132 countries can't legally buy Marvel Tōkon: Fighting Souls on Steam, and it's not a licensing issue or a rating dispute — it's because the game requires a PlayStation Network account, and PSN itself doesn't operate in those regions. The block was first flagged on July 4, 2026 by a ResetEra user pointing to the game's SteamDB regional-availability listing, and as of this writing, it's still in effect.
bunpav's take: this is the second time in three years Sony has run this exact play with a PC release, and the second time it's produced the exact same headline. We've covered the PSN clarification for Marvel Tōkon's open beta before; this is the deeper look at the purchase-blocking issue itself, which is a materially bigger problem than a beta footnote.
TL;DR — what people are actually asking
| Question | Direct answer |
|---|---|
| Why is it blocked? | Requires a PSN account; PSN isn't available in 132 countries. |
| When was this found? | July 4, 2026, via a SteamDB listing. |
| Has this happened before? | Yes — Helldivers 2 in 2024, 170+ countries, reversed after backlash. |
| Did Sony fix it this time? | No — as of publication, the block is still active. |
| Does the whole game require PSN? | Sony categorizes it as online-focused, despite single-player modes. |
| Release date? | August 6, 2026 — PS5, Steam, Epic Games Store. |
What exactly is blocked, and how was it discovered?
The block affects Steam purchases of Marvel Tōkon: Fighting Souls specifically — the game's store listing is unavailable to accounts and payment methods tied to the 132 restricted countries. It surfaced publicly on July 4, 2026, when a ResetEra forum user identified as Chairmanchuck pointed to the game's SteamDB regional-availability data, which mapped the restricted country list almost exactly onto the territories where PlayStation Network cannot be accessed at all.
That mapping is the tell. This isn't a publisher declining to localize or a distributor withholding regional rights — it's a direct, mechanical consequence of a mandatory PSN account link requirement. If you can't make a PSN account because Sony doesn't operate the service in your country, you can't satisfy the game's login requirement, and Steam accordingly won't sell you a copy you'd be unable to launch.
Why does this keep happening after Helldivers 2?
This is the part that's generating the sharpest community reaction, because it's a repeat of a very specific, very public failure. In 2024, Sony required PSN account linking for Helldivers 2's PC version, which blocked the game from sale in more than 170 countries. The backlash was immediate and severe — Steam reviews cratered to "Overwhelmingly Negative," and the controversy became one of the defining PC-gaming stories of that year. Sony reversed the requirement within days.
In the aftermath, PlayStation did walk the policy back for several subsequent single-player PC releases, which is why the Marvel Tōkon block reads as a regression rather than a first offense. Sony's apparent internal distinction is between single-player titles (PSN not required) and titles the company categorizes as online-focused (PSN required) — and Marvel Tōkon, despite including single-player campaign content, has been placed in the latter bucket. That categorization is doing a lot of quiet work: a fighting game with online matchmaking gets treated the same as a always-online live-service shooter, even though the two have very different offline-play viability.
One commenter's reaction to the story, cited in coverage, captures the tone of the broader response bluntly: "Sony hasn't learned anything from anything, and they don't care."
How is this different from the disc backlash?
It's worth distinguishing this from the physical disc production cutoff controversy running in parallel this month, because they're getting conflated in some social replies despite being separate issues with separate mechanics. The disc cutoff affects manufacturing — it changes how future games are distributed physically, but existing discs and existing access methods keep working. The PSN account requirement is an access control — it can make a game completely unpurchasable and unplayable for entire countries' worth of players, regardless of format, the moment it ships.
Both controversies are landing in the same month, both are drawing "same energy, different mechanism" reactions in PlayStation's social replies, and both stem from the same underlying dynamic: Sony consolidating more of the PlayStation ecosystem under direct account-level control. But the PSN block is the more severe of the two in practical terms — it doesn't degrade an experience, it eliminates legal access entirely for a defined set of countries.
What's the current status?
As of this writing, Marvel Tōkon: Fighting Souls remains blocked in 132 countries on Steam, with no announced policy change from Sony or developer Arc System Works. Neither company has issued a direct public statement explaining the decision to maintain the requirement after the Helldivers 2 precedent, which is itself part of what's fueling the "they don't care" read from the community.
The open beta, which ran July 24–26, 2026, did not carry the same purchase restriction — beta clients are typically distributed through different channels than full retail purchases, which is why players in affected countries were able to test the game even though they won't be able to legally buy it at launch. That gap — playable in beta, unpurchasable at release — is likely to become its own flashpoint once the August 6 launch date arrives and the contrast becomes concrete rather than theoretical.
Why does Sony require PSN linking at all?
Sony's stated rationale, both historically and in the aftermath of Helldivers 2, centers on account security, cross-platform progression tracking, and anti-cheat enforcement for titles with meaningful online components. Linking a PSN account theoretically lets Sony apply the same ban and moderation infrastructure it uses on PS5 to PC players, and it ties purchases and unlockables to a persistent identity Sony controls rather than one tied purely to a third-party storefront like Steam or Epic.
That rationale is coherent in the abstract, but it runs directly into a structural problem Sony hasn't solved: PSN's own regional footprint is much smaller than Steam's. Valve's platform is available in the vast majority of countries worldwide, while PlayStation Network operates in a meaningfully smaller list of supported territories — a gap that predates this controversy and has nothing to do with the game itself. Every time Sony requires PSN linking for a PC release, it's importing PSN's narrower availability map onto a storefront that never had that limitation, which is precisely the mechanism producing the 132-country block.
The unresolved question is why Sony keeps applying this requirement inconsistently. Some 2026 PC releases from PlayStation-owned studios have shipped without any PSN requirement at all, following the post-Helldivers 2 walk-back; Marvel Tōkon evidently didn't get the same treatment. Without an official explanation of the categorization criteria, outside observers are left inferring the logic from which games get flagged as "online-focused" versus which don't — and a fighting game with robust single-player content landing in the stricter bucket suggests the line is drawn more loosely than Sony's own messaging implies.
What does this mean for Arc System Works specifically?
It's worth separating Sony's platform policy from Arc System Works' position as the developer here, because the two are not the same decision-maker even though they're getting conflated in some community reactions. PSN account requirements for PC releases are a platform-level policy Sony sets and enforces, not something individual developers opt into independently — Arc System Works is shipping the game under terms set by its publisher relationship with Sony, similar to how Helldivers 2 developer Arrowhead Game Studios was not the party that chose to add the PSN requirement in 2024.
That distinction matters for where community pressure is likely to be most effective. Arrowhead publicly distanced itself from the PSN requirement during the Helldivers 2 controversy, and it was widely understood that the backlash needed to be aimed at Sony's platform policy rather than at the developer's creative decisions. The same framing applies here: criticism of the PSN requirement is fundamentally a critique of Sony's account infrastructure policy, not of Arc System Works' fighting-game design, even though Arc System Works' name is attached to the blocked product.
What should players in affected regions do?
- Don't assume this will reverse before launch. Sony reversed Helldivers 2's requirement within days of major backlash, but that was under much larger and more sustained review-bombing pressure — there's no guarantee the same response repeats for a smaller title with less mainstream visibility.
- Check SteamDB's regional availability listing directly before assuming your country is or isn't affected — the 132-country list is specific and doesn't map perfectly onto assumptions about which regions "usually" have PlayStation access.
- The PS5 version isn't a workaround for most players — it requires purchasing through a PlayStation Store region where PSN operates, which isn't a realistic option for most people actually affected by the block.
- If you want to add pressure, use the same channel that worked in 2024 — public, visible Steam review and community feedback was what moved Sony on Helldivers 2, more than private complaints.
Related reading
- Marvel Tōkon Open Beta: Times, Roster, Modes, and PS Plus Requirement
- PlayStation Plus July 2026: Catalog and the Disc Backlash
- The PlayStation Disc Ban: Sony Ends Physical Disc Production in January 2028
- Order of the Sinking Star Comes to PS5 — Jonathan Blow's Puzzle Adventure
- Marvel Tōkon blocked in 132 countries — TheGamer coverage
Facts current as of July 22, 2026. This is an active, unresolved story — check Steam and SteamDB directly for the latest regional availability before purchase, since the restriction list or Sony's policy could change without a formal announcement.