Although it was originally announced in 2020, Pragmata was delayed in 2022 and then indefinitely delayed in 2023. After the second delay, many thought the game had been quietly canceled, but the dev team was quietly working on building a solid experience. Now that Capcom has shared a playable version of Pragmata at Gamescom, it's safe to say that the extra time paid off.

While there's a lot to like about the Pragmata demo, the most important takeaway is that the dev team has absolutely nailed the controls. Pragmata's main pillar has you mixing gunplay with puzzles, and that's something that just wouldn't work if the controls weren't up to snuff.

You play as Hugh, the last surviving member of a team sent to investigate the moon base known as the Cradle. A devastating quake damaged the facility and seriously injured you. You are rescued by Diana, an android that looks like a young girl and can hack just about anything. It's up to the two of you to figure out what happened at the Cradle. Blocking your way is IDUS, the base AI, and a whole bunch of aggressive robots.

It would've been simple enough for the dev team to craft Pragmata as a third-person shooter, but it opted to blend a hacking component into the mix. Simply shooting enemies doesn't do much damage. Instead, you have to use Diana to hack an enemy after targeting them. This slows down time slightly and opens up a hacking minigame. Successfully completing the minigame makes the opponent vulnerable to your primary weapons.

The hacking element could've easily felt out of place, but that's not the case. Controls map naturally to the face buttons, and the risk-versus-reward element is always present. You can quickly complete the hack by racing to the green square, but you can increase the damage that you do by moving through the blue squares and creating a more complex hack.

In the latter half of the demo, you find an additional hacking node as a limited quantity pickup. The new node appears randomly in the hacking minigame and is used when you pass over it, just like the default blue squares. Because the quantity is limited, using these nodes is a more strategic choice. The demo only had one type of limited use node, but it's likely the full game will have more options.

Hacking also played an element during exploration. Different hacking minigames came into play when unlocking doors to move on to the next area, as well as to trigger certain platforms. The Pragmata demo wasn't heavy on platforming (and you have a short hover option in case your jumps aren't perfectly timed), but there was one area where I needed to jump on a block, trigger a remote hack, and then jump onto another block to escape. Even there, the hacking felt like it was integrated into the environment as opposed to being dropped on top just because it could be done.

In addition to hacking, the demo had three different guns to try. The Grip Gun is a six-shot energy pistol that serves as your default weapon and automatically reloads over time. The Shockwave Gun sends out a powerful shockwave that is perfect for damaging stronger enemies. The Stasis Net does a small amount of damage while restricting enemy movement. Both the Shockwave Gun and Stasis Net have to be found in the world. Ammo is limited to a single clip and must be collected in the world when needed. You can't stock up, and it doesn't automatically refill like the Grip Gun ammo.

The end of the Pragmata demo featured a boss fight that was larger and more complex than the standard enemies. You could use the same strategies that worked on normal enemies, but you have to be more methodical. One new bit was an overheat mode for the boss. Once triggered, the boss went into a temporary vulnerable state that allowed you to execute an extra powerful attack.

Story-wise, the demo didn't reveal a lot more than we already know from the trailers, but there were some data pads with personal letters that could be found. These offered up some hints for the backstory. I'm guessing that players who like to poke around will be rewarded with more of this in the full game.

Thirty minutes isn't long enough to go in-depth, but it is certainly long enough to register interest. After playing, Pragmata is now firmly entrenched in my "most wanted" list for 2026. I can't wait to jump back in and spend more time with Hugh and Diana. I'm interested to see how Diana develops as well as her further interactions with Hugh. Diana has the potential to be a breakout character for Capcom if she's written well throughout the game.