Review: Splatoon 2

Very fair and balanced review, Tom. I just saw that NL gave this 10/10, which I find very dubious indeed. That site says that absolutely everything from the original is built on and massively improved, but that's not what I'm seeing. It's a great game, no doubt, but as you say, there are some thing that should have been tweaked, and hopefully eventually will be in future patches.

Amazing, there's absolutely no way I'd consider giving a 10 to any game of this nature. A portion of the judgement should always be reserved until the new content has begun to flow, I have no doubt that Splatoon 2 will get better with the regular free updates, but without a time-machine..

If I bought CoD one year and then the subsequent as well, although the formula might be identical, down to quite specific details, such as the exo-suits in Advanced Warfare and then Black Ops 3- still there'd be an entirely different campaign mode which doesn't evoke deja-vu, and at least some parameters will be shaken-up in the core multiplayer, such a move to set-loadouts rather than freedom of choice,  something that does break the original formula, even though overall its still reproduction at large.

With Splatoon 2, I guess it feels like they weren't willing to break things, maybe because of time restraints. I can understand this since, of course, despite the decent Wii U sales, we can't pretend many people won't be discovering the franchise for the first time with the Switch version. On the other hand, as we've discussed, I'd say if you were to just throw an existing fan into Splatoon 2, there is a chance they may not realise it's a new iteration at all when playing the existing modes. Whereas a CoD player going from AW to BO3 would immediately tweak- something is different. So some existing fans may feel conflicted. Some may have expected more change.

Or maybe they won't, I really don't feel qualified to speak any further on the matter since I can't perceive all the minor ways its been improved for the better compared to the original- so perhaps existing fans will be over-the-moon with the re-balancing, mode tweaks, plus vastly improved single player experience and the introduction of Salmon Run- it's possibly more than enough for some.

If you've spent hundreds of hours in Turf War, I can see how these things would feel like a big deal. Can't argue with that since CoD and Battlefield and whatever else has plenty of that going on too. If you ask me though, they should have titled this Deluxe and released a Splatoon 2 a year or so from now, with more radical changes.  It's difficult to envisage the free added content changing the shape of Splatoon 2 too much, and I must say, I settled on the same score as the original quickly. 

Lastly, I think that Splatoon 3 has to have a fully-fledged single-player too. The Hero Mode was a joy to play, I think there's a multitude of things they can do with that now. Big changes there hopefully for the next.

( Edited 19.07.2017 18:01 by The Strat Man )

My biggest issues with this sequel is how it's still lacking in it's online mode and it was the perfect opportunity to fix those problem from the first game.

Want to team up with a friend and some other randoms for turf war? Nope, you need a full group of 4 friends to be able to group up.

Want to play a variety of different stages in one play session? Nope, you're locked to two for two hours, and you could be stuck playing the same one over and over if it keeps picking it.

Want to play Salmon Run? Nope, it's at set times "oh, can you play the 8 o'clock one?"... "Nah, I'm busy at that time".

Want to change your weapon/equipment in the lobby screen? Nope

So yeah, as much as I love Splatoon, those things really disapoint me. I'm still going to enjoy it, but all it does is make the game less enjoyable to play with friends. I love to play online games with friends, not randoms and Nintendo make it the hardest to even do that with most of their games.

But Marzy, Nintendo Life said it improves on everything over the first game.

Splatoon 2 is just about everything you could ask for from a sequel. It builds on everything the original set up and then some; almost every single major issue people had with the first game has been resolved, showing that Nintendo is genuinely listening and wants to deliver the absolute best experience possible. Anyone who says Nintendo can't do online should be eating their words right now.

10/10

I am laughing. That whole quote is hilarious.

I guess they've never played any other online game before.

That's all I can say with a comment like "Anyone who says Nintendo can't do online should be eating their words right now"

Call me cynical, but if you check Metacritic, their review sits on the top of the pile because it's the only 10/10...so I'm calling that a clickbait score to bring in the extra hits.

Amazon apparently will have the game delivered to me in Saturday (it comes out on our national day so no post on the 21st -_- ...) but my splatoon 2 controller is still up in the air despite the fact i asked for the game and controller at the same time and now they're saying they're unsure if they'll ever get any more of that controller in the future.

No matter how hard I try I just can't seem to get into this game. I had a bad time with that Testfire event the other day. The controls just seem to irk me and I am just too bloody crap to enjoy this game, I blame age! 

I'm with you there - I do like the look of it, and would love to get into it, but I couldn't get into it at the events I tried it, and wasn't a big fan of the Wii U version...so I'll probably be giving this a wide berth.

Flynnie said:
No matter how hard I try I just can't seem to get into this game. I had a bad time with that Testfire event the other day. The controls just seem to irk me and I am just too bloody crap to enjoy this game, I blame age! 

RudyC3 said:
it's super skilled players that are ruining the game for me.

Azuardo said:

RudyC3 said:
it's super skilled players that are ruining the game for me.

If that's the case, the ranked mode needs adjusting to better pit players of the same skill level together, or allow you to choose the rank of players you wish to play with/against.

Ah yeah, I see you meant in the Testfire. Yeah, I can see how the vets would be mixed with newbies there, making it very unbalanced and unwelcoming.

I'm same as you with Smash. When Cloud came along, I considered trying to learn the game proper, and I sorta did with a couple of other characters when we were doing the Cubed3 tournies, but really I just played Smash for the solo stuff. Totally in agreement how sad it was that they stripped that back with Smash 4. Lack of a proper story mode was such a shame. It's still got such an appeal about it tho, so I always find myself buying each version. Next time tho, they really gotta step it back up on solo stuff.

You could play through the single player first, Rudy, if you're having a tough time getting used to it. It's a good way to learn all the mechanics of the game.

Marzy said:
You could play through the single player first, Rudy, if you're having a tough time getting used to it. It's a good way to learn all the mechanics of the game.

Adam Riley said:
I'm with you there - I do like the look of it, and would love to get into it, but I couldn't get into it at the events I tried it, and wasn't a big fan of the Wii U version...so I'll probably be giving this a wide berth.

RudyC3 said:

Flynnie said:
No matter how hard I try I just can't seem to get into this game. I had a bad time with that Testfire event the other day. The controls just seem to irk me and I am just too bloody crap to enjoy this game, I blame age! 

I'm the same more or less. I do enjoy the gameplay although aiming with motion controls doesn't work all that well for me, but the other players who are infinitely stronger than me are ruining the experience for me. But then there's salmon run and there's the solo part which apparently is more fleshed out this time around. As i told others on Mush's stream the other night, i was considering cancelling my preorder cause i wasnt having a good time, but a couple more games online and grasping the controls a bit more, finally managing to splat some people, brought me back to a point where i kinda still wanted the game. Hopefully with more practice i can actually enjoy this more. I don't enjoy smash bros as much as i used to on gamecube and n64 for the same reason, it's super skilled players that are ruining the game for me.

Playing Splatoon just makes me think that all I am good at/want to do  is own a 'Painting simulator' ....

I don't think MK matches you on your VR at all. It's all randoms. It's more or less just a bragging rights number.

Azuardo said:
I don't think MK matches you on your VR at all. It's all randoms. It's more or less just a bragging rights number.

I will try to look up on that. Perhaps you're right! With no indicator I never thought that was the case.

Indeed I've pretty much had the same experience as Rudy explains with both MK7 and MK8. With that said I have seen some 'higher' level people enter the fray in a lower ranking match. 

If such a ranking were to display in Splatoon then at least i'd know what to expect when I enter the match!