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@zeldagaymer93 NWPlayer123 leaked the 6 map names on Twitter just hours after the 2.0.0 update.

The WW Splatoon sales figures are a bit confusing, when discussing July. The 1.6M units was the WW sales figures for Splatoon June 30, in Nintendo's financial report. It would be very close to 2M by now, since the demand for this game is stronger in Japan than in the US.

I'm a bit confused about these connection issues people are experiencing. Are the players experiencing connection issues really using wired internet on the Wii U? Nintendo made quite a bit of changes to be more picky about stable internet connections in the 2.0 update, and I surely appreciate that. Turf War, and Ranked and especially the Splatfest are much more fluent and enjoyable now. I only encountered one player with lag during the whole Splatfest.

@chardir Yes, I also don't understand that part. What good would Tenacity do in a one-player game?

@Iggly You can still visit the plaza and order gear from people you meet there from Spyke, It's more expensive, but it's a fast way to get rare gear.

@Kaze_Memaryu I agree with you, Splatoon is not DLC in the usual sense, since it isn't optional. The downloadable updates to Splatoon are all mandatory updates, just like to the main game of MK8 and Smash.

@duffmmann The result of connecting 2 Gamepads is 30 fps, that's apparently one of the reasons why Nintendo never support it.

@shani At the most, every 10th match or something would result in an actual change of rank (such as going from B to B+). It's a good change, since bad-players lobbies were used as a ranking-up tool.

@FragRed You can set Private Mode to play in 1vs1, and you can team up with that 1 friend as a 2-player team.

@Iggly I think that's one of the best changes in this update. If a less popular side wins the majority of their matches, there should at least be some theoretical chance of that side to win the Splatfest.

@Fandabidozi New weapons at each level up to level 20. The new update promises rewards each 5th level.

FWIW, the Splatoon experience is very much designed for surround sound, not headphones or stereo sound output.

Official press release available now. Level cap raised to 50. Ranks raised with S and S+.

@Plainsville According to the current info, they seem to make some drastic changes to the Underpass stage. (Removing the tree at the start, moving the side corridors, adding structures to the deep middle part, and more.) personally, I've never experienced any major issues with that stage, and it's brilliant for tower control. Arowana Mall however...

@GloverMist The Rainmaker rules (from the leak) are here:
https://www.nintendolife.com/news/2015/06/unreleased_splatoon_maps_and_weapons_get_detailed_rainmaker_mode_explained
@Fernink If that's the case, it seems like there are 2 other variants of the bucket arriving as well (Triple Bloblobber and Bomlobber).

@Zach777 I think it's a mix of on-disc and DLC here. The data mining leak only listed 10 available stages, and this shows 2 more stages. The leak also didn't list the bucket or the straw hat. But Rainmaker seemed to be on-disc. My personal guess is that most of these new things are from the August update.

@MikeW They might continue to update Splatoon with new content for a year for all we know, and we might never even know when the "final" content update arrives. All we know is that there will be a "big August update" with party matches. The more you wait, the more uphill the battle will be to become really good at Splatoon.

@rjejr Since you're so interested in time zones: NoE tweeted about the weapon at 12:00, London time. NoA tweeted about the new weapons + the Splatfest at 1 PM, Redmond time. That's a 1 hour difference between the NoE and NoA marketing departments.

@RyanCraddock I interpreted the response almost as a confirmation that more singleplayer mechanics will appear in future multiplayer stages. After all, Moray Towers introduces steep vertical traversal jumps that were only found in single player mode before.

Great interview with many good questions. I liked how carefully he avoided the question about single player mechanics appearing on future multiplayer stages.

@Yorumi I'm confused about your posts about the "lack of depth". If you feel you play all matches in the same way, why don't you change your way of playing? Almost every match I play is completely different in Turf War (I probably get matched towards painters with fairly low K/D), and my primary aim is to always win every random match. The only map where I feel any kind of repeatable scenarios is the Mall when there are many chargers, and sometimes Port Mackerel when all are good level 20 players. The ranked battles is a different thing, but those compensate in intensity. And the "unbalanced weapon" thing is even more confusing... The weapon set vs. gear vs. map rotation is where things really get deep IMO. I'm still not at A+ 99, though.

@elhozzo Probably 118-0516? If so, it's an error during matchmaking, caused by your firewall, or a firewall at some of the players you try to connect to. Here's the NoA trouble shooting guide for that error:
http://www.nintendo.com/consumer/wfc/en_na/ds/results.jsp?error_code=118-0516&system=Wiiu&locale=en_US

@Peach64 IIRC, MK8 sold the majority of its 5M+ units after the first month.

I can't say I'm a fan of hackers spoiling the fun of surprises.

Thanks for the review. Other reviews on this game seem to also praise it. Will absolutely get this one!

@Fee The weapon (and map) updates aren't downloads. They are available in game and unlocks from the server.

@liljmoore All games you mention are niche games with an attach rate of a couple of %. Bayonetta 1 had about 2% attach rate on its original platforms. Fire Emblem: Awakening had about 4% attach rate on the 3DS. Compare that to MK8 that has around 50% attach rate, or SSB U with around 40% attach rate.

Great (and somewhat surprising) news!

One of the few times I agree with @Quorthon. Terrible eShop titles from Nintendo (such as Dr. Luigi) and VC titles that have aged extremely bad (such as the DKC 1-3) sells MUCH more than any excellent indie game can dream of.
And it's hilarious that Monster Hunter 4 is an example of 3rd party that sells well. Nintendo has promoted Monster Hunter 4 a LOT (for example in the Nintendo Directs) in all regions, and Nintendo publishes MH4 in the NoE region.

@A01 The total gameplay value is depending on co-op or not, IMO. I've played it both single player, and with 2 different setups of co-op. Even if the puzzle solution is known beforehand, the co-op experience gets quite different depending on who's controlling what.

A really really excellent game, both in single player and co-op.

@rdrunner1178 @JaxonH The studio has also hinted that they might add some more stuff to the game, if it sells well.

@Koz I very much doubt that most children can co-op ASA beyond level 20 on the standard difficulty. It becomes pretty difficult after a while. (And BTW, ASA is a great single-player game as well.)

You can play every game with few amiibo figures. Just delete the save data to connect the amiibo to something else.

Very good info there, thanks @AlexOlney!

@andyg1971 You don't need to win all the Mirror mode cups to unlock 200c cups. Mirror and 200cc unlocks the same way.

@Josaku Baby Park is supposed to be a special 7-laps track, meaning that the leaders will start to attack from behind at some point. And I can see that Baby Park becomes extremely challenging on 200cc.

@OorWullie Yes, Ice Ice Outpost is brilliant online, and I've noticed that Ice Ice Outpost is a very popular vote online nowadays, That track often gets enormously tight and chaotic.

Don't think it has been mentioned here yet, but Baby Park is supposedly a special 7-lap track.

I agree with you, Alex. I've played Affordable Space Adventure in both single player and 3-player co-op (up to level 16 in both campaigns now), and the experience is bigger when shared, even if you actually do less than while playing in single player mode.
Same thing with the co-op vs. single player missions in Pikmin 3.

Affordable Space Adventures! Absolutely.

I'll get this immediately when it arrives on Thursday!

@rjejr There are quite a few difference between Splatoon and Yoshi and their amiibos:
1. Different amiibo manufacturing methods (yarn instead of plastic) and probably different factories. I bet the Yoshi amiibos are more complicated to do. At any rate, the Yoshi amiibo manufacturing is a "first" for Nintendo.
2. It's more cruical that Splatoon gets a simultaneous release, since it has online and the Ranked Battles are not opened until enough players have reached a certain level. Yoshi is a game with just levels to play locally.
3. Yoshi is a game that will probably mostly be played until the player has solved the levels, and I don't think there will be much interest to buy the yarn amiibos after that period. Splatoon is designed to be played over a long period of time, like MK8.
4. The main thing that can sell a out-of-stock Yoshi amiibo later (after the player has solved the game) is the cuteness. It's important that the supply mistakes of the initial Smash U amiibos aren't repeated with Yoshi.
5. A Splatoon amiibo that goes out of stock can still be bought and used for the game at a later date, just like in MK8 and Smash U. Actually, with the way the Splatoon amiibo works in the game, it makes sense to buy them after the player is familiar with the base game.

@rjejr @Grumblevolcano It's pretty obvious that the Yoshi game was delayed (it was planned to arrive much earlier) for BOTH NoE and NoA because of the production of the yarn yoshi amiibos. The split release dates for NoE and NoA is to assure that the supply of yarn yoshi amiibos. Since the NoA market is the largest amiibo market, Yoshi releases there last. Regarding Splatoon, Nintendo has worked towards a world-wide simultaneous release (such as MK8) for a quite long time.

@Grumblevolcano For all we know, NX is not the successor to Wii U or 3DS. NX was presented alongside the Wii U and the 3DS.

@GreatPlayer But there were some Luigis placed in the standard game already.

You already reported this delay a week ago. The 3DS version was listed for August back then.

https://www.nintendolife.com/news/2015/03/nintendo_announces_fresh_release_details_on_a_host_of_exciting_eshop_games

Nice list! And great to have a release date on Affordable Space Adventures!

@sarethums Switch the view to the TV if you don't like playing it on the Gamepad. And as already said, chasing the cats is optional. You can still beat the game without them.

I played Year Walk as well as their Beat Sneak Bandit on the iPad. Year Walk had a great mood that would gain on being on a big screen. Hope they implement at least some basic Gamepad button support even though their games are very touch screen based.

@Danrenfroe2016 Star Fox show difference content on the Gamepad and TV. Kirby does not.

Great news! Curve Digital produces quality stuff! Stealth Inc. 2 is my favorite from them so far.

@Tsurii897 Exactly. The Q&A was rescheduled since Iwata got a flu. NintendoLife produces lots of strange articles these days.

Stealth Inc. 2 is a must for anyone who like really good Wii U games.