Much has been written about pragmaticIt’s unique and strange combat system throughout the many trailers leading up to its release, but having played the entire game twice (on Standard and Lunatic difficulties), I can tell you it’s true. What looks like a AAA third-person shooter soon reveals itself to be something much more idiosyncratic.
Protagonist Hugh is accompanied by a sentient android (known in the game’s fiction as ‘Pragmata’) named Diana who can hack the mechanical enemies you fight throughout the game. These enemies all have projectiles that are completely impervious to your bullets, but once you hack them, the projectiles open up to reveal the smoothest inner workings you can shoot.
What this means is that each enemy in an encounter requires you to do a hacking minigame before you can shoot them. This minigame involves moving a cursor from point A to B across a grid, coloring squares as you move, avoiding previously colored squares and other obstacles. This seems like it would get annoying very quickly, but Capcom has done a great job of varying the enemy types. Different enemies have different sized hacking grids that present different obstacles for you to worry about. This also means that over time you’ll master not only the movement and attack patterns of each enemy, but you’ll also begin to internalize what their hacking networks tend to look like.
Further complicating this are the consumable hacking nodes that you can pick up in the environment. The nodes you have in your inventory appear on the grid, and if you color these special nodes while hacking an enemy, a lot of special effects are included on the enemy. You start with basic tricks that allow them to stay exposed for longer or expose multiple enemies at once; Over time, you unlock some really crazy tricks that allow you to freeze enemies, electrocute them, overheat them, make them attack each other, and even heal yourself.
That’s just the hacking part. Once you hack the enemies, you have to shoot them and pragmatic Includes some really cool weapons. You have your basic pistol called the Grip Gun, which can fire off a few shots before needing to reload. Gathering weapons are single-use items that, once used up, are dropped. Pickup weapons are divided into three types: attack, tactical and defensive.
Attack weapons include weapons such as a shotgun, a long-range laser sniper that needs to be charged to deal more damage, homing missiles, etc. Tactical weapons are used more for crowd control, so they have stasis webs that freeze enemies in place, riot bombs that make them fall, and sticky bombs that make them easier to hack. Defensive, as the name suggests, includes things like drones that attack enemies for you and a bubble shield that protects you from incoming fire.
Defeated enemies drop currency that you can use to upgrade your suit, weapons, and Diana’s hacking skills. There are a few different currencies to track on different pieces of your equipment, but it never gets too complicated beyond “put the thing on the thing to make it better.”
There’s a reason I wanted to talk about combat and progression first and foremost in this review; It is because combat is the central pillar that supports everything else contained within pragmatic. If you choose to play this game it will be because you are attracted to this strange combat loop. And if you choose to bounce off of it, it will be because of how you feel about combat. That’s not to say that nothing more important is happening, but this is still the core aspect of pragmatic.
The game takes place on the Moon, where humans have been using AI to 3D print a colony (what could go wrong?). It all begins when a team of astronauts, including protagonist Hugh, arrive at this colony, only to discover that its AI custodian named IDUS has gone crazy and unleashed killer robots on its residents. Your team is totally slaughtered, but before you can meet the same fate, you meet Diana, who allows you to use all the aforementioned hacking to survive against these killer robots.
Much of the narrative drive of pragmatic It is to discover what happened in this colony, why IDUS decided to bite the hands that made it and all the mystery that surrounds Diana’s existence. It’s a surprisingly gripping story with some interesting twists and revelations along the way. There is more than a little resident Evil DNA here in the way much of the narrative unfolds through text and audio logs as you discover the collapse of this colony after the fact.
Structurally, pragmatic It plays out like a 3D metroidvania. You travel through linear levels that, once unlocked, can be freely explored to find secrets and collectibles. Each level has areas you can’t access at the beginning, which become available later in the game as you unlock more abilities, causing that classic completionist backtracking that is the backbone of this style of game. In each level you unlock tram stations that allow you to quickly travel back to your shelter.
The shelter acts as a center of pragmatic. From here, you can fast travel to any exit in any of the game’s levels at any point, but its main purpose is to be the place where you interact with everyone. pragmaticThe secondary mechanics. The shelter has stations that allow you to upgrade your equipment, but over time you can also unlock a virtual reality station that allows you to play optional challenges that in turn allow you to unlock alternate costumes, better weapons, and more.
However, the main thing you’ll be using the center for is interacting with Diana. Throughout the game, you acquire various items that you can give to Diana as “gifts” that will allow her to experience a little piece of a real human childhood. You can also talk to her, play games like hide and seek with her, etc., allowing you to further deepen Hugh’s relationship with her. There’s no mechanical incentive to do this beyond completionism, but players who do this will find themselves much more emotionally invested in the game. pragmaticEmotional rhythms are higher than those of players who do not.
Diana herself is a surprisingly well-realized character, walking the line perfectly between a robot’s lack of understanding of how humans work and genuine childlike innocence. She doesn’t quite understand why Hugh is concerned about her physical well-being when he can simply repair her if she gets damaged. But he also displays a playful curiosity about the human experience that Hugh is more than happy to oblige. Watching these two characters come together is one of the best aspects of this game. It’s not as emotionally complex as other dad games. the last of us either god of warbut it is still a very well realized relationship.
Visually, pragmatic It’s a bit of an acquired taste. At first glance, it seems like the middle ground between the ‘NASApunk’ hard sci-fi aesthetic of star field and the over-designed avant-garde style of games like Vanquish. However, the visual language is consistent enough and applied with intention in a way that one becomes accustomed to over time. This is further contributed to by the surprising aesthetic diversity of the levels you explore. For a game that is completely set on a lunar colony, pragmatic includes many different biomes. One takes place entirely in a laboratory, another level is a half-printed replica of New York City, another is completely outdoors on the surface where you enjoy low gravity, etc.
Hugh’s character model is fully clothed in his bulky spacesuit the entire time, but the few times he lifts his visor to show his face he shows off the impressive facial animation we’ve come to expect from RE Engine games. Diana, on the other hand, is a marvel of character animation with an immediately distinct appearance, and her facial animations go a long way toward endearing you to her. The voice acting, while not bad, is pretty basic, so it’s really the visual execution of these characters that works to make you identify with them.
However, the enemy design and animation is clearly where the most work has been done because this is one of the most impressive collection of baddies Capcom has put out in some time. There are several different types of humanoid robots, different mechs, that look and move like robotic versions of the titans of attack on titan, and even huge robotic worms. pragmatic also includes some really excellent boss battles (which I love seeing after being disappointed with the bosses in Resident Evil Requiem earlier this year).
The music perfectly complements the visuals with powerful synthesized battle tracks that always give way to moody piano melodies that play throughout your slow exploratory strolls through the levels. The game’s main theme that plays when you’re in the shelter is particularly beautiful, and I’m pretty sure that at least an hour of my total play time was spent letting the game run in the background while listening to the shelter theme.
A single game of pragmatic It will take you between 12 and 14 hours, but completing the game unlocks New Game Plus, the Lunatic difficulty setting, as well as the ‘Unknown Signal’ which gives you access to upgraded bosses and secret missions for 100% completion of all areas, the reward for which is the best armor in the game. So, in classic Capcom style, if you vibe with what pragmatic are doing, your total playing time is likely to extend far beyond the limits of that first game.
At this point it seems redundant to point out the generational winning streak that Capcom has had since 2017. Resident Evil VIIbut I have to because it’s still as impressive now as it has been all this time. This is Capcom’s third release in 2026 after the absolutely phenomenal Resident Evil Requiem and Monster Hunter Stories 3: Twisted Reflectionand with Onimusha: Way of the Sword Coming soon, Capcom is having an incredible year.
For pragmatic By itself, as I said at the beginning of this review, this game is unlike anything I’ve ever played. It’s a unique, well-designed game with a well-executed narrative that moves at a fast pace. When you play and review as many games as I do, and have for as long, it becomes increasingly rare to find a game that makes you say, “I’ve never played anything like this.” But yeah, I’ve never played anything like it. pragmatic.
