Splatoon 3 (9th September 2022)

[sumo73]

On 9/7/2022 at 7:13 PM, Cube said:

https://opencritic.com/game/13284/splatoon-3

 

Reviews are coming in. Looks like the general consensus is "more of the same, a little bit better" and that the biggest improvement is the singleplayer, which is longer and much more like the octo expansion.

Got the game yesterday and I agree mostly with 'more of the same, a little better'. I'm sure more things will be added to it but so far it's good. The little things they've added to the game make it feel more polished overall. I still play Splatoon and Splatoon 2 even now so know I will be playing this long into the future.

Edited September 12, 2022 by sumo73

[Hero-of-Time]

The game sold a crazy amount, as expected.

Quote

Nintendo Co., Ltd. (HQ: Kyoto, Minami-ku, Japan; Representative Director and President: Shuntaro Furukawa) announced that domestic sales of the Splatoon 3 game for the Nintendo Switch system have surpassed 3.45 million units* in the first three days since its launch on September 9, 2022. This is the highest domestic sales level for any Nintendo Switch software within the first three days.
* According to Nintendo. This includes both packaged and downloadable versions.
 

 

[Ashley]

Not sure if anyone's seen but Nintendo gave some advice on opening up ports for this game and it's faced some criticism for opening up vulnerabilities (see responses). Just a heads up in case anyone was considering it:

 

[sumo73]

If you already have SplatNet 3 from the Nintendo Switch Online app, scan this from the app (not outside) and get an exclusive banner to use in game.

 

Edited September 16, 2022 by sumo73

[RedShell]

For anyone that’s playing this, are the news broadcasts now skippable even when first starting up the game? Or is that ticker tape feature they showed in the Direct only available when your already playing?

[Dufniall]

4 hours ago, RedShell said:

For anyone that’s playing this, are the news broadcasts now skippable even when first starting up the game? Or is that ticker tape feature they showed in the Direct only available when your already playing?

It's available at the start of the game. Only if there are some "big" announcements like a Splatfest, those you can't skip. But the level highlights and grizzco news can be skipped.

[Hero-of-Time]

 

[Glen-i]

I feel like any Inkling/Octoling worth their salt wouldn't pick Water type out of principle.

[S.C.G]

Splatoon 3 x Pokémon Splatfest Set For 11/11/2022

Now up on the main page.

[Dufniall]

Now that I've finished my first playthrough of Bayonetta, it's time to pick this up again. I've been enjoying it, there's a lot to do in Splatopolis. I'm slowly working my way through the single player, which is a lot better than the one in Splatoon 2 (didn't play the Octo Expansion though). Salmon Run is a joy to play, with some new bosses and a superboss around this time.

Turf War is still good as always, although I haven't played that many matches yet. Same goes for the Ranked Mode, although it's nice to play some Rainmaker or Splatzones again! And if you really don't know what to do there is always the card game to enjoy.

Two things still bother me though. Why are we still locked on two stages per game mode? And why do I still get kicked out of lobbies when the game changes the stages?

[Ike]

Pokémon Splatfest t-shirts are available to buy .

 

[Hero-of-Time]

I was wanting something fun to play and so I decided to pick this up today. Just in time for the Pokemon Splatfest as well! I was going to go with Team Fire but I based my choice on which of the 3 starters I like best in Pokemon Violet/Scarlet (water). I've had a cracking time on it so far. I really picked the game up for the single player mode but have been sucked straight into the online side of things. It's such a rush turning the tide of a battle with 20 seconds to go and bringing home the W.

I seen @darksnowman was playing and I tried to join him but it appears he joined a different team.  

@Glen-i would approve of this user.

[darksnowman]

On 12/11/2022 at 8:03 PM, Hero-of-Time said:

I was wanting something fun to play and so I decided to pick this up today.

Spose since you've no hair to tear out...  

On 12/11/2022 at 8:03 PM, Hero-of-Time said:

Just in time for the Pokemon Splatfest as well! I was going to go with Team Fire but I based my choice on which of the 3 starters I like best in Pokemon Violet/Scarlet (water). I've had a cracking time on it so far. I really picked the game up for the single player mode but have been sucked straight into the online side of things. It's such a rush turning the tide of a battle with 20 seconds to go and bringing home the W.

I seen @darksnowman was playing and I tried to join him but it appears he joined a different team.  

@Glen-i would approve of this user.

With the poll being just "What's your partner Pokémon type?" I took a broader look at my Pokémon history.  

Tbh, it's an automatic choice yet I put some consideration into it only because of what characters they aligned the options with.  In the end, I went with fire because that's what I've gone with in the games other than when I've picked up an extra version. Unfortunate then, that they put fire with that horrible-looking goblin creature but I figured I couldn't justify voting green just because I chose Bulbasaur in Leaf Green or blue because I took Mudkip in Emerald and possibly Totodile in Crystal.  

Red - Charmander
Gold - Cyndaquil
Ruby - Torchic
Diamond - Chimchar
Shield - Scorbunny

Leaf Green (bundled with a NES SP) - Bulbasaur
Emerald (because I loved Ruby) - Mudkip
Yellow (3DS VC) - Pikachu
Crystal (3DS VC) - Forget

Yup, no contest for me. The order is placed on my team fire t-shirt.  (Even though it has a stupid print on the back.)

In the Splatfest itself, I'd a horrible run of matches yesterday and swapped to pro and tried to get tricolour matches this evening. The wins came (better matchmaking?) so after one session I went from nothing to fire champion status. Great.  Some of those wins were multiplier matches so I raked in a decent bit of clout as I went. I've easily contributed more to this Splatfest than the previous two because of it. Pro mode from here on out methinks. Spent my conch shells and scrubbed the t-shirt for chunks. Scores on the doors tomorrow! The result I've my fingers crossed for is never seeing the best choice put on Frye again...

[Glen-i]

5 hours ago, darksnowman said:

Unfortunate then, that they put fire with that horrible-looking goblin creature

You take that back! I will not take smack about knock-off Bubble Bobble Dragon!

How can you like Totodile, but not dig the fire croc? It makes no sense!

[darksnowman]

5 hours ago, Glen-i said:

You take that back! I will not take smack about knock-off Bubble Bobble Dragon!

How can you like Totodile, but not dig the fire croc? It makes no sense!

I was referring to Frye as she was the fire rep in the poll. Yeugh.

I'd still pick the twisted fire starter in the new games even if it looks the least inspiring for once.  

[Hero-of-Time]

10 hours ago, darksnowman said:

Spose since you've no hair to tear out...  

Sad but true.  

10 hours ago, darksnowman said:

In the Splatfest itself, I'd a horrible run of matches yesterday and swapped to pro and tried to get tricolour matches this evening. The wins came (better matchmaking?) so after one session I went from nothing to fire champion status. Great.  Some of those wins were multiplier matches so I raked in a decent bit of clout as I went. I've easily contributed more to this Splatfest than the previous two because of it. Pro mode from here on out methinks. Spent my conch shells and scrubbed the t-shirt for chunks. Scores on the doors tomorrow! The result I've my fingers crossed for is never seeing the best choice put on Frye again...

I had my first taste of Tricolour matches and I'm not a fan. Maybe because I was on the Team Water but being pinned in from either side and having to fend off two teams was very tricky. I think I only managed a single win out of the many matches I had. I much prefer the standard Turf War matches.

I decided to have a quick session on single player mode before I headed off to work this morning. Before doing so I checked to see what the results were for the Splatfest.

Team Water won every category. I was very surprised by the percentage of players who pick a water Pokemon as their starter.

Back to the single player mode, I've cleared the first 3 sites so far and nabbed 100% on each of them.

Spoiler

I've been clearing each site 100% before I move to the new one. This means uncovering all the map, finding all the secrets and playing each of the stages with each of the weapons that are on offer. This has certainly given me a lot of Power Eggs to play with and as such it meant that when I do eventually go to the next site I'm able to unlock a lot of the area straight away. Searching for all the secrets also means that my character is quite powered up thanks to the levelling up skill tree. Secrets to find, unlockables to gain, skills trees to use...the game is ticking a lot of the right boxes for me.

As for the stages themselves, so far they have all been great. There is a cracking amount of variety to each of the levels and even though I play through them multiple times, because of how different the weapons are to use, it means it keeps the stages fresh...no pun intended. The levels do seem to take inspiration from the Octo Expansion from the second game. Some of the levels are single weapon use only and require you to do things like time trials or use a single shot to explode a bunch of targets. They only last a minute or so but they break things up nicely from the standard stages. None have really caused me any issues at the moment but there is still a few sites left to play through.

I am a little concerned about the length of the single player mode. I haven't been on it that long but have already made my way through half of sites. Although I do expect another site to open up after the 6th, especially when you see what parts you are collecting. 

[Glen-i]

2 hours ago, darksnowman said:

I was referring to Frye as she was the fire rep in the poll. Yeugh.

I'd still pick the twisted fire starter in the new games even if it looks the least inspiring for once.  

Ah, well then. That's a relief.

Although, it does bring to mind something that always bugs me with Splatfests. And it's the popularity portion of it all.

2 hours ago, Hero-of-Time said:

Team Water won every category. I was very surprised by the percentage of players who pick a water Pokemon as their starter.

On face value, you could take it as that. But I've been under the impression that the actual question has only a partial influence on the end result of the popularity vote.

Compared to the previous Pokémon question, this one is awfully vague. Now, I didn't take part in this latest one, but the one in the first Splatoon was much more specific.

See what I mean? Even if you weren't a Pokémon nut, you could at least make a decision based on whether you preferred the dragon or the turtle. This one was just a more general "Which of these elements is your favourite?" vote for anyone who weren't Pokémon fans. Which means their votes wouldn't really reflect the question from a Pokémon perspective.

And then there's the very real fact that a sizable number Splatoon players vote for the team that's represented by their favourite presenter, whether they agree with them or not. You've seen it with darksnowman, who bemoaned the fact that Frye was on Team Fire.

And as a relatively outside viewer of Splatfests, I'm under the impression that the team that wins the popular vote doesn't actually win the Splatfest most of the time. You have to wonder if any players try to guess the popular team and purposely choose the other team purely so they can "win".

And then there are the Pokémon players who answer the question honestly, but this question is open to interpretation. Take me, for example. If I based my choice on which starter is my favourite from each generation, then I'd go Team Fire. But if I decided to go with which one I think has my favourites, then I'd go with Team Water purely because of Feraligatr and Greninja.

What they should've done is taken a leaf from the original game and used the artwork of the Gen 9 starters to symbolise each choice. I'd go with Fuecoco in that case, and I get the feeling a lot of people would make their choice based on which one they liked best. You would've got a more accurate popularity result then.

Edited November 14, 2022 by Glen-i

[darksnowman]

2 hours ago, Hero-of-Time said:

I had my first taste of Tricolour matches and I'm not a fan. Maybe because I was on the Team Water but being pinned in from either side and having to fend off two teams was very tricky. I think I only managed a single win out of the many matches I had. I much prefer the standard Turf War matches.

I've found tricolour matches so tough to come by in these Splatfests I don't feel qualified to pass judgement on the mode one way or another. It's cool to team up with opposing players but when you're the team in the middle... all the best. It must help keep the leading team from running away with it.  

2 hours ago, Hero-of-Time said:

Team Water won every category. I was very surprised by the percentage of players who pick a water Pokemon as their starter.

I remember a few squirtle choosers but not that many. From what I've read online, Frye and Big Man are the fan favourites so it seemed only a matter of time before the blue rep lost a Splatfest. Just saw on the app it was a clean sweep for water though three categories were so close green could have taken it on a different day.

Being on the fire team, I'd close defeats, defeats by ~10% and defeats where all four players were hemmed in the starting area by the opposition so I wasn't holding my breath.  

[Hero-of-Time]

5 hours ago, darksnowman said:

I've found tricolour matches so tough to come by in these Splatfests I don't feel qualified to pass judgement on the mode one way or another. It's cool to team up with opposing players but when you're the team in the middle... all the best. It must help keep the leading team from running away with it.   

Yup. It's a nightmare defending the middle spot when you have players spawning either side of you. You have to balance defending the spot with trying to take back any territory that the other teams have gained. It's a very tough scenario.

5 hours ago, darksnowman said:

I remember a few squirtle choosers but not that many. 

I seen lots of artwork kicking about the town for him. Clearly lots of Squirtle fans play Splatoon.

[Hero-of-Time]

 

[darksnowman]

6 hours ago, Glen-i said:

And then there's the very real fact that a sizable number Splatoon players vote for the team that's represented by their favourite presenter, whether they agree with them or not. You've seen it with darksnowman, who bemoaned the fact that Frye was on Team Fire.

They very much present it in such a way that you're aware it isn't just about picking an answer, you're also joining the team of that particular rep.

First one, easy. Rock. No questions asked. People's champion. 
Second time around, it wasn't so clear cut. Then when each rep made their case, I found myself siding with the blue character's logic. 

This time around, I saw it as them manufacturing a win for one of the other teams as soon as the alignments came out. I wanted to stay true to blue but in my heart, I knew which option was getting my vote. Just hope they don't manipulate me like that again.  

58 minutes ago, Hero-of-Time said:

You have to balance defending the spot with trying to take back any territory that the other teams have gained. 

Turf war in a nutshell.

When I watched that, I thought it looked like Chill Season was set to bring a new chilled-out hub area for the winter months  but it's just some different (or extra?) stages and stuff. No mention of the new catalogue and incoming FOMO that comes with that sort of thing! I'm still grinding out the current catalogue in the hopes of finishing it (once) by the end of the month.  

[bob]

Spose since you've no hair to tear out... [emoji14] 

@Hero-of-Time right now:

[Hero-of-Time]

14 hours ago, bob said:

@Hero-of-Time right now:

I finished the campaign last night. I kept on doing what I was doing and clearing all of the sites as I went.

Spoiler

Some of the stages took a bit of practice to complete, especially those with weapons that I'm not really that good with. The ones that seemed to cause me the most headaches were the stages that had you riding on rails and having to hit all of the targets as you move. There was one of these stages that had no checkpoints and so you had to do a clean run with each of the weapons on offer. Another stage that took a while to complete was where you had to use the hammer power up and throw it at a series of targets that popped up. The time limit was very strict with this one and I when I did eventually defeat it, I just scraped by with a tiny amount of time left.

The last boss was a decent fight but I definitely prefer the final battle in the original game. That fight just seem to have more energy and excitement than what was on offer here. Still, I enjoyed each of the phases, as well as the ending to the story. Plus, the last boss looked hilarious.  

Spoiler

 

After finishing each of the stages in the game I was greeted by this message.

I've not tackled it yet but I had a quick read about it and apparently it's this games version of Champion's Road. I look forward to giving this a try this evening.

I'm not sure if I'll  be playing the online component of the game much as I really just bought it for the single player campaign. Even when going for 100% it was still a shortish experience (probably took around 8 hours or so) but that doesn't mean to say it wasn't fun. I loved my time with the story mode. Some of the level designs and challenges are top tier Nintendo stuff and proves once again that they are the best at what they do when they are firing on all cylinders. They always seem to manage to balance the level of difficulty and the level of fun perfectly. Do you want to play the campaign at a steady pace? Then just go through the game with the recommended levels. Do you want a little more of a challenge? Then try your hand with another weapon set up. It's also set up like a 3D Mario game in that you don't have to clear every stage in order to progress. If you are having trouble with one of the levels then you can simply skip it and earn your Power Eggs somewhere else. There are more than enough kicking about to unlock what you need in order to see the credits.

Playing through Splatoon 3 has me eager to revisit the second game. I never did play through the whole campaign and barely scratched the surface of the Octo Expansion. I can certainly see myself revisiting that game, and possibly starting from scratch, in the near future. Until then, I have a Champion's Road style level to tackle. Here's hoping I can get it finished before Pokemon releases, although I'm still not sure whether or not to pick that up.

 

Edited November 16, 2022 by Hero-of-Time

[Dufniall]

Have you tried the Tableturf Battle card game @Hero-of-Time? May be a fun single player bit to try out if you're still looking to get some more worth out of it.

I finished the single player last week as well, although not 100% it yet, that'll be my next order of business. Levels are nice and diverse, some take precision like the rail-grinding ones, and I really enjoyed the puzzle where you have to copy a statue with crates. I loved the finale, it kind of makes me think that the rest of the single player should have been structured like that,

Spoiler

(climbing the rocket made the level part of the story, while the rest of the single player feels a bit detached because all the levels are separate from the overworld)

Curious if they go that way with the paid single player DLC.

Now bring on Big Run! I can use some Salmon Run extravaganza as that is my favourite mode to play.

[Hero-of-Time]

1 minute ago, Dufniall said:

Have you tried the Tableturf Battle card game @Hero-of-Time? May be a fun single player bit to try out if you're still looking to get some more worth out of it.

I loved the finale, it kind of makes me think that the rest of the single player should have been structured like that,

  campaign end mild spoilers (Hide contents)

(climbing the rocket made the level part of the story, while the rest of the single player feels a bit detached because all the levels are separate from the overworld)

 

I completely forgot about the card game. It looked great on the trailers but i've yet to delve into it. Thanks for the reminder.

Yeah, the structure of the game is very much like the Octo Expansion. It makes for a snappy experience but I agree that it does feel a little detached in the grand scheme of things.