Allow me to shed some light on Splatoon Raiders, as someone who has been waiting for just this kind of game to arrive for quite some time.
Splatoon (the entire series) is a team-based Player versus Player (PvP) shooter. You’re fighting against other players (instead of AI-controlled enemies that would be fine-tuned to make the experience always enjoyable).
Splatoon is a series that definitely looks like it was made for children. But add in the physics-based movement and fact that you’re working with and against a team of players of varying skill levels, and you get a game that is intrinsicly quite difficult.
All Splatoon games also have a single-player mode included. If memory serves, the story modes are about 4-8 hours long. Not too shabby, but I wouldn’t suggest anybody buy the entire game for them.
The single-player mode works as an enhanced tutorial (much like the story modes in games like Starcraft or Warcraft 3), letting you experience and try out all the mechanics and weapons in the game before you hop into the actual meat of the game: the PvP.
Here’s the thing: I like PvP in general. When you play against another player, it’s not just about mechanical skill. There’s an element of mental play involved. My reaction time might not be as fast as yours, but I can trick you into making mistakes that give me an edge. It’s great.
However, I don’t really like team-based PvP. Now there’s too many people and variables involved. You often run into an enemy team that is way above your skill level. Sometimes it’s your team that is overpowered, and then it just feels like you’re getting carried by the rest of the team.
Also, if any player disconnects, the match is kind of ruined.
Despite that, I’ve kept playing Splatoon games since the first entry (in 2015). I’ve bought all the games in the series and played them somewhat extensively, because I like the gameplay, the festivals, and the aesthetics.
I don’t play any other shooters, because gun combat doesn’t really interest me. Splatoon adds just enough fantasy in the form of shooting ink and being able to swim in it to make it interesting.
I like Splatoon, but…
So I like Splatoon. But not team-based PvP. And I imagine I’m not alone. I’m a part of some group of players who yearns for something other than that.
We, the players who like Splatoon, or want to like Splatoon, but don’t really care for the meat. Are we a compelling audience? Is it worth making an entire game that abandons the PvP just for us?
Splatoon 2 and 3 actually got some single-player content added to them. Splatoon 2’s Octo Expansion brought an additional single-player story campaign. However, Splatoon 3’s Side Order was even more interesting: a whole new roguelite single-player mode that you could play over and over again.
And outside of those, Splatoon 2 introduced a new mode called Salmon Run. It’s a team-based Player versus Environment (PvE) mode. On paper, that sounded exactly what I was hoping for: it allows me to play with people, but completely removes the imbalance of running against some professional esports team that just wipes the floor with you.
The problem is, Salmon Run is notoriously difficult! Hopping in it is like hopping into a raid dungeon in vanilla World of Warcraft, in that you have to read up on what to do beforehand, or have people in the team who already know the ins and outs of the place. If you don’t, then you have to learn by failing over and over.
But on top of that, Salmon Run goes and makes things weird:
- You’re assigned a random weapon (from a rotation of 4 weapons) that may or may not be very good in the mode (and you have to know how to use it, or learn how to use on the spot). It’s almost like if you hop into a dungeon and your class gets suddenly changed from a warrior to a priest.
- You’re not running the dungeon, the dungeon is running you: it’s an endless onslaught of enemies and “bosses” coming at you on a timer. (No time to think or look around, or to mark enemies or talk with your team about what should be done.)
- Most “bosses” are very dangerous (e.g. can shoot at you from anywhere in the stage) AND invulnerable to all damage 95% of the time AND require precision targeting (sometimes with bombs, which are very risky to use because they spend a huge chunk of your ink reserves).
- You have to be very efficient at beating the “bosses” so they don’t swarm you. But it’s not enough to defeat them, you have to prove it by collecting golden eggs from the defeated “boss” and taking them one-by-one to a basket. Fail to meet your quota of eggs, and the run ends in failure.
- Every time you successfully complete Salmon Run, the mode gets even harder (or easier, if you lose, but dropping down in ranks also means you get paired with worse players…)
- There’s no upgradable gear, buffs or levels to help you out: it’s your team and your pure skill and knowledge against the AI-controlled enemies.
To us who hopped into Salmon Run, we were thrown in the deep end of the pool and never let out. That was the only option. You struggled and learned or you gave up and did something else.
Enter Splatoon Raiders
This brings us to Splatoon Raiders. Raiders is a full single-player game (with some co-op multiplayer options) that is based on the Salmon Run.
But in this game, you have experience points, levels, gadgets, weapon drops and an invulnerable AI companion. Everything can be modified and upgraded to adjust difficulty. If you can’t make it through a stage, you don’t just have to git gud, you also have the option to improve and change your character and try again. You can also call help from other players, or sign up to be called to help others.
Not just that, but the “bosses” are also substantially simpler to deal with. Instead of being completely invulnerable most of the time, they always take damage, no matter where you shoot, just considerably less than if you attack their weak spots. Some bosses are completely redone and don’t need the insane strategies or the precision that they require in Salmon Run.
And finally, you can even choose the difficulty setting when starting the game (and change it whenever). There’s easy, normal and hard (just with fancier names).
Splatoon Raiders is the shallow end of the pool. It is the single-player story mode to the meat that is Salmon Run.
I have questions
As someone who was thrown into the deep end almost ten years ago, I don’t feel particularily bitter about it. Despite the difficulty of Salmon Run, I somehow kept playing it a lot, and still do at times.
But the fact that Salmon Run was released much earlier than Splatoon Raiders does raise several questions regarding game development:
In general, is it better to push the players to their limits from the start, or slowly introduce them to a game mode? There are games like Warcraft 3 that did the latter (ease-in via story mode), and games like Team Fortress 2 that did the former (no story mode or tutorials).
Would things be different for many players (or the series as a whole) had Splatoon Raiders come out before Salmon Run?
Is Splatoon Raiders something that will work as a throw-in for new players to the series? It would feel weird if it wasn’t made for that purpose.
Regardless, I’ve been having fun with Splatoon Raiders. I hope and assume the game is much beefier than the single-player story modes in Splatoon 1, 2 and 3. (And hopefully even beefier than Side Order DLC, since that was about 20 bucks and Splatoon Raiders is around 60). Despite the bosses in this game being nerfed compared to Salmon Run, I have managed to fail a few times here and there on normal difficulty.
My biggest concern right now is that the game is teaching me some bad habits that I’ll have to shake off once I go back to Salmon Run…
