Jenuall wrote:This franchise has always been on my "sigh, another piece of gooseberry fool to distract Nintendo from making games I'm interested in" list and therefore something that I've always just instantly dismissed as trash and not worth my time.
Like Smash, or Donkey Kong.
But, seeing as it seems like it's not strawberry floating going anywhere, I might have to try and actually get into it. Which leads me to the core point and query of my post:
What actually is Splatoon and why should I give a gooseberry fool?
It's 4 v 4 online shooter with the core mechanic revolving around the paint which your gun shoots and it sticks to the map. You can turn into a squid to move through your paint which lets you move quicker, heals you and hides you from the opposition team. However, they can cover up your paint with theirs, and their paint slows you down and hurts you. Shooting opponents with your paint gun directly will eventually kill them and cause to die and respawn at their base.
No game mode is based around getting the most kills however-there are 6 main modes in multiplayer with the core mode being turf and the rules are simple, whichever team has the most paint on the map at the end, wins. Obviously killing your opponent helps because they lost precious time waiting to respawn while you cover the map.
There are then 4 "Ranked Modes"-Rainmaker, Tower Control, Splat Zones and Clam Blitz. Each of these have different core objectives (such as Splatoon's variation of capture the base and things like that). The lower ranks here are abit of a shitshow but when you climb up to the higher levels and everyone knows what they're doing, they can be great fun and very tactical.
Finally there is also a horde mode where its you and 3 teammates against invading enemy salmon. Also alot of fun, but relies on you having decent teammates again.
There are single player campaigns which are good for learning the controls but not really the main focus of the game. Having said that, they released DLC for 2, Octo Expansion, which is much better than the base campaign. Supposedly they had some of the designers from BOTW's shrines involved in the DLC and it shows, with some cool clever concepts.
The brilliance of Splatoon is the paint mechanic and the way it influences everything that happens. The map is forever changing and as such tactics need to constantly evolve. It is frantic but once you get to grips with it, loads of fun. The controls are spot on too, with a combination of controller and motion controls, which can take a little getting used to at first but once you do, work seamlessly.
What I would say though, is like most online shooters, you do need to put some time into it to get good. It's not worth it just for the single player and if you kick around in the lower ranks with people who don't know what they're doing it's very frustrating. If you get through that though and it clicks though, I honestly believe it's one of the best things Nintendo have done in years.
