained skeptical. One reply prompt that the builders run a second beta simply to point out PC gamers that it really works. It’s not a nasty thought, for the reason that FGC is sort of unforgiving.
Combating recreation legend Christopher “NYChrisG” Gonzalez made this fairly clear: STOP USING THE ‘IT’S JUST A BETA’ EXCUSE WHEN IT COMES TO PEOPLE’S GRIPES AND CONCERNS PLEASE!” He wasn’t about to forgive the sport simply because it’s a beta, which could be very probably the mindset of different aggressive combating recreation gamers.
This was the primary impression. And it was not a superb one.
On the actual.CAN WE STOP USING THE “ITS JUST A BETA” EXCUSE WHEN IT COMES TO PEOPLES GRIPES AND CONCERNS PLEASE!!!!!! EVERY SINGLE TIME!?!?!? YALL SOUND DUMB AF— Chris G (@NYChrisG) July 27, 2026
The professionals are already bashing the sport
Technical glitches apart, the precise gameplay design divided high-level gamers into fierce opposing camps. As quickly because the beta concluded, the FGC commentary machine exploded.
FGC veteran and commentator James Chen urged followers to cease making an attempt to pressure Tōkon to be Marvel vs. Capcom 2. He argued that whereas motion and combo buffers at present really feel a bit sluggish and want tuning, gamers ought to admire Arc System Works’ distinctive imaginative and prescient as a substitute of continually begging for a carbon copy of older tag fighters.
His optimistic overview said: “I feel we’ve got a really sturdy recreation at hand for now. I feel there’s a LOT for us to find out about Marvel Tokon, and the sport has the potential to get degenerate fairly closely as soon as we’ve got precise time with it.”
I’ve stated it earlier than, however — notably the western FGC — we spend an excessive amount of time making an attempt to bend video games to our will. We would like Combating Video games to fulfill our expectations of how they need to play versus making an attempt to understand the video games given to us.Marvel Tokon just isn’t Marvel Vs.…— James “jchensor” Chen (@jchensor) July 27, 2026
This was not the final consensus, nevertheless. Most gamers, each professionals and casuals, didn’t prefer it. When one participant stood up through the recreation to level out that it’s a beta, it was not met with a lot settlement.
Tokon just isn’t for me. PC unoptimized. Performs so gradual. There’s no combine. Avatar is so arduous. No ranked boohoo …is what I might say if I used to be slightly bitch.IT’S THE FKN FIRST WEEK AND A BETA. HOLY SHIT YAL SO FAST TO WANT TO GO BACK TO DRIVE RUSH THROW LOOPS. STOP IT.— MARN (@MarnORZ) July 26, 2026
NYChrisG famous that switching between different fast-paced fighters and Tōkon at a neighborhood event felt like enjoying underwater. A handful of combating recreation gamers agreed that the sport simply didn’t really feel proper. Numerous combating video games are getting too gradual, and it appears Marvel Tōkon is one among them.
I performed each Avatar and Tokon on the native. Discuss night time and day distinction. One match I am urgent buttons on the pace of sunshine, the subsequent match im underwater. It was fairly arduous to modify between the 2. Unwell get used to it, however rattling the distinction is insane— Chris G (@NYChrisG) July 26, 2026
Smash and 2XKO professional William “Leffen” Hjelte weighed in with an in depth breakdown of the mechanics, arguing that whereas the motion system feels sluggish, the sport itself is definitely absurdly highly effective and snowbally. He identified that assists and energetic tagging carry method too little threat, utterly debunking the early web fable that Tōkon is a gradual, conventional, ground-based fighter.
In keeping with Leffen, the impartial skips and mixup energy ranges on this recreation are completely degenerate in the most effective and worst methods potential. He did add, nevertheless: “Regardless of all these massive gameplay points and much more much less necessary stuff, I imagine that the sport has a number of cool issues in it and I’ll positively be competing in it!”
IMO the largest situation for tokon is:1. Sport feels actually sluggish to maneuver and do issues in, name help + floor motion esp – is unnecessary as a result of the motion is tremendous sturdy however extraordinarily unhealthy feeling.2. Assists + Energetic tag are WAY too sturdy and do not carry sufficient threat.— TSM Leffen (@TSM_Leffen) July 26, 2026
I actually don’t assume Marvel Tōkon is horrible. That’s not likely the purpose. After I performed the demo at Evo, I cherished it. From the gameplay to the design, I simply felt it was very cohesive, polished, and thrilling. I can’t wait to play it as soon as I get a brand new combating stick.
The precise level is that it made a horrible first impression on a neighborhood that’s very fast to hate. A neighborhood that already has loads of different choices. And this will give it a really gradual begin. This lack of momentum could kill the hype earlier than it could actually attain its full potential. It’s going to be arduous to realize the eye of the already small and spread-thin neighborhood, who’re already invested in 2XKO, Avatar, and Road Fighter.
With August 6 proper across the nook, Arc System Works has a really quick window to repair the PC optimization and tweak the combo really feel earlier than the complete recreation formally drops. However it could be too late.
