Splatoon Ranked Battle Mode and First Free DLC Go Live Today

3am? Aww man. I'll have to get round to it in the morning then.

Awesome! I can't wait.

Rapid fire? I'm in.

I wish we had more of a stage choice. I don't like the current method of rotating every few hours.

Well it's holiday here in Italy tomorrow so YESSSSSSSSS!!!

Is it DLC, or is it on-disc and is just being unlocked?

@chardir It's been out for 3 days. Pretty safe to say it's just being unlocked.

I'm very happy with this though, I have about 30 hours in Turf War and am beginning to get tired of it.

I managed to finally get the game yesterday and already on Rank 6
Guess I'm prioritising it over my new PS4 again tonight so I can play Ranked tomorrow

I wish Nintendo wasn't so harsh on Europe.
Always doing things really late.

@Politoed honestly, we need a new director in Europe. Shibata does little to nothing to get games here, we always get them after USA and Japan. And don't even get me started on the UK store.. :l

@chardir It is not on disc, it is being included in an update. Someone correct me if I'm wrong

Maaaaaan, why's it gotta be 10 pm? I have to teach tomorrow...I'm gonna have time to download it and then go to bed. Boooo.

Oh damn I'm only level 4! I want to finish single player and get the samurai and schoolgirl sets first...
Also: I LOVE how you still gain points even when your team loses and how the game mixed teams up. I lost 4 times in a row against a Japanese pro player but then we teamed up and rocked that s***.
I <3 Splatoon so much! Splatoon+Bloodborne GOTY 2015

@Politoed Because Nintendo of America is an American-based company. They don't cater to Europe. That's what Nintendo of Europe is for.

@DarthNocturnal The Prima guide shows both variants of Zapper. N-Zap '85 and N-Zap '89.

@DarthNocturnal The NZap 89 is the orange version and is planned DLC

Keep it coming. Hopefully the game will build and build in quantity and quality. Let's hope it gets a following and sells some consoles as a bonus.
Haven't seen any UK TV promoting for this though.

@DarthNocturnal According to what I've seen the orange one is being used as well, as the alternate sub/special set for this weapon.

@Yorumi

Not surprised by that. The game rates you for amount of turf you ink, not amount of deaths you do/receive. There have been rounds where I don't splat anyone but get splatted a lot and still win, because I painted a lot of turf.

Does tell how update and get content?

Or is it all done automatically?

Already? Man was that quick. This is going to be a long morning!

@AyeHaley: 2015 GOTY for sure! I think you are the first to call it.

Oh, and I NEED that NES Zapper!!!

NES Zapper

Cant wait,it will be 9am for me but I'll be there Splattershot and coffee at the ready.Hopefully they'll up the currently available maps to 3 too as 2 for 4 hours is a bit of a joke, they might be waiting till there are a few more maps available for that though.Hopefully we'll receive another 1 or 2 maps next week too.Exciting stuff.

@Yorumi have you tried moving sideways while rapid firing the charger to paint a wide avenue relatively quick?

@chardir To be fair, i dont see the point in locking content on disc for such a game. Online games rise and fall with variety, and locking stages away without good reason would just be a freakin stupid decision.
Im pretty sure that these updates are downloads instead of simple unlocks.

@Topic
Geeze...still Level 8 here....and two more Amiibos to go...
I hope i can catch up today.

A new stage already? Well, that was a short wait.

So is the new map and weapon a download from the eshop or an automatic unlock?

Oh my goodness! Nintendo...first I thank God...then I thank you!!!! That map looks like an absolute blast. I am so sorry for what I am about to say...Nintendo...you made me ink.

@DarthNocturnal correct me if im wrong but isn't there a nother n zapper coming as well? I think I saw a video on it... they were numbered after the year the came out...

I'm wondering as to how we get the weapon after the update... will they add a lvl 21 so we can go buy it or something??

Also what would happen if I keep on playing after the update rolls out i assume i'd be locked out of online? would make sense tbh... I'm struggling to get to lvl 10 but I also started a day late...

@DarthNocturnal the 85" NES Zapper was in black whereas the 89" was the iconic Orange.
Apparently the 89" is also coming. Gamexplain on Youtube found the reveal in the Splatoon Strategy guide.

@Le_Dook That doesn't happen always. Lately, things have been balanced. Some games out in North America sooner, some games out in Europe sooner. Nintendo is improving that. Here are some west Nintendo published games release dates:

Bravely Default "For the Sequel" (not the original one released in JP in 2012):

JP December 5, 2013
EU December 6, 2013
AUS December 7, 2013
NA February 7, 2014

The Wonderful 101 release dates:
EU August 23, 2013
JP August 24, 2013
AUS August 24, 2013
NA September 15, 2013

Yoshi Woolly World release dates:
AUS June 25, 2015
EU June 26, 2015
JP July 16, 2015
NA Fall 2015

@OmegaStar
Happy Birthday!

@chardir does it really matter if the content is on-disk already or not? It's a free DLC anyway.

Splatoon Rules !!!!!!! So Much Fun 😝

Nintendo Scope should serve as a bazooka or charger, and ROB as a homing bomb. Just no Wii Zapper please.

When I recently played some 1080º Avelanche, I thought it must be awesome to use the paintbrush snowboard in Splatoon, especially on the skatepark map, but that will never happen obviously as it would require a completely new way of programming and playing.

Almost there! I played for a long time at launch, and finished up the singleplayer in about a day. After that though, I've been playing the game for about an hour or two each night. Right now I'm sitting at level 9. Almost there!

Speaking as someone who routinely hits +1100p with the standard issue Splattershot jnr - I don't think the weapons are imbalanced at all, far from it in fact.

I think the main issue is that at this stage people in general seem unwillingly to change their loadout according to the maps. Each map favours different play styles and I believe that we should acknowledge that.

@Yorumi it varies. My personal best with the Splattershot is 1483p after the win bonus. I tend to switch my loadout regularly and can't say I've personally noticed it being particularly imbalanced.

I do see a lot of really ineffective rollers though.

Edit: I'm Rank 15 presently (for reference).

3am? Looks like I'm playing lots of Splatoon tomorrow. That new map looks very fun

@Yorumi thing is that by choosing a weapon like the Charger you immediately acknowledge that you won't be hitting the same level of XP - this is a support weapon intended for suppressing the other team while your mates do the job of marking turf.

I'm not sure its even possible to balance such drastically different weapons in terms of XP unless you simply award more for kills and in the process subvert the premise of the turf war game mode.

Disclaimer: I'm not at all interested in maximizing XP - my sole motivation is securing a win for my team.

@Yorumi I do appreciate the issue. However in my personal experience I have found that I can be more effective depending on the map using a Splattershot rather than an Aerospray because of the secondary and special weapons. I can't agree that it is categorically the best weapon in all situations, even in turf war.

Maybe they could increase the explosion on death by Charger so it covers much more ground? That would avoid potentially imbalancing for kills and ruining the whole game mode.

Looks like I'll be spending my evening playing Splatoon. Again.

@Yorumi as I said, I do appreciate the issue. However, once one has achieved the current maximum Rank 20 - does it even matter how much XP you are awarded? I'm not convinced that rollers are under powered in turf war - they enable you to efficiently cover the most ground while your team mates do the job of keeping the enemy at bay. (I think that right now its still far too early to make such calls.)

The Charger is different case entirely. Clearly it is not suited for maximizing XP within the Turf War rule set. Other game modes, like that tower one, will empower the Charger, making it far more effective as you can efficiently nullify the other teams chances of scoring at all (given the premise of that mode as we know it).

@Yorumi I do not have a false impression. My point is simply that the outcome of a turf war depends solely on which team covers the most ground. The awarding of XP is naturally based on that premise. However, I do not agree that a personal reward of XP matters more than the final outcome, which is what seems to be being argued here. It stands to reason that the Charger awards the individual less XP in this game mode.

I agree that in an ideal world all weapons would be considered equal. However, we are talking about a game mode which naturally favours weapons that can efficiently cover the most ground. If one opts for a Charger regardless - you are doing so in full knowledge that you won't get the same amount of XP because you simply can't cover the same amount of ground. In such a game mode, you then fall into a role of supporting your team.

@Yorumi I don't think the charger is good for turf war, I'm going to try the charger in splat zones and see if it works way better there

@Yorumi @BonafideInfidel - OK, I have to ask, what's an aerospray weapon?

I'm at level 10, I've purchased every weapon available except the rollers b/c I just don't get rollers. I always go back to using the starter gun b/c it's the only 1 I can get over 800 points w/. And I like shooting rollers in the face while I'm bubbled up. I know the chargers aren't for me either b/c I can't keep repeatedly pressing a button after all those auto weapons.

@rjejr - IGN has wiki up that covers all the weapons available once sufficient Rank is achieved: http://uk.ign.com/wikis/splatoon/Weapons

I seem to recall the first Aerospray becomes available at Rank 12 but I'm not entirely sure.

@Yorumi The Aerospray isn't OP, it just easy to use. It just like how everybody thought the Roller was OP in the Global Tesfire when they really wasn't.

@Yorumi The charger can be useful in sniping opponents so your team mates can take control of the zones

@Yorumi Well the charger has to be useful for something right. Even if I see the laser warning in turf war, I still get shot even if I'm running away. The charger's shot is just so fast

@Yorumi - "Its on that looks like an industrial paint sprayer"

OK, I'll keep an eye out for it. And I don't think I've ever seen anybody get 1600, I'd say 1150 or so even on the winning team. I was just using the level 10 Pro Splatter and dropped that after 1 match, went back to the 500 coin level 4 Splatter b/c I like throwing the balloons.

@Yorumi - I've decided I'm too good for others to score that against me and too good for my teammates to score it either. jk

I use an aerospray but only get on average 750 no bonus if not 850 WITH BONUS I am generally not good at shooters so the aerosray is PERFECT for under-skilled players. however I do agree that skilled players should avoid but even then yorumi the gun sacrifices damage and range so that's why it has awesome subs specials and fire rates, because it's lacking 2 key things. that's just my opinion though you may feel otherwise but I don't think it's OP plus when you walk into a battle with a charger you WILLINGLY ACCEPT that you will not be getting a lot of turf covered.It is mainly a weapon for keeping enemies at bay plus even if that was not true you claim that you know you won't be getting that many points so stop spamming the same OH CHARGERS ARE UNDER POWERED and AEROSPRAYS ARE OP because you sadly can't change it. I can't either . btw please don't hate me for using it yorumi Once I use it to reach level 20 (FTW) I have no real use for it. that means I'm not going to use it anymore

That's awesome! I want the nes zapper weapon so badly now lol

@DiscoGentleman Or, the disc contains unfinished Data and the patch just makes it playable (Just the Models but no collision data or just the 3D model and not the finished textures, stuff like that).
Whatever it is, i highly doubt that anyone would would lock away content just to release it a few days after launch (for free no less) if its in a working condition.
Server / traffic costs are way too high for such shananigans.

And lets be honest here, the asking price of Splatoon is already rather low, if they wanted to, they could already nickel and dime the heck out of it with such "unlock" mechanics.

@Yorumi By "Chargers" you mean the sniper rifles ?
I hate Splatoon weapon discussions, because the localisation teams came up with their own names, thus making it almost impossible to know what people are actually talking about.

The Aerospay (which is the silver / golden paintball gun i presume) is also my go to weapon, though i mostly pick it since it offers me both, good splatter coverage and means to defend myself in midrange combat.
Its a good allround weapon that more often then not loses direct close quarter combats due to its wide spread and doesnt have the accuracy and reach to take on snipers or incomming rollers (if youre unlucky and it splatters everywhere but the roller itself).

Though, all this could be due to my personal and rather unorthodox playstyle. If i had to come up with a name for it, it would be a "patcher":
Repainting lost turf, coloring routes not taken, seek openings to pave a way for others while occasionally defending choke points.
Basically a "fill in" roll where its needed the most, depending on the situation.

@DiscoGentleman @Einherjar
"exactly. It makes no sense to lock the content, only to reveal it about 4 days after release."

It does. Nintendo intends to offer new content every few days/ every week until August in order to keep the interest of the small Wi U userbase for a longer period of time. I wouldn't be surprised, if everything but the big August update is already on disc. Many of the DLC weapons and maps are known for a very long time.

@Yorumi
I gotta agree with you on the aero spray weapons. I'm usually on top with SplatJr (I've bought weapons but still can't find a replacement, level 16 now). But when an Aero spray (gold/bronze one) is on the team, they are always on top of their respective teams.

@Yorumi I had plenty games like this without any Aerospray users though. Scorings like this can also happen if you have two well ballanced teams driving each other back and forth over the map.
We started off strong, painted our way across the map right up to the enemys base panel, got wiped out completely and they retook pretty much everything.
The end result was 700+ points on literally every player but a map coverage of 70+% for teh winning team.

The weapon is fantastically good, there are no two ways about it. But i wouldnt flatout say that its overpowered, but rather, that its a tad too versitile. Splatoon isnt about shooting people, but covering the map in ink, and the aerospray is decent at both of these things.
It has a decent map coverage with its wide spray pattern und high rapid fire stats but it also pulls its weight in a firefight.
But it can be bested by rollers and snipers pretty easily due to its inaccuracy and overall mediocre damage output if you land only a few scattared hits.

@scamander If they are known or not doesnt mean they are actually finished. And again, the vanilla release was pretty barren, which could actually turn more people off then make them sit on the edge of their seat for more updates.
And think of it, releasing new maps is fine and dandy, but if your unlucky, you might not even see those in person due to the random map selection.
So even IF they want to hold interest for a long time, some people might not even notice the update.

I played against some teams so good I'm convinced EVERY weapon can be mastered for maximum performance. There was this one dude who was sniping us from high ground- no matter what we did or what route we took this guy would pick us off like it was nothing. They absolutely destroyed us because our entire team could not get past this one sniper. Meanwhile we've got three other guys aggressively pushing the line forward against us, aside from Johnny Crackshot. I'm certainly not good enough to do that myself, but that was the first time I experienced the TRUE power of some of these other weapon types.

VERY thankful for this. I got done with the single player story today as well as reached level 20. Its good they're adding stuff now. but tbh the lack of maps at the beginning makes me feel i was cheated out of money. Even if it was only for about 4 days.

Whew, 10 PM! That's just before I leave for work. Gotta get that Zapper.

@Yorumi I'm thinking this is more a matter of balancing player/team skill than XP parity among weapons (much like the initial "rollers are OP" reaction during the test fire).

I can echo what @Einherjar and @JaxonH have said as this mirrors my experience also. Once you start progressing into the higher ranks it becomes very clear that there is a huge gulf in player skill. Right now I'm inclined to think that the biggest issue is that teams are frequently too imbalanced, making for a steep learning curve and harsh experience overall.

Got to c+ almost b- in an hour with a 15 win streak. My player name is PokemonJ I look forward to facing you online.

Can't stop playing ranked mode !

@Einherjar

Nintendo made perfectly clear, they intend to release 9 new maps, new weapons, new gear and new modes in small updates over the summer and all of this would FINISH in the big August update. It's not surprising at all we got new stuff today. In fact, I was surprised there was no mention of it in the weekly eShop update as I figured they'd unlock stuff every week on Thursday. People were stupid to jumping to the conclusion Nintendo would release a half-assed product, because they needed more time. If one of them had actually thought about this for just one moment, they'd noticed this makes perfectly sense for an online multiplayer shooter, that is a new IP on a system with a very small userbase. There was no way to tell beforehand how well the game would sell. So in case only a small percentage of a very small group of Wii U-owners would buy it, they had to make sure these play it as long as possible. And I was right. There was no download. All the new Splatoon stuff was just there at the time Nintendo said it would be. So it's on disc after all.

@DiscoGentleman

Dude, we are talking about an online multiplayer game, that is a new IP and is released on a system with barely any userbase. This IS a logical explanation and it also explains why there was only one online mode at release and no map choice. It's more logical than to think Nintendo would suddenly turn a 180 on their design philosophy and release an unfinished product. Oh, and look. It it also what happened. The time they said the new stuff would be available came and it was all just there. There was no update, all was already on disc! Guess I'm a logical person after all, lol.

Got to remember this game would have went gold 2 - 3 months ago and i assume the map/mode/gun wasn't finished by then or else they would have to delay Splatoon and Nintendo can't afford to do that.

Ranked battles are so good for lvl up if u win. I get like 2000+ points every round and the rounds can be shorter than in standart battle.
Sadly im already on lvl 20.

My rank is c+

i want splatoon 2 to come to NX.
It name should be splatooNX

Here is a video of yours truly playing the new content this morning, still half asleep. Totally worth it.

@scamander But you are totally aware that your "makes perfect sense" concept doesnt make that much sense in reality, right ?
If the game bombed at released, they would have shipped a half locked game that they now need to pamper for weeks to unlock everything for an audience that isnt there and probably quite "upset" about the initial lack of content instead of focusing the workforce emediatly on other projects to make up for these losses.

Your conspiracy theory is rather narrow minded in that regard. Not entirely wrong, but shallow at best. No company willfully releases a half locked new IP to gamble with an artificial content extravaganza in hopes that there will be an audience to please with it,

The game was shipped early and what we see now is somewhat of a "final touchups" stage of development.

@Einherjar I could answer to that in detail, but why should I? As already pointed out, my "conspiracy theory" (which many people actually believed in, btw) was proven true, because there was no download for the newly released content. It is already on disc. There wasn't even a small download to unlock it.

And what kind of work would it be for Nintendo to give access to already developed content that is on disc? Please, think.

EDIT: Btw, two of the four already revealed "DLC" maps are also in the single player! So of course they are done. :rolleyes:

EDIT2: Another reason why I actually think that ALL new content is already on disc (with the exception of the August update, which will probably handled by the servers, only) is, because otherwise, people without disk space couldn't play the game anymore due to the map switching system.

Wow, quite a thread we've got going on here. My 2 cents: Yes the aerosprays are the easiest to score highly with, however I don't think that makes them OP necessarily. E.g chargers (snipers) are more support weapons, you're keeping the enemy at bay while your team capitalises and does more inking. This won't give you more XP, but it will contribute a lot to a victory. XP isn't everything. XP also includes inking you do that then gets re-inked by the other team. Thus it's not even a reliable measurement of your contribution by the end of the game really.

@scamander I agree. I'm pretty sure the content is already on the disk for the reasons you say. Ninty are just releasing it slowly to keep the interest up which is fine with me. It keeps me excited for new maps which is a good thing.

Has week one dlc become the acceptable face of day one dlc then...?

I could understand people getting the 'ump if it was pay Locked DLC, is it such a big deal if it is free?

@Yorumi I get your points, I personally don't think it's a big deal for Splatoon. I think saying buying Splatoon is Blind Faith, because you don't know what the free DLC is, is over dramatisation some what.
I also don't think this will be a trend going forward for games like Mario.
Your spot on about reviews, as we have already seen Splatoon getting less than deserving scores.

@Yorumi I get ya, I personally won't lose sleep over it, as long as it's free

@Yorumi
Yea it is really easy to build up turf points with a roller and a rapid fire shooter. Charger on the other hands are mostly for support, even if you do try to cover tons of turf, it is hard to accumulate that much turf with a weapon that is more oriented towards splatting other inklings than covering turf.

It is a godsend in ranked battles which started today. A good charger can make or break the battles as a good charger inkling can defend an area solo, or make defending mush easier for tothers.. Ranked battles are where they shine, well they do for me personally. I remember being their being occasions when I am the only charger in the team and the match going all topsy turvy from us winning to a loss when I lost my foothold.

They are not that good if you want to level up in regular though. Use a roller or a gun for that.

@DarthNocturnal It's the original grey/black that the gun was originally. The orange color came out later (and it will also be coming out later for Splatoon).

@Yorumi Points doesn't represent how good a weapon is or how good a player is. The charger is a amazing weapon, it can kill an Aerospray user in a few seconds. And don't tell me kills don't matter because they do, a lot actual. If your whole entire team get killed by a group of charge then they can take your turf during the respawn time. Even though charger users barely get points, they still something that you should have on your team. Just because the Aerospray can rake up lots of points, doesn't mean it's OP at all.