@Pusha
To be honest, I find it quite bothersome to highlight and answer to every points of your statement, especially since I have to repeat myself. But I'm enclined to do it to clear out my point of view.
No, what makes any game competitive is a skill gap. No skill gap = No competitive game. Anything that increases that gap is beneficial for competitive and anything that decreases the gap is detrimental to competitive. Giving people some form of mini-map first of all implies everyone has the same map, so it doesn't somehow create unfair situations out of the blue. It also doesn't remove stealth from the game, you can still hide in ink, you can still approach from behind, but it makes it appropriately more difficult.
Having a mini map in Splatoon actually decrease the skill gap between players if we follow your logic, since players have a lot more ease to localize themselves. Thus, we lose a decent part of thought-processing that goes into map control and situation awareness. Thought-processing and mindgames also add to the skill gaps and it's important, skill gaps aren't all about direct confrontation and movements.
Having a mini map in regular shooters is necessary, because sounds on their own aren't enough for players to localize non visible foes, it's confusing and it might slow down the pace of the game, or worse, games get stale. On the other hand, Splatoon has pretty visible ink bullets or trail going through the small map, you can see ink everywhere and eventually, it's not your team's ink, and that's probably not a good sign and this place is dangerous. That's basically your alternative to a mini map, and a smart alternative imo.
Stealth is completely pointless if you know an opponent has a good chance of being there in the first place. At least, without a mini map, you can sneak from behind setting yourself up crossing a wall, for example, and that'll possibly work because there won't be a mini map to reveal your plan since your potential target won't see ink being spread in his direction. This adds depth, and depth contributes in creating skill gaps, because the better player knows how to take advantages of options the other player might not expect.
If you are behind someone and you don't get a kill it is your fault and your fault alone. If they turn and get a kill on you, you screwed up and whether they turned because of a map or team communication or because their magic 8 ball told them too doesn't matter. What mini-maps help with are players camping or hiding or flanking. It makes it more difficult to do those things, which is good because it increases skill gap. It doesn't eliminate playing "smart and good" as you call it, it just makes you also have to have gunskill to earn your kills.
I don't know why you see flanking as a cheap option. I don't see why you must rely on a mini map to prevent being flanked. Actually I see why, it's just blatant lazyness when it comes to covering options.
To me, it just seems like you're the kind of player to whine when someone screws you as you didn't expect it, since the game doesn't clearly show the danger to you. That's just neglecting options, a lack of lucidity, not respecting the possible unfavorable outcomes you might face, even though every hints are shown to indicate you an hostile area, including being near a wall that might hide a player, who can possibly take you off guard a few seconds later.
Having a mini map in that case puts you way too safe. I kinda understand that you prefer direct confrontation, but again, not everything is about this.
Camping more than 10 seconds is useless in Turf war, you can just ignore a camper to focus on areas he or she doesn't cover, which is a lot since weapons range is limited in Splatoon, even for Charger weapons. A camper is definitely a deadweight for his team, and basically free turf to take all around the map.
Either a motion sensor within a radius, a mini map with ink or a mini map with shots registering would all add a simple extra layer to the game that would be beneficial to competitive play.
Good news for you, there's actually a secondary or special weapon that can localize foes for you and all your teammates. It's basically a temporary wallhack.
Again, i reiterate, it is largely due to the lack of voice chat that this problem might arise. No opportunity to give callouts online is silly and sucks for competitive because it greatly reduces your ability for map awareness. In other games the mini-map can fill part of the void, but not in splatoon.
I disagree, and I already said several times that Splatoon gives you all the visual hints to determine the situation on the map. I'd rather think not being able to acknowledge that is proof of lacking individual awareness. I find myself not having real issues dealing with all this, I always know where I must go, and what I should be aware of danger when approaching certains areas of a map, am I a genius or something ? Probably not.
I also do think the lack of voice chat in
public rooms is not as essential and dramatic as overstated by some people, which seems to include yourself.
Serious players will always find a way to communicate with Skype, TS, Mumble or anything else like everytime. If Mario Kart players can, die-hard Splatoon players won't really have any problems dealing with this. The lack of voice chat is still very regrettable for those who really lack options on this matter though, not denying it.
If you still can't take these arguments, then there's no point in continuing this discussion with you, I won't change your mind, you'll still be pissed off by the lack of mini map, even though there's no real concern to have on this aspect, given you put enough efforts playing the game as it should be played.
We'll then just let the meta talk for itself once the game comes out. ¯\_(ツ)_/¯
