Splatoon has come a long since its initial release in May. The game that came out nearly a year ago was fun, but it doesn’t have the amount of content and replay ability that it does now. Thanks to Nintendo’s steady flow of free weapons, maps, apparel, game modes, and many other free updates, the game changed people’s perception of what a shooter can be.
The folks over at Game Informer got the chance to speak with the game’s two directors, Yusuke Amano and Hisashi Nogami. During the interview the two of them discussed the decisions that went into making the game and why the game wouldn’t work on the 3DS. The interview also gave fans an idea of what can and should be expected of the game down the road.
The first question of the interview talked about the game’s launch and the process behind releasing the game with a small amount of content.
Amano: “So when myself and Mr. Sakaguchi were coming up with the idea for Splatoon, we knew that this was going to be a new type of online game and different from preexisting shooters. Regarding the decision to release Splatoon with what might be considered to be a smaller set of content at the beginning, our goal in making that decision was to raise a user base that would understand the game’s mechanics solidly and therefore be able to participate even more exciting online battles. We really wanted to prioritize training the user base to learn the fundamentals because we thought that would create the most satisfying experience for everyone.”
The interview briefly touched on the game’s single player mode and how fans seemed to enjoy the short, but charming, campaign. The interviewer also tried to find out if there were any plans for an expansion in the single player.
Amano: “When we envisioned the single-player mode, we saw it as a way of teaching those game mechanics I mentioned earlier to players and as something they would be able to take with them into multiplayer mode in the game. One thing with the single-player mode is that it was sort of a way to expand the world view of Splatoon – the sort of story, if you will – that we weren’t able to do in the multiplayer mode. Regarding any kind of spin-off or expansion, rather than just releasing additional stages for the single player mode, if we wanted to do something like that, I would want to make it a larger scale update. There were elements of the single-player mode that I wasn’t completely satisfied with myself.”
Nogami: “I really think that there’s a strong connection between the two modes in the game. So we don’t actually have any plans to just release a single player spin-off of the game itself due to the strength of that connection.”
The interviewer also brought up if the game would ever make its way to the 3DS, similar to how Smash Bros. did.
Amano: “With the splattering of ink, which is definitely key to the game, this is something we spent a lot of time on getting the feel and the look of exactly like we wanted. I think that’s something that would be quite difficult to realize on the 3DS considering its limitations.”
Amano and Nogami discussed the idea of regular updates during the interview, and discussed why they didn’t implement features such as voice chat and map options into the game.
Amano: “After this update in January, we will of course continue to support bug fixes and balance changes to the game where we feel they are necessary. With map rotation, this is something that we envisioned from the beginning of development of the game. The idea that players would have two maps on which to play and you would take one weapon into the map and figure out the best way to move about the map and learn the ins and outs of each stage. We don’t have any immediate plans to change that. Thinking forward, this is something that would really affect the structure of the game. It is something that we consistently continue to see users discussing. It’s perhaps something we will start to think about as a challenge, and we would need to think of the best ways to solve that challenge, but we don’t have any immediate plans to take that on.”
The final topic brought up during the interview was the idea of implementing paid DLC. Nogami immediately ruled out that idea and continued by saying that they will keep providing new content for the game until next month.
Leave a CommentNogami: “As we mentioned earlier, the free content for the game will continue to release until January 2016 and we don’t have plans to release paid DLC after that.”
Written by TJ Cencula
TJ joins the battle as the force behind the Nintendo Wire original series: Smash Supremacy, Mii V Mii and Custom Conquest. You may know him better as one of his two alter egos: Hero TJ, the exuberant expression of TJ's inner child, and Dark TJ, the maligned manifestation of his shadow self.
