Mononoke no Kuni promises an engaging battle system and heart-touching boss fights

Happinet has recently been known to host a large booth with a vast lineup of games at the annual Tokyo Game Show. When I finally had the opportunity to attend TGS once again in 2026, one of the games in their booth caught my attention. The game in question is Mononoke no Kuni, a Japanese mythology-themed action RPG under development by Lights-Interactive.

I was given 20 minutes to try out this game at the event, but the booth staff also told me that it is also available as a public playtest demo downloadable via Steam since this May. When I finally had the time to check out the latter after returning back home, it took me around 3 hours to check out pretty much everything the playtest demo has to offer so far.

The general gist of the story in Mononoke no Kuni is that you are playing the role of Taiki, a boy who apparently has a curse that causes people to stay away from him, but found solace with a puppy dwelling in the Musashi Shrine, which he eventually named Musashi.

But when the temple became infested with demonic apparitions, Musashi sacrificed itself to protect Taiki. The mysterious shrine maiden Kushinada would later appear to offer Taiki an opportunity to save Musashi by training in another world, where she can also temporarily resurrect the puppy.

The alternate world Taiki enters for his new journey is mostly inhabited by creatures known as Mononoke. But this world is also on the verge of collapse due to various defilements in the form of purple crystals, hostile monsters, and yokai bosses. However, Taiki has since learned purification rites as an attack method to clear them and gradually restore the world.

When I first saw the screenshots for this game, I initially thought it would take inspiration from Okami for the Japanese folklore theme, as well as The Legend of Zelda due to the heart icons being used to show Taiki's total HP. But when I played this demo, I also noticed yet another reference to the Nioh games, as the maps feature miniature shrines that can be accessed to replenish the player's HP and recoveries while also respawning enemies along the way.

The stages available in this demo also show how you will gradually have to navigate through them by special platformer means. The first one has you jump with mushroom-shaped trampolines. 

As for the battles, this game offers a combat system where you can attack, evade, and guard against enemy attacks. It also has a perfect evasion moment where you can land attacks while time around you slows down. But it is also worth noting that the Y button attack can not only be charged for more power; its early frames can also be used to parry enemy attacks that are about to land on you.

Defeating enemies will let you rack up experience points, and when you have gathered enough, you can spend them to upgrade Taiki's stats and abilities. I particularly noticed that we can not only upgrade the HP and attack power, but also the guarding abilities. For someone who prefers a more defensive play style like myself, this really helps because we can opt to further reduce the damage received from blocking attacks.

Mononoke no Kuni is also set to have several minigames like fishing and disc-throwing, which also reward items needed for further skill enhancements. But one of the notable features I noticed is that we can sell specific material items found in treasure boxes to unlock an outfit set for Musashi that will also give it new exclusive skills.

Speaking of the bosses, if you have played a lot of Japanese folklore-themed games, you may have become familiar with yokai creatures like the Kamaitachi weasel or the One-Eyed Monk. Defeating the early bosses will also gradually unlock new powerful attacks that you can unleash with cooldown time.

However, what sets this game apart from others is the background stories given to each boss that start halfway through the fights. These yokai bosses were originally humans, but they had incidents that caused them to have regrets, which gradually morphed them into the very yokai. Such depictions make them have more touching backgrounds to me, especially when compared to other similarly themed games.

The public playtest demo available so far stops after the second boss fight against Kamaitachi, but it already makes me curious to see the rest of the storyline in Mononoke no Kuni. Happinet and Lights-Interactive currently put 2027 as a release window for its full launch.