While another Splatoon game was an inevitability, seeing Splatoon 3 in the most recent Nintendo Direct was a year-defining moment nonetheless. Splatoon is quickly becoming a top-tier Nintendo franchise, finding astronomical commercial success and fan attention in equal measure. However, it's important that Nintendo doesn't rest on its laurels with respect to Splatoon 3. The title needs new features that define its identity and key changes that address past issues.
Splatoon 3 already looks to be doing that with a bold art direction that will hopefully translate into bold new mechanics also. Still, it must be recognized that it took Splatoon 2 some time to truly come into its own. At launch and in the months afterward, the game felt a bit too familiar to its predecessor. Eventually, new features and a brilliant DLC expansion fleshed out the package. Yet, the studio must ensure that the same trap isn't sprung twice, by making Splatoon 3 content rich and unique from day one.
Customization is very important to the Splatoon world. The gear system offers players the opportunity to fine-tune their avatar both aesthetically and mechanically. Splatoon 2's Octo Expansion even added another race, the Octolings, but it was a cosmetic swap only. While that made sense as to not give those who shelled out for single-player DLC an advantage online, Splatoon 3 should include various races on day one for all players.
Ideally, these would not only impact aesthetics, but they'd also have an impact on gameplay. Imagine having access to a Sharkling, for example. Perhaps the Sharkling is slower when swimming but has a huge shark fin that protrudes from the ink that can damage enemy players. This could act as Splatoon's version of a heavy class and is just one concept for how this idea could be implemented.
Splatoon's single-player campaigns have always been a highlight of the series. In some respects, they've been evocative of Super Mario Sunshine's design. With hub worlds and varied mission types, these have always exercised Splatoon's innovative mechanics in both 3D platforming and action-oriented contexts. Yet, they've always felt somewhat restrained, especially given their potential.
The reveal trailer for Splatoon 3 seems to suggest that there will be a larger focus on single-player, however that's yet to be confirmed. While more of the same with Splatoon 3's flavor would be great, a true open-world would be even better. In fact, the open archetype of Bowser's Fury could provide a solid template for a Splatoon sandbox, one which emphasizes the series' trademark movement and combat. This could offer the campaign true staying power and position it as a focal point of the experience.
Perhaps one of Splatoon's most overt and widely criticized design decisions is its map rotation. Both of the previous games cycle between two (sometimes three) maps for fixed blocks of time. This was always a limiting choice which led to long sessions feeling repetitive as battles played out over the same stages repeatedly. So, the rotation certainly needs to be addressed in the sequel.
The solution to the map rotation lies within the Switch's most popular game: Mario Kart 8 Deluxe. That title features a voting system for its online races wherein each player nominates a course. One of those is randomly chosen, and then the race proceeds. This approach would be an amicable solution in Splatoon 3, and would seemingly be easy to implement.
In unofficial terms, Turf War is Splatoon's casual mode, similar to Overwatch's Quick Play queue. It offers a more laid-back experience in contrast to the focused and competitive Ranked modes. As such, there is room for it to be wackier considering that players head to Turf War just for fun, not for glory.
Bearing this in mind, Splatoon 3 should take a page out of Super Smash Bros.' playbook and really get chaotic with items. Splatoon 1's Battle Dojo already featured items of sorts which could be applied to Turf War, but those should just be the beginning. With how creative the series is, there is so much room for clever items that could make Turf War a hectic and new experience.
Splatoon has always lacked a proper local multiplayer presence. While the original Splatoon dabbled in the concept, it has been largely overlooked in favor of the online suite. Given how many other Nintendo series prioritize local multiplayer, Splatoon's online focus makes sense. Still, the franchise could do both, and Splatoon 3 should implement new modes accordingly.
Naturally, having offline versions of the online modes that could be backfilled with bots is an obvious solution to the problem. However, given how lovely Salmon Run is, the development team could easily conceptualize new modes that are designed with the split-screen experience in mind. From riffs on established shooter modes to brand new archetypes, Nintendo has the opportunity to include something that truly makes local multiplayer an integral facet of the Splatoon experience.
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