Marvel Tokon: Fighting Souls, a Marvel fighting game being primarily developed by Arc System Works, was announced during the recent State of Play presentation. The characters known thus far are Captain America, Iron Man, Ms. Marvel, Spider-Man, Star-Lord, Ghost Rider, Doctor Doom, and Storm, with more likely to be revealed later.
Unlike anything produced by Capcom’s Marvel vs. Capcom series, Marvel Tokon: Fighting Souls is apparently a 4v4 team fighting game. The Marvel vs. Capcom series is known to feature 2v2 and 3v3 gameplay, but we’ve never seen 4v4 before.
Of course, there are many players out there that tried to get into games like Ultimate Marvel vs. Capcom 3 and Dragon Ball FighterZ (another 3v3 fighter), but were overwhelmed with having to learn multiple characters just to play at a basic level.
“There are a lot of things that make this title special, but what deserves to be highlighted is probably the 4-on-4 team battle format, which is the most ambitious and innovative feature.” — Takeshi Yamanaka
Needless to say, the 4v4 formula that Marvel Tokon: Fighting Souls is apparently attempting to take on will probably feel even more intense on these sort of players. During the reveal trailer, Arc System Works addressed this concern.
“There are a lot of things that make this title special, but what deserves to be highlighted is probably the 4-on-4 team battle format, which is the most ambitious and innovative feature,” said Takeshi Yamanaka, producer at Arc System Works.
Indeed, the 4v4 formula already has an interesting way of making Marvel Tokon: Fighting Souls stand out from other fighting games.
“When Arc looks at these Marvel characters, it’s not simply just the visuals. It’s also the gameplay mechanics and adding in that ‘What is that pop?’ What is going to be something that’s different? Up until now, you’ve seen tag fighters that have 2v2, 3v3,” continued Reid Brad, senior producer at PlayStation Studios.
“So you can duke it out as just the leader and three assists, or you can tag in your assist to swap your leader and change the match up on the fly.” — Reid Brad
“We felt like we just had to go 4v4. And in doing so, we found a lot of unique and fun ways to change up the gameplay that I think players are going to be very excited to see.”
Following up from this, the two would eventually address the elephant in the room about this gameplay style. It turns out that the developers have a plan in place to enable multiple playstyles within Marvel Tokon: Fighting Souls.
“You might be thinking, ‘Wait, do I have to practice four characters just to win?’ said Yamanaka. “Don’t worry.”
“Learning four characters is extremely daunting, but the team at Arc System Works has found a way to design a system that adapts to your playstyle,” continued Brad.
“Learning four characters is extremely daunting, but the team at Arc System Works has found a way to design a system that adapts to your playstyle.” — Reid Brad
“So you can duke it out as just the leader and three assists, or you can tag in your assist to swap your leader and change the match up on the fly.”
Based on this description, it almost sounds like a player’s entire team will share a singular health bar. It’s not confirmed just yet, but this system would easily allow a player to choose between swapping back and forth between their characters, or just sticking with one combatant for the entire match (while using the other three for assists).
If this is the system that Arc System Works and PlayStation are alluding to, then its a system that would work very similarly to Tekken Tag Tournament or Street Fighter X Tekken. It’s theoretically possible to lose a match without every switching between the other fighters in those games.
Ultimately, we’ll have to wait for more details regarding Marvel Tokon: Fighting Souls’ gameplay to find out what’s going on here.