Iwata Asks ("The Inklings in Splatoon was going to be Rabbits")

[YesI'mTaco34]

Is it bad that I prefer these character designs?

kinda looks like a character you would see in Sponge Bob cartoon

 

[redadil4]

"We made a lot more. But we didn’t just make weapons to have more weapons. We planned everything out so that we could pair geographical features and weapons to create a variety of ways to play. So it was a lot of work even when we added just one weapon...

Iwata
It’s no fun if there’s a weapon that always lets you win.

Sato
Right. If this was just a one-player game, we could make an ultimate weapon that players would enjoy playing with, but since it’s a competitive online game, we took those ten months to adjust the overall game balance so each weapon had its pros and cons.

Amano
We also took a lot of time to test out the stages, with help from the people at Mario Club15.15. Mario Club Co., Ltd.: Debugs and tests Nintendo software which is under development.

Sato
If a stage was unbalanced, and there was even a slight advantage in strength, it made for a big discrepancy between players and ruined any chances to turn the battle around.

Iwata
And that’s not quite what you want for a competitive online game, is it?

Sato
Right. We wanted players to feel like they couldn’t let their guard down until the bitter end, to give them a really exciting battle. So we spent a lot of time on that.

Nogami
And there’s a real sense of accomplishment when your strategy pays off. If you work hard on something and it doesn’t bring results, you get sick of it."
Iwata: You want that effort to be rewarded.

Nogami
Right. So we took a lot of care in making all of the stages and the weapons one by one, so we could make that happen.

Amano
So each time we added a weapon, we needed to test it on the stage.

Nogami
So it was sort of like a math problem. If we added a single weapon, it was not a simple addition as we had to adjust all sorts of other variables, like a math problem, and we did that right up until the game was completed.



It definitely seem they put a lot of work into balancing the game!!!

 

[SilverEra]

It would be cool if we'd have the rabbit designs as DLC.

 

[WaifuRaccoonBL]

I always love iwata asks! <3

Anyway, always interesting to hear how Splatoon started.

Like all the little details they did as well. I can't say I like a lot of the original ideas, so they made the correct call.

I am sad they don't think the name caught on. I certainly call them Inklings.

 

[Geistbox]

Amano: But in the beginning we weren’t trying to create a new character. We were trying to create a new game structure first and foremost.

Nogami: That’s right. We weren’t invested in creating a new character. We just set out to create a game with a new structure.

Iwata: That’s very important. The way that (Shigeru) Miyamoto-san and the EAD make games, the idea comes not from the design, but from the function. The design comes after.

Form following function is easily what separates Nintendo from many of the developers that get this so wrong, and is why there's been no better time for Nintendo to create a brand new all-star cast.

 

[Howl7]

Really interesting Iwata ask, it was funny to read and obviously, thanks for sharing!^^
Like others i will be happy to see tofu and rabbit gears, Splatoon development's Easter Egg! *-*

 

[kinetik07]

Is it bad that I prefer these character designs?

looks like they kept the design

Spoiler

 

[Davybot]

Boy howdy am I glad they didn't go rabbits.
Not saying I hate them, they look cute, but squids squids/octos make way too much sense.

 

[LinkJr]

They need to release a "Bunny Hood" for the Inklings now!

Really great read, I like these more when they show prototype images, makes it more interesting to see the game evolve from the white blocks to the final product.

 

[shrooby]

I'll have to go through the whole interview later, but it sounds interesting on the surface.

I'm glad they did the change.
Think of all the bad puns that couldn't be made!
That's a world I don't wanna to live in.

 

[Graff]

Shoulda been cows shooting different flavors of milk out their udders.

 

[RedML51]

As cool as squids are, tofu might have been cooler protagonists...

Splatofu!

But squids are cool too. Rabbits wouldn't have made sense really... I'm glad they released that concept photo though, haha. It looks like they got quite a bit of the design done before they even decided on/designed the Inklings, which is interesting...

 

[Terabyte]

I just read the Iwata Asks earlier. I'm glad that they made the changes they did instead of leaving it at tofu, really glad... Rabbits would be okay I guess, but Inklings were the best choice imo.

 

[MrRoidley]

That was an interesting read.
It's funny how the squid idea came much later than the ink concept, and that they thought of rabbits as characters before the squids.

 

[missingno]

I just realized, this is the old squid-people design.

 

[BOOXMOWO]

I definitely think they made the right choice. As lovable as rabbits are there are so many of them in video games, cartoons, etc. it wouldn't have been as memorable. Being the only (or one of the only? At least the first I've heard of) squid-centric game gives Splatoon a unique motif (and so many pun opportunities).

More importantly every gameplay feature they wanted to include from the start makes so much sense for the Inkling, I'm kind of amazed at how perfectly it fits.

Also I've seen so many people misinterpret "We considered using Mario" as "It started as a Mario spin-off" over the past few months. I hope they finally catch the memo after this.

 

[RedML51]

Also I've seen so many people misinterpret "We considered using Mario" as "It started as a Mario spin-off" over the past few months. I hope they finally catch the memo after this.

Not to mention that Nogami even says in the interview that they forgot about Sunshine initially. So it sounds as though they weren't even thinking about Sunshine when making Splatoon. (at least, at first)

 

[Gideonsmash]

Rabbits? Hmm, now I see why they didn't know what they wanted to do with the game (an earlier interview)

 

[MINUS]

Even though squids work better at creating a completely unique game experience, their design philosophy behind nearly choosing rabbits was also genius.

 

[FlareHabanero]

I kind of want to see the rabbits as future DLC as sort of a nod to the prototype.