Splatoon 3 Season 2: 8 New Features In The Chill Season
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The seasonal format has been adopted by just about every developer since Fortnite’s meteoric rise, and Splatoon has now jumped aboard that format. Not much has changed here, mind you, with the exception of holding off substantial content updates until the currently allotted period.
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Despite the differences between Splatoon 3 and the usual battle pass format for shooters like Battlefield or Call of Duty, there is plenty of content to enjoy this time around for players who have been here since launch or are jumping in for the holiday season. Here’s everything new in Splatoon 3 during Season 2: Chill Season
New Catalog 
The catalog introduced at launch refreshes with 100 new ranks to unlock throughout the season. It includes the usual assortment of gear, nametags, tableturf cards, and the like. While there is a good mix of everything here, there is still not much unique to this system that warrants interacting with it. XP is earned cumulatively over time throughout most game modes, so you don’t have to do much to unlock the tiers, but someone from Nintendo misunderstands the battle pass system.
The reason for this system is to build in desired rewards that keep players playing the game regularly — or even buy the tiers outright. While it’s probably a good thing tiers are not up for purchase, it feels like a tacked on reward system rather than something that keeps you playing.
Balance Changes & Bug Fixes 
The patch prior to the season’s launch was light on the usual balance changes that players of all skill levels have been waiting for. While there are a plethora of bug fixes, the only substantial balance changes are to ink coverage requirements to unlock specials, the power of the Reefslider and Ink Vac Charge Shot getting a buff, and making it harder to spam Tenta Missiles.
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Games from launch up until 2.0 saw Tenta Missiles all over the place. Now, players who use the special will have to wait until it has completely finished before they can start building up another one. These are all positive changes, but the lack of drastic or widespread changes has some players concerned they will have to wait another few months for the meta to shift.
New & Returning Gear 
Season 3 welcomes some seasonal themed gear such as the moby knit, a knit sweater for your squid or octoling, and even the aptly named ‘fuzzy boots’ — heavily based on ugg boots. There are also a number of returning gear items from both Splatoon 1 and 2, such as the skull bandana, painter’s mask, and varsity jacket. It’s nice to see a commitment from Splatoon’s current team to adding seasonal items for the winter, as well as some popular items in games past like the varsity jacket.
With this current theming, it’s safe to assume every season will have themed clothing added, as well as ones returning from the previous titles.
New Weapon Kits 
Possibly the biggest addition to the game in Chill Season, the massive number of new weapon kits added to the game should help diversify loadouts for the months and even the year to come. While this update limits the new kits to just ten items, they should all see some play throughout the game in the coming weeks.
Two of the new kits, Aerospray RG and the Forge Splattershot Pro both feature the Booyah Bomb, which is still the best special in the entire game.
New Weapons 
Three new weapons were added to the game with the Splattershot Nova, the Big Swig Roller, and the Sniperwriter 5h. The Nova features a high firing rate and long range but with lackluster damage. Its sub and special are the Point Sensor and Killer Wail, which should make it a fairly mobile weapon.
Second is the Big Swig Roller, a new roller class weapon with good ink output and firing speed. Splash Wall and Ink Vac give it good longer range use for vertical flicks and defensive options.
Last is the Snipewriter 5h, easily the most interesting of the new weapons. When fully charged, it can fire five separate shots before needing to charge again. These charged shots can two-shot enemies from any distance. The Sprinkler and Tacticooler combo also allow you to play both backline support, medium range, or up close to take advantage of its consistent damage output.
Two New Maps 
Many will likely be interested in the two new maps added to the game. Sadly, both of these maps are less than stellar. Flounder Heights, a map from Splatoon 1 that was not featured in 2, makes its return, and with good reason. It is a vertical map with far too much space to cover in turf war, making it quite chaotic. Ranked modes are challenging for teams without voice chat, as it’s easy to scale the walls behind the enemy team and flank. For three-way battles during Splatfests, it should be great as the middle team with four players will have the high ground.
Brinewater Springs is a new map with not nearly enough room to spread out. Each team has a long roll-out point before converging on mid, which even with side areas intended to get around the enemy feels far too small. Teams almost entirely stick to the midpoint or back closer towards spawn. There is also little recourse once teams start pushing back towards spawn, making most matches lopsided.
X Rank Returns 
High ranked players will be relieved to see X rank returning in Splatoon 3. X rank is separate for every ranked game mode: Splat Zones, Tower Control, Clam Blitz, and Rainmaker. X rank players are also separated by region. The Takoroka division separates Japan, Hong Kong, South Korea, Australia, and New Zealand into their own region, with the Tentatek division featuring North and South American and European players.
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This is likely done for latency and connectivity reasons, with X-rank being more competitive than lower ranks, this is far more important. This could also be a way for Nintendo to more easily separate top players for competitive tournaments, where Japanese players have historically dominated.
Big Run 
Coming in mid-December, Big Run is a new special time event for the Salmon Run game mode. In this event, Salmon Run will be played on traditional Splatoon maps rather than its own exclusive Salmon Run maps. The first map announced and expected to be used for the event is Wahoo World.
Splatoon’s official social media accounts have also teased an exclusive locker reward for the best performers during the event. This is hardly a huge motivator for most players, as the locker mechanic has seen much less use since launch, but it’s nice to know Nintendo is conscious about offering rewards to keep players invested throughout an event outside Splatfests.
Splatoon 3’s Chill Season ends on March 1st, 2023. It is unknown at this time if this will immediately roll into the nest season or if there will be a down period.
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