Marvel Tōkon: Fighting Souls held a beta the past weekend, finally giving PC players a chance to play Sony's superhero tag fighter before launch (and a second opportunity for those on PS5). It was short but sweet, reaching an all-time peak of 33,233 concurrent players on Steam alone—just beating out Street Fighter 6's beta player peak back in 2023.
However, PC players' toughest foe during the beta wasn't skilled players; it was stuttering, low FPS, and a whole host of other issues. Not the best sign given Marvel Tōkon launches next week on Thursday, August 6—that's just eight days, including the weekend. During the beta, developer Arc System Works quickly apologised for these issues and shared some community-tested fixes.
Tōkon Warriors,What a weekend! Thank you to everyone who jumped into the Open Beta and joined the fight. This is exactly why we run these, to get the game in your hands and find what we can make better before launch. To our PC players, message received. The team is already…July 28, 2026
All is not lost though, as Arc System Works has outlined a number of fixes in place for launch day, particularly targeting PC players. "This is exactly why we run these," the post reads, "to get the game in your hands and find what we can make better before launch."
"To our PC players, message received. The team is already hard at work on the performance you deserve, with improvements lined up for day one."
These improvements include reducing the high CPU usage that players quickly picked up on, which should boost overall performance, and fixing the stuttering that always knew to strike at the worst moment.
It's also promised to tackle unnecessary shader compilation, issues related to streaming via OBS and Discord, and various rollback netcode and cross-play issues.
I'd be surprised if the developer wasn't aware of and already working on these performance issues before the beta, which makes me more hopeful that they'll be fixed in time despite the short runway.
However, these issues have come at the worst possible time. Sony's pulled away from PC, which has left a sour taste in the mouths of many. Add to that the fact that, because Marvel Tōkon requires you to sign into PlayStation Network, its PC version is unavailable in over 100 countries—just like the fallout that surrounded Helldivers 2 in 2024. The poor first impression of Sony's Marvel tag fighter on PC is just the latest in a string of unfortunate news.
