Pragmata Hands-On Preview – Fly Me to the Moon & Let Me Slay Among the Stars
If you’d told me I’d be controlling two characters at the same time in a third-person shooting action game, I’d have said, “Yeah, right, what is it? Like there’s a space marine shooting stuff and some little girl riding his back that operates a separate minigame-like enemy hacking system to lower enemy defense? Hahaha!” But then Capcom would’ve been like, “Actually, yes.” Pragmata does exactly that, and the results are spectacular. I played a brand-new demo build at the 2025 Tokyo Game Show and was blown away.
Within minutes, everything fell into place. You’ll do your classic shooting, jumping, and dodging with your space marine while also doing some quick-thinking, very light puzzle solving side stuff with the girl riding his back. I should probably introduce them so that I don’t have to refer to them as “space marine” and “little girl” for five more paragraphs. Space Marine is a burly “everyman” guy from Earth. Heck, his name is even “Hugh,” and yeah, we see what you did there. The little girl’s exact origin wasn’t made clear, apart from her being an android. Being from the moon, she doesn’t understand a lot of our global cultural norms and has an exotic space name: Diana.
If you’ve been following this game for a while, you may have seen previous demos in which Hugh and Diana meet for the first time. Hugh realizes Diana’s intelligence when he crash-lands and she does The Right Thing(tm) and repairs his suit, which in turn regenerates the cells in his body and heals his wounds. Her more impressive powers are made obvious when Hugh does The Right Thing(tm) and tries to protect her from a space soldier trying to “remove” (computer system’s words) them from the area where Hugh has apparently crash landed. While Hugh is blasting away with his gun and doing only so-so damage, Diana hops on his back, gets a clear shot, and hacks the enemy, allowing Hugh to utterly decimate it.
The Dynamic Duo
Making its debut in this area was the upgrade system. Littered around the moon, because the moon is a filthy place and you should never go there, there are orange cubes that allow Hugh and Diana to power up their abilities. I had the choice of improving the HP in Hugh’s suit, weapon damage, Diana’s hack power, and probably something else I’m forgetting.
Evasive actions and hovering drain a movement gauge, so spamming the dodge during a boss fight isn’t an option. There are also occasional areas only reachable by Hugh leaping from a high place, then doing a Princess Peach and timing the hover well enough to push himself onto a ledge.
Controlling the two characters was much more intuitive that it initially sounded. Diana’s job in battle was to navigate a light around a 2D maze, one block at a time, using the face buttons as if they were D-pad buttons to move (for example, on a PS5 controller, the triangle button would move up, the square button would move left, and so on). After picking up blue icons, avoiding red ones, and then reaching an endpoint, the “hack” would be complete, and the Space Marines’ damage would reap the benefits. Picking up all blue icons on the grid wasn’t necessary, but the more you get, the more powerful a shot she can deliver.
This new demo took place in a travel hub on the moon, where Hugh was tasked with restoring power at the solar plant. It’s still very early the game, but after the pair has already met. The duo wanders the plant, jumping over obstacles or unlocking doors as needed, fighting enemies all the while. In combat, Hugh can only do mediocre damage without Diana’s hacks. It’s not totally insignificant, but each shot is usually doing a mere fraction of its potential before Diana hacks a given enemy. While Hugh is paying for his steak dinner with coins, Diana is pulling out the paper cash. There are no credit cards in space.
What Happens When You Die in Pragmata?
After I got a little overconfident and got myself smashed by some sort of midboss, Hugh was sent back to the lunar base, fully regenerated. He could make upgrades, talk to Diana, and get back out there. The fast travel menu still included other places, so it’s possible that backtracking for upgrade cubes and items might also be a thing (the latter was not confirmed by Capcom, though).
Hugh has a basic weapon with infinite ammo, which regenerates over time, so he’ll never be completely unarmed. Other weapons are scattered about, which, however, have ammo limits that can be replenished with enemy drops. Running out of ammo means the gun is lost, and you’ll have to pick up another somewhere or find a different weapon. Featured in this solar power plant area was a “shockwave” gun that does heavy damage up close and whose shots spread out a bit (so basically a shotgun). In videos, we’ve also seen a stasis gun that would do very light damage while halting enemy movement and leaving them vulnerable for a few critical extra seconds.
The two protagonists tag-teamed their way through hostile territory, trying to restore power. At one point, I was fighting a big robot that somehow reminded me of either a very small Metal Gear or D.Va from Overwatch. Enemies like those were really putting the fun combat on full display. The flow of chipping away with small shots while dodging, then seeing the opening for a hack and unleashing critical damage, felt like second nature after even just a few minutes. Trying to remember to do all of that and switching to the shockwave gun for more damage sounds daunting, but that’s part of the fun.
In fact, its gameplay feels so surprisingly fresh that I’d predict it’s only a matter of time before this formula catches on. Years from now, we might look back at Pragmata as a gaming milestone, labeling other games as “Kind of like Pragmata.”
Pragmata is set for a 2026 release on PC, PS5, and Xbox Series X|S. When Capcom announces a specific release date, MP1st will let you know.
For more hands-on previews of upcoming Capcom games, we also got our hands early on Resident Evil Requiem, and it might be the scariest entry yet.
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