Nintendo on going the original IP route with Splatoon, post-launch content rollout

A portion of a Nintendo Life interview with producer Hisashi Nogami...

NL: It's been stated that existing Nintendo IPs were previously considered for Splatoon, before the concept for squids was decided upon. How important was that decision in terms of the final concept and the player abilities that define the gameplay?

HN: One option we had was to use an existing IP, but our biggest focus was on a character design that best communicated the gameplay. As our objective here was to create something with gameplay the likes of which hadn't been seen before, we felt new characters would be best to represent this as opposed to an existing IP, hence why we went in that direction.

NL: Can you explain the reasoning for gradually rolling out additional stages, items and modes in the months after release?

HN: There are two reasons for this:

First, we put a lot of effort into every inch of the online stages, so by playing them over and over again users can get a better feel for the terrain, giving the gameplay more breadth and depth. The characteristics of the weapons and the strategies for using them vary with each weapon, and of course these will vary depending on the stage you use them in and even what combination of equipment your teammates and opponents are using. We want users to enjoy each and every single piece of content we've prepared, so rather than provide a lot at once, we're going to be adding them a little at a time.

Second, is that while we've paid a lot of attention to the balancing the game, the flip-side of this is that we feel the game needs weapons with a lot of variety as well as stages with complex layouts to really expand the gameplay.

The problem there is that these can sometimes disrupt the overall balance of the game.

The real fun of Splatoon comes when players are comfortable with the game, and are able to play to their full potential with other players they meet in the online matches.

We'll be adding more stages and weapons as we see how the community matures. We'll also do something similar with further game modes too.