With the recent release of the Side Order DLC that adds a roguelite to Splatoon 3, the trend of the moment, the single player package of Splatoon 3 has become a pretty robust package rarely seen in the genre, and that's great to see.
And increasingly I find that's an important thing to my enjoyment of the franchise, because I truly feel now that at this point in time, the multiplayer side of Splatoon, the actual main event of the package, feels often flawed at a base level in numerous ways and has lost the appeal it had as a more casual online multiplayer offering.
Get ready for some Splatoon scrub quotes and potentially flawed grousings, because as the latest season and probably one of the last big content updates for S3 drops, I can't hold back no more!
Let's start with the following...
- The default game mode Turf War is a mess
Surely the marquee mode based around simply painting floors, where you can feasibly aid your team without needing to be a crackshot or engaging with opponents much at all, is a breezy casual mode right?
WRONG
There's a number of reasons for this, one of which will get its own segment next, but for now, let me tell you how like a man who does not learn from history and is doomed to repeat it, each time I step back into S3, be it a new season, a splat fest or just after some months away, I figure I'll get my bearings in turf war first, maybe try and those new weapons and stages, simple logical stuff I'm sure instead of stepping into ranked modes.
And each time I find myself in the most oppressive games the series has to offer, I don't know if looser matchmaking is to blame, heck I think it's a whole bunch of things that I will get around to, but if I'm gonna find myself oppressively trapped in spawn by a crack squid squad of Japanese players, it's right here in turf war, and to help explain this I'll move onto the complimenting second point...
- The map design is frequently kinda shit
Y'know, sometimes I put on some really rose tinted nostalgia splat goggles and think back to Splatoon 1 where we only had 5 stages to kick off with from memory, and as I recall public enemy number 1 here was Arowana Mall. See the thing with the mall was that it presented a very narrow stage with limited flanking routes, it was a middle of the map ruck of attrition, not a bad thing to exist as a way to differentiate between say the openness of saltpray rig or the finely tuned Splatoon 101 map that was Walleye Warehouse.
So why the heck does that funnel into killbox design motif seem to be the inspiration for Splatoon 3 in general? when you're making me appreciate Overwatch map design then something has truly gone wrong. This game's default starter map that's the baseline for the entire game, can be opressed and locked down by one guy holding a gatling gun on the central pillar.
At some point this series seemed to give up on flanking routes, paths hidden from immediate view and wields its symmetrical map design as a kudgel to beat you into a centre of the field standoff, where the winners set up and overwatch your spawn and any inky residue that might indicate a player coming down one of the very few and very blatant sidepaths.
So going back to the whole turf war gimmick, a key thing to me should be the ability to get around the map in multiple ways and ink areas that break your opponents stronghold placement by sheer necessity of them having to get their arses moving and prevent your territorial gains off to the side or even (gasp) in their half of the map.
Obviously the bigger the map, the more chances you have to actually make moves like this, yet I can't help but feel that even in the biggest maps, the visiblity of the terrain is just so obvious that the opposing team would need to be playing blind to not notice any ground being lost. A casualty of not having a gamepad devoted to a map maybe?
This funnelled map design then in turn leads into the spawn camping situations, outranged by a charger overlooking your spawn area while you've got a brush or roller to try and make moves with? yeah good luck buddy, if only there was some kind of special move you could use to help turn the tables...
- Special Moves favour the players leading
On paper, the fact players gain special meter by inking turf means that it should work somewhat as a comeback mechanic as the leaders have less area to make gains here while the rest have a map full of meter gain, yes, on paper.
For some reason Splatoon thinks that it's a great idea to just obliterate your special meter build upon being splatted, to me this is like if dying in Overwatch wheeled back your ultimate meter, absolute insanity.
We're back to that whole lack of flanking routes issue, as all inked roads lead back to the centre hotspot that new meter gain doesn't amount to much if you can't build it by being boxed in, pinned down, or just straight blasted down again. On that note, the other team will be making special meter gains by keeping you at bay, the rich get richer, the poor get poorer.
And that's without going into the specials in general, the zipcaster seems like a cool way to create your own flanking path, but seemingly to keep it "balanced" or something, it lasts like 5 seconds and sends you right back to where you started once it times out, less a full repositioning tool and more a try to assassinate someone in a tight time window, or dribble a small ink puddle in their half of the map before being launched back into the firing line of the opposing team's crab tank pressure.
- There's no good way to change your tactics or adapt mid-match
Okay here's a tough one to potentially tackle, it needs to be said though.
So you load up your match, you've got a 50/50 chance of landing on one of two available maps (yes, they're still using this dumbass system), one could favour your weapon choice, the other might not, so already we're running into a potential problem.
Then you see your team, hey, that's guy has the same weapon as you! and that gal has one within the same classification, we're three rollers and I dunno, some octoling with a blaster
The other team is revealed, packing a well rounded selection of weapon types and specials, there was nothing you could or can do about any of this, maybe try to console yourself by making Fred Durst proud by singing Rollin to yourself.
TELL ME WHAT YOU'RE GONNA DO NOW?
You don't know which map you're heading to, you don't know your team, you don't know your opponents and you sure as heck can't switch any weapons mid game
You thought you could be a balanced team of squids, in an unbalanced matchmaking scenario, but you were wrong, the only thing you have is CHANCE
It's taken until game number 3 for the devs to finally let players change weapons between matches without ending matchmaking entirely, this is how stubborn they are with the idea of changing your approach. And I'm very aware that simply saying "let us change weapons mid match goddamnit" is not a quick fix, surely though, there's something that could be done here? being able to have two loadouts but you can only swap at spawn maybe?
Speaking of loadouts....
- Both casually and competitively, making your build is a clusterfuck
Presumably in the name of balance, your sub weapon and special weapon are hardlocked to your chosen main weapon, over the course of the game's lifespan the dev team dripfeed a second variant of each weapon with a different loadout, but that's all you're getting, so if you're an absolute mug like me who just wants to make the perpetually underpowered undercover brella actually work, your options are already limited to the devs vision, I waited years for a variant and all I got was this slow moving gimmick wall.
Straight up I think there needs to be a complete rethink of how subs and specials are handled in an inevitable Splatoon 4 (in general, my hottest take is that Splat 4 needs a refresh full stop at a base level not even just related to my bitching here but that's another story).
If nothing else, having more options than two, where the second loudout might be a year and a half away from the games release would be a start.
Like, even a super sweaty competitive shooter like Rainbow Six Siege will drop in a new operator with nuemrous options within their given weapon limitations, Splatoon handles this in an even more limited fashion and in such a roundabout way to boot.
And then there's your buffs, forcibly attached to your clothing
Here's where it sucks casually (and competitively for optimising but let me talk drip first)
It goes without saying, but for a game that plays up fashion so highly, you want to rock the clothes that express your style, you don't want to say force yourself to wear something else entirely because Ninja Squid is locked to other less appealing gear, or the piece of clothing you like is stuck with quick respawn while you're kinda hoping to not be dying enough to actually need it.
Alas this is splatoon 3 and we're still stuck trying to balance our fashion with in game function...why?
The sub abilities for a piece of attire have this initially randomised but grindable to get what you want formula available, so there's a bit of personal choice in here, just handled in a completely overcomplicated and tedious manner.
Pay this currency to drink something to increase the odds of this one ability being rolled by the roulette? grind out levels on clothing and create enough "chunks" to make one slot yourself? wait, first pay this other currency type to increase the slot spaces on your gear because that one thing you like wasn't blessed as three star worthy...
Nintendo, what in the freemium currency fuck is all this? casual shooter my arse, this series has been incresaingly clogged with currency clutter, don't forget your limited time pre splatfest only shells for the gacha machine, yes, really.
Anyone who comes in here like "but the GRIND for OPTIMISATION is what keeps me playing" can jog on, you play because the game is fun, not because you want to fill bars, don't worry, we've got other bars to fill...
- The level and battle pass exp gain difference between wins and losses is incredibly lopsided
Okay nothing new here, games aren't all about rewardingus me for blowing chunks, greater gains for wins makes sense, but did ya have to make losing extra demotivating?
Games rocking battle passes tend to have ways to give players exp outside of just winning, partly because y'know, only one person wins a Fortnite battle royale, that aside you've got weekly tasks and dailies, that come with their own issues sure like dictating how someone might play, nothing like a guy tanking your team in a game because they gotta hit their daily quota of some task that isn't all that beneficial to the game being played, but I digress, again.
Splatoon 3 finds itself adopting a free BP formula (so thanks for that at least) but offering few ways to move up the catalog outside wins, I think Salmon run can pay into it so you can at least PvE instead of PvP, on the whole though it's lacking.
Some games are even cool enough dudes (well, as cool as forcing us on a BP grind can be at least, as in, not very) to let some single player content factor into BP exp, now that Splatoon 3 has a roguelite and also its incredibly underrated card game, they could have those play into some exp gain each week surely? one of the secret sauces for Splatoon 3 as a whole to me was how its multiple avenues of play to bounce around the modes available, something the game itself could help push.
Side note: the salmon run exclusive items are booty butt cheeks, and probably the most unholy grind in the game on top of that, so let me just get that dig in here.
---
To break up the text, please enjoy this random frye quote
I've typed enough poster repeling text that the era spellcheck has given up the ghost, so let me wrap up with the following.
I feel like splatoon is a series that should be more popular than it is, oh sure it has the sales, japan love it and seem to factor into most of those sales, here on era though I feel like it's been increasingly shrinking in mindshare as each game releases and I'm not surprised honestly.
What was once seen as having the potential to be the "mario kart" of online shooters and boasted a fresh and elegant core game design, is now fairly stagnant and increasingly less casual friendly. I shit you not when I say I find playing this game online sweatier than any of the other current shooters I play, and this is the one that's supposed to be the non threatening Nintendo one
A lot of stubborn sticking to the dev teams conventions desite incremental changes (everything about the weapon shop, or why do I have to listen to entire splatfest results I might not have event played a part in? etc) or outdated design no doubt playing a part in that, along with the ever limited Nintendo online infastructure, who wants a shoddy tickrate in your twitchy shooter?
My feeling is that the series has never truly followed up on the potential of splatoon 1, and the multiplayer itself is arguably regressing while barely expanding in any interesting ways, and despite all this Splatoon 3 is pretty great, it's just I'm way more impressed with everything outside its multiplayer at this point which seems to go against the real goal of the series.
And increasingly I find that's an important thing to my enjoyment of the franchise, because I truly feel now that at this point in time, the multiplayer side of Splatoon, the actual main event of the package, feels often flawed at a base level in numerous ways and has lost the appeal it had as a more casual online multiplayer offering.
Get ready for some Splatoon scrub quotes and potentially flawed grousings, because as the latest season and probably one of the last big content updates for S3 drops, I can't hold back no more!
Let's start with the following...
- The default game mode Turf War is a mess
Surely the marquee mode based around simply painting floors, where you can feasibly aid your team without needing to be a crackshot or engaging with opponents much at all, is a breezy casual mode right?
WRONG
There's a number of reasons for this, one of which will get its own segment next, but for now, let me tell you how like a man who does not learn from history and is doomed to repeat it, each time I step back into S3, be it a new season, a splat fest or just after some months away, I figure I'll get my bearings in turf war first, maybe try and those new weapons and stages, simple logical stuff I'm sure instead of stepping into ranked modes.
And each time I find myself in the most oppressive games the series has to offer, I don't know if looser matchmaking is to blame, heck I think it's a whole bunch of things that I will get around to, but if I'm gonna find myself oppressively trapped in spawn by a crack squid squad of Japanese players, it's right here in turf war, and to help explain this I'll move onto the complimenting second point...
- The map design is frequently kinda shit
Y'know, sometimes I put on some really rose tinted nostalgia splat goggles and think back to Splatoon 1 where we only had 5 stages to kick off with from memory, and as I recall public enemy number 1 here was Arowana Mall. See the thing with the mall was that it presented a very narrow stage with limited flanking routes, it was a middle of the map ruck of attrition, not a bad thing to exist as a way to differentiate between say the openness of saltpray rig or the finely tuned Splatoon 101 map that was Walleye Warehouse.
So why the heck does that funnel into killbox design motif seem to be the inspiration for Splatoon 3 in general? when you're making me appreciate Overwatch map design then something has truly gone wrong. This game's default starter map that's the baseline for the entire game, can be opressed and locked down by one guy holding a gatling gun on the central pillar.
At some point this series seemed to give up on flanking routes, paths hidden from immediate view and wields its symmetrical map design as a kudgel to beat you into a centre of the field standoff, where the winners set up and overwatch your spawn and any inky residue that might indicate a player coming down one of the very few and very blatant sidepaths.
So going back to the whole turf war gimmick, a key thing to me should be the ability to get around the map in multiple ways and ink areas that break your opponents stronghold placement by sheer necessity of them having to get their arses moving and prevent your territorial gains off to the side or even (gasp) in their half of the map.
Obviously the bigger the map, the more chances you have to actually make moves like this, yet I can't help but feel that even in the biggest maps, the visiblity of the terrain is just so obvious that the opposing team would need to be playing blind to not notice any ground being lost. A casualty of not having a gamepad devoted to a map maybe?
This funnelled map design then in turn leads into the spawn camping situations, outranged by a charger overlooking your spawn area while you've got a brush or roller to try and make moves with? yeah good luck buddy, if only there was some kind of special move you could use to help turn the tables...
- Special Moves favour the players leading
On paper, the fact players gain special meter by inking turf means that it should work somewhat as a comeback mechanic as the leaders have less area to make gains here while the rest have a map full of meter gain, yes, on paper.
For some reason Splatoon thinks that it's a great idea to just obliterate your special meter build upon being splatted, to me this is like if dying in Overwatch wheeled back your ultimate meter, absolute insanity.
We're back to that whole lack of flanking routes issue, as all inked roads lead back to the centre hotspot that new meter gain doesn't amount to much if you can't build it by being boxed in, pinned down, or just straight blasted down again. On that note, the other team will be making special meter gains by keeping you at bay, the rich get richer, the poor get poorer.
And that's without going into the specials in general, the zipcaster seems like a cool way to create your own flanking path, but seemingly to keep it "balanced" or something, it lasts like 5 seconds and sends you right back to where you started once it times out, less a full repositioning tool and more a try to assassinate someone in a tight time window, or dribble a small ink puddle in their half of the map before being launched back into the firing line of the opposing team's crab tank pressure.
- There's no good way to change your tactics or adapt mid-match
Okay here's a tough one to potentially tackle, it needs to be said though.
So you load up your match, you've got a 50/50 chance of landing on one of two available maps (yes, they're still using this dumbass system), one could favour your weapon choice, the other might not, so already we're running into a potential problem.
Then you see your team, hey, that's guy has the same weapon as you! and that gal has one within the same classification, we're three rollers and I dunno, some octoling with a blaster
The other team is revealed, packing a well rounded selection of weapon types and specials, there was nothing you could or can do about any of this, maybe try to console yourself by making Fred Durst proud by singing Rollin to yourself.
TELL ME WHAT YOU'RE GONNA DO NOW?
You don't know which map you're heading to, you don't know your team, you don't know your opponents and you sure as heck can't switch any weapons mid game
You thought you could be a balanced team of squids, in an unbalanced matchmaking scenario, but you were wrong, the only thing you have is CHANCE
It's taken until game number 3 for the devs to finally let players change weapons between matches without ending matchmaking entirely, this is how stubborn they are with the idea of changing your approach. And I'm very aware that simply saying "let us change weapons mid match goddamnit" is not a quick fix, surely though, there's something that could be done here? being able to have two loadouts but you can only swap at spawn maybe?
Speaking of loadouts....
- Both casually and competitively, making your build is a clusterfuck
Presumably in the name of balance, your sub weapon and special weapon are hardlocked to your chosen main weapon, over the course of the game's lifespan the dev team dripfeed a second variant of each weapon with a different loadout, but that's all you're getting, so if you're an absolute mug like me who just wants to make the perpetually underpowered undercover brella actually work, your options are already limited to the devs vision, I waited years for a variant and all I got was this slow moving gimmick wall.
Straight up I think there needs to be a complete rethink of how subs and specials are handled in an inevitable Splatoon 4 (in general, my hottest take is that Splat 4 needs a refresh full stop at a base level not even just related to my bitching here but that's another story).
If nothing else, having more options than two, where the second loudout might be a year and a half away from the games release would be a start.
Like, even a super sweaty competitive shooter like Rainbow Six Siege will drop in a new operator with nuemrous options within their given weapon limitations, Splatoon handles this in an even more limited fashion and in such a roundabout way to boot.
And then there's your buffs, forcibly attached to your clothing
Here's where it sucks casually (and competitively for optimising but let me talk drip first)
It goes without saying, but for a game that plays up fashion so highly, you want to rock the clothes that express your style, you don't want to say force yourself to wear something else entirely because Ninja Squid is locked to other less appealing gear, or the piece of clothing you like is stuck with quick respawn while you're kinda hoping to not be dying enough to actually need it.
Alas this is splatoon 3 and we're still stuck trying to balance our fashion with in game function...why?
The sub abilities for a piece of attire have this initially randomised but grindable to get what you want formula available, so there's a bit of personal choice in here, just handled in a completely overcomplicated and tedious manner.
Pay this currency to drink something to increase the odds of this one ability being rolled by the roulette? grind out levels on clothing and create enough "chunks" to make one slot yourself? wait, first pay this other currency type to increase the slot spaces on your gear because that one thing you like wasn't blessed as three star worthy...
Nintendo, what in the freemium currency fuck is all this? casual shooter my arse, this series has been incresaingly clogged with currency clutter, don't forget your limited time pre splatfest only shells for the gacha machine, yes, really.
Anyone who comes in here like "but the GRIND for OPTIMISATION is what keeps me playing" can jog on, you play because the game is fun, not because you want to fill bars, don't worry, we've got other bars to fill...
- The level and battle pass exp gain difference between wins and losses is incredibly lopsided
Okay nothing new here, games aren't all about rewarding
Games rocking battle passes tend to have ways to give players exp outside of just winning, partly because y'know, only one person wins a Fortnite battle royale, that aside you've got weekly tasks and dailies, that come with their own issues sure like dictating how someone might play, nothing like a guy tanking your team in a game because they gotta hit their daily quota of some task that isn't all that beneficial to the game being played, but I digress, again.
Splatoon 3 finds itself adopting a free BP formula (so thanks for that at least) but offering few ways to move up the catalog outside wins, I think Salmon run can pay into it so you can at least PvE instead of PvP, on the whole though it's lacking.
Some games are even cool enough dudes (well, as cool as forcing us on a BP grind can be at least, as in, not very) to let some single player content factor into BP exp, now that Splatoon 3 has a roguelite and also its incredibly underrated card game, they could have those play into some exp gain each week surely? one of the secret sauces for Splatoon 3 as a whole to me was how its multiple avenues of play to bounce around the modes available, something the game itself could help push.
Side note: the salmon run exclusive items are booty butt cheeks, and probably the most unholy grind in the game on top of that, so let me just get that dig in here.
---
To break up the text, please enjoy this random frye quote
I've typed enough poster repeling text that the era spellcheck has given up the ghost, so let me wrap up with the following.
I feel like splatoon is a series that should be more popular than it is, oh sure it has the sales, japan love it and seem to factor into most of those sales, here on era though I feel like it's been increasingly shrinking in mindshare as each game releases and I'm not surprised honestly.
What was once seen as having the potential to be the "mario kart" of online shooters and boasted a fresh and elegant core game design, is now fairly stagnant and increasingly less casual friendly. I shit you not when I say I find playing this game online sweatier than any of the other current shooters I play, and this is the one that's supposed to be the non threatening Nintendo one
A lot of stubborn sticking to the dev teams conventions desite incremental changes (everything about the weapon shop, or why do I have to listen to entire splatfest results I might not have event played a part in? etc) or outdated design no doubt playing a part in that, along with the ever limited Nintendo online infastructure, who wants a shoddy tickrate in your twitchy shooter?
My feeling is that the series has never truly followed up on the potential of splatoon 1, and the multiplayer itself is arguably regressing while barely expanding in any interesting ways, and despite all this Splatoon 3 is pretty great, it's just I'm way more impressed with everything outside its multiplayer at this point which seems to go against the real goal of the series.