I have a lot of emotions about Sizzle 2024 and the future, do you?

[Aiko.Octo]

You know, I was going to make this a profile post since it's a bit on the personal side, but there's too much to say and I also wanted to open it up for others to tell their side of things because I like hearing those perspectives.

The amount of progress I've made this season is surreal to me. I started playing ranked end of February 2023, got to A by the end of May 2023, and then... made no further progress for almost an entire year. Then I got to A+ May 2024 and then to both S and S+ this season. That's just... beyond what I previously thought possible for myself. And the biggest factor in that by far was actually having people to talk to and explain my challenges to and bounce ideas off of and generally actively learn from instead of trying to figure everything out in a vacuum by myself. So thank you to all of you who were involved in that. I sure didn't get this far alone <3

We're going into the first season of no huge content updates and it feels like an interesting threshold to cross. Grand Fest is in sight and the game going forward is going to be a different place. A lot of people will taper off playing as updates slow down (especially the folks who wanted to stop playing long ago but felt shackled by FOMO).

But personally I feel like everything is just beginning; there's so much I want to do next season and I can't seem to pick a focus. I want to learn like a dozen new weapons and see how high I can grind in both S+ and X and of course take part in any competitive event that I can. For the first time, I think, I actually feel kind of limitless, or at the very least no longer bound by the outdated idea that there are some things I just can't do.

Obviously I do have limits though (mostly in the sense of a limited amount of time to play each day) so I'll either have to prioritize something eventually or just make peace with the fact that doing a little bit of everything at once means it will take a longer time to hit milestones in anything specific. But I'll worry about that later. Right now I am just... enjoying being excited about everything.

But how are you all feeling about this? What was this season like for you? How do you feel about the new era that we're entering, and how will that impact your style/frequency of play, if at all? What hopes and plans do you have for the coming season and beyond?

 

[Cephalobro]

After being shackled by the FOMO for so much of my time, I feel relieved that it won't have any more new catalogs. So I can finally treat Splatoon 3 just like how I treated the previous Splatoon games in regards to games from other series I play: as a very secondary game while the primary game will be the other games in my library.

And as for what new heights I will go for in Splatoon 3, well, that's easy, I'm finally going to go into Anarchy mode now that I can simply divide my Splatoon 3 attention between that and Salmon Run (with a side attention to getting every single gear in the game and filling their slots, which coincides with the Salmon Run part for obvious reasons), when I don't want to do either but still want to play Splatoon 3? Finish getting all of the card sleeves from Tableturf.

EDIT: But not to worry, I will still keep making Splatoon SFMs when I have the time to do so.

 

[sevenleaf]

But personally I feel like everything is just beginning; there's so much I want to do next season and I can't seem to pick a focus. I want to learn like a dozen new weapons and see how high I can grind in both S+ and X and of course take part in any competitive event that I can. For the first time, I think, I actually feel kind of limitless, or at the very least no longer bound by the outdated idea that there are some things I just can't do.

honestly i feel this too!!! content updates ending kinda sucks i guess but i just started my competitive journey this year and just now i feel like i’m starting to find my footing. i haven’t hit S+ yet but i’m taking the end of this season not as yet another failure but as a reset point yknow? and as the season ends and i’m coming out of a several-months-long slump i’m feeling motivated to push myself competitively going forward

sry to be sappy on your thread but it’s been awesome improving alongside my teammates in genesis wave and yall in octo airlines and all the other competitive squidboards regulars and i’m really excited for the future for all of us the end of content updates just doesn’t feel like an end at all because the competitive community and our lil chunk of it isn’t going anywhere anytime soon

 

[briank913]

I get the sentiment but I think it's refreshing to start a season without new weapons and new toys. It's a bummer knowing that some will never get the third kits that will pop off (Dread D:) but I think it's a good time to continue honing the skills we've developed and to pursue improvement. Maybe there's some secret hope for some form of content extension but I'm of the view that we should enjoy what we have now. Besides, we got the next Big Run (hype!), Grand Festival, and more GAMBLING to do.

Sizzle 24 really was a banger with Triumvirate, BIG Big Run, the last batch of 2nd kits, Sashimori's glorious return, and silly adventures. If I could summarize Sizzle 24 at the personal level, it would be: accomplishment. I 5-starred Sploosh, finally 999'd all 7 SR maps, and grew more proficient with many weapons. We even won a game of Low Ink with Sploosh! What a way to end the season!

I've been playing around with Forge Pro lately and I think that and/or Carbon may be my go to for the next season. That and thanks to Scales being a reward, I am aiming for that 333 Gold Banner!