During our recent visit to Capcom to try out their TGS 2025 lineup, they had yet another demo of Pragmata to play, and this build brought us closer to figuring out what this game might actually end up being.
This is my third time demoing the Pragmata, and it’s become of my most anticipated games of 2026. That said, I was well-oriented with how the action works, but let me explain it another time if you haven’t ready any of our previous previews.
Pragmata is a third-person shooter that requires you to hack an enemy before you can inflict any damage on it. For example, if you have an enemy robot trying to kill you, simply shooting at it won’t do anything. As soon as you aim your weapon at the robot, a grid-like prompt appears with a minigame in which you have to navigate the cursor to hack icon. To move the cursor, you have to use the face buttons. We were playing on a PS5, so in this case, triangle goes up, circle goes right, X goes down, and square goes left. Once you do that, you’ll be able to shoot an enemy down.
That being said, when you have your weapon aimed, you don’t have much mobility, so if you have to put your weapon away to dodge or avoid damage, you have to solve the hacking puzzle all over again.
We’re getting good at this hacking thing.
The build at TGS featured another stage and boss fight, each with tuned up difficulty. In this demo, we first had to return power to a lunar base. The hallways were all pretty dark, but thanks to a new scan ability we didn’t have before (activated with the square button), we were able to quickly find the breaker and restore the power in the floor were on. Shortly after that, we had to deal with an enemy robot before doing some light platforming. There were security lasers in the area that we had to jump over and effectively use the boost to hover over, and I was just bad at it. I lost more than three quarters of my health trying to traverse in this way.
So when I found myself in a bad predicament against two enemies at the same time, it marked the first time I did in any of may Pragmata demo runs.
Luckily, that’s where the nifty base came in. One of the main features we were shown was this “mission control” type area that acted as a hub world. Here you can talk to Diana (which leads to a bunch of heartfelt conversations very similar to those sleep talks with Pauline in Donkey Kong Bananza), as well as upgrade your suit and weapons with the currency you collect throughout the game.
As I continued to play and took damage, I also took it upon myself at going back to the hub to heal. When I died the first time, I knew about the hub, but I didn’t know if the game was a roguelite that would remove my progress if I went back. At least from what I played, that assumption couldn’t be further from the truth as they ended up really being checkpoints, and you actually should go back once in a while not only to heal and improve your loadout, but to have those conversations with Diana too.
Exits to your base seemed to appear at the right time at every level. I think we found the gameplay loop!
Considering these entrances back to the base kept showing up at the right places, I don’t think we’d be far off in assuming that Pragmata is a level-based game very similar to that of a dungeon crawler to finish. Maybe I’m wrong, but this is the closest we’ve come to understanding what kind of an action game Pragmata is, and I think these bases more than represent a clue, especially with all the wholesome things that can happen in there as far as the plot goes.
Speaking of conversations with Diana her advice comes well when you’re in the middle of fights too. Sometimes, she’ll tell Hugh to jump, and when you do, you usually avoid a deadly oncoming shockwave. That impressed me.
The level we played was a lot like the first demo where we had to unlock a door by scanning screens throughout the map, taking out rogue monsters along the way. Before long, we found an elevator that took us up to an area where we were able to find a globe to gift Diana before another boss fight. If you read our last preview, this boss was pretty much the same.
I’ve been absolutely loving each demo of Pragmata I play, and I really hope the game can continue this momentum leading up to its release in 2026. Even if I don’t touch it again until then, I’ll be ready for when it comes out on the PlayStation 5, Xbox Series X/S, and the PC next year.
During our recent visit to Capcom to try out their TGS 2025 lineup, they had yet another demo of Pragmata to play, and this build brought us closer to figuring out what this game might actually end up being. This…
During our recent visit to Capcom to try out their TGS 2025 lineup, they had yet another demo of Pragmata to play, and this build brought us closer to figuring out what this game might actually end up being.
This is my third time demoing the Pragmata, and it’s become of my most anticipated games of 2026. That said, I was well-oriented with how the action works, but let me explain it another time if you haven’t ready any of our previous previews.
Pragmata is a third-person shooter that requires you to hack an enemy before you can inflict any damage on it. For example, if you have an enemy robot trying to kill you, simply shooting at it won’t do anything. As soon as you aim your weapon at the robot, a grid-like prompt appears with a minigame in which you have to navigate the cursor to hack icon. To move the cursor, you have to use the face buttons. We were playing on a PS5, so in this case, triangle goes up, circle goes right, X goes down, and square goes left. Once you do that, you’ll be able to shoot an enemy down.
That being said, when you have your weapon aimed, you don’t have much mobility, so if you have to put your weapon away to dodge or avoid damage, you have to solve the hacking puzzle all over again.
We’re getting good at this hacking thing.
The build at TGS featured another stage and boss fight, each with tuned up difficulty. In this demo, we first had to return power to a lunar base. The hallways were all pretty dark, but thanks to a new scan ability we didn’t have before (activated with the square button), we were able to quickly find the breaker and restore the power in the floor were on. Shortly after that, we had to deal with an enemy robot before doing some light platforming. There were security lasers in the area that we had to jump over and effectively use the boost to hover over, and I was just bad at it. I lost more than three quarters of my health trying to traverse in this way.
So when I found myself in a bad predicament against two enemies at the same time, it marked the first time I did in any of may Pragmata demo runs.
Luckily, that’s where the nifty base came in. One of the main features we were shown was this “mission control” type area that acted as a hub world. Here you can talk to Diana (which leads to a bunch of heartfelt conversations very similar to those sleep talks with Pauline in Donkey Kong Bananza), as well as upgrade your suit and weapons with the currency you collect throughout the game.
As I continued to play and took damage, I also took it upon myself at going back to the hub to heal. When I died the first time, I knew about the hub, but I didn’t know if the game was a roguelite that would remove my progress if I went back. At least from what I played, that assumption couldn’t be further from the truth as they ended up really being checkpoints, and you actually should go back once in a while not only to heal and improve your loadout, but to have those conversations with Diana too.
Exits to your base seemed to appear at the right time at every level. I think we found the gameplay loop!
Considering these entrances back to the base kept showing up at the right places, I don’t think we’d be far off in assuming that Pragmata is a level-based game very similar to that of a dungeon crawler to finish. Maybe I’m wrong, but this is the closest we’ve come to understanding what kind of an action game Pragmata is, and I think these bases more than represent a clue, especially with all the wholesome things that can happen in there as far as the plot goes.
Speaking of conversations with Diana her advice comes well when you’re in the middle of fights too. Sometimes, she’ll tell Hugh to jump, and when you do, you usually avoid a deadly oncoming shockwave. That impressed me.
The level we played was a lot like the first demo where we had to unlock a door by scanning screens throughout the map, taking out rogue monsters along the way. Before long, we found an elevator that took us up to an area where we were able to find a globe to gift Diana before another boss fight. If you read our last preview, this boss was pretty much the same.
I’ve been absolutely loving each demo of Pragmata I play, and I really hope the game can continue this momentum leading up to its release in 2026. Even if I don’t touch it again until then, I’ll be ready for when it comes out on the PlayStation 5, Xbox Series X/S, and the PC next year.
by Danreb Victorio
