Splatoon is Nintendo’s take on the First Person Shooter genre which pits two teams of four players, playing as cute lil’ squid people, to paint the battle arena in their own coloured ink, trying to mark it as your own territory.

One of the main features is a live map feed being displayed on the GamePad to show the player the progress of inking, this acts as a way of seeing who needs help or what area of the map needs some major splattering. In an interview between Game Rant and Splatoon producer, Hisashi Nogami, Nogami stated that voice chat is a possibility to be included in the game, assuming it does not conflict with how the game is played.

The core concept of Splatoon is that by looking at the way the ink is being spread around and progressing, you know, you can kind of see what your enemies are doing, what your teammates are doing, and then you’re able to decide what you want to do. And that’s kind of the main thing we’re always thinking about, and we kind of get similar questions about the number of people that can be in a multiplayer match, but for this game it’s really that four-on-four is the best number. With four-on-four, the amount of influence that a single player has is perfectly balanced, but also the speed at which the battle changes, the way the battle is developing changes is also completely perfect.”

The idea being that the core concept is basically that players look at the way the ink is being spread around, the way it’s being painted around, and decide what to do. If in any way that doesn’t disrupt that balance we’ve created, we’ll definitely consider different ways of communication and introduce that to the game as we go forward with development.

It does make sense for voice chat to be included within the game, however personally after a while voice chat can seem a bit generic and easy. What if there were different and more creative ways to communicate with other team members. Morse code in Steel Diver: Sub Wars definitely seemed very interesting. One idea I had included using the GamePad to make little doodles on he map while playing to create a strategy with your peers.

Do you think voice chat should be included? Or do you have other ideas they could incorporate in Splatoon?

Leon Fletcher

I am a huge Nintendo fan, hence why NintyBuzz exists. I especially love all things Zelda and Metroid. NintyBuzz was started by me back in the Summer of 2014, it started out mainly as a hobby, though the site has gradually grown, and I hope it grows for many years to come!