A basketball team cannot make up for a massive deficit in points in the last 30 seconds in the game. A football team cannot make up for a massive deficit in points in the last 30 seconds of a game. In turf war, the map could be 80% good guys and can turn into 80% bad guys in the last 30 seconds of a game. Overtime in the other modes may allow a team that was seriously behind to overcome something, but there are severe restrictions and massive pressure in order to stop them from doing so, and go figure, it's only easier to do so if they didn't have a massive deficit in points. Good luck getting your tower from 100 to 4 in the last lap of a game just off of one team wipe, or holding a point for that long when the enemy team has been dominating you the whole time. The snapshot in other sports analogy does not hold up at all. The swing snapshot is absolutely one of the reasons Turf War isn't viable, especially because it's a set amount of time and you can't win by knockout, which stops stellar teams from preventing comebacks and "messing up" to begin with.
People also talk about fun but fun does not define competitive. Also, splatoon's mechanics in an of themselves greatly separate it from other shooters even if their modes resemble others, it doesn't need turf war to be unique and that's not even the big point to be discussing anyway.
I'm not really sure if you're responding to Helio alone or (it kind of seems as) if you're including me (this is why we quote lol) but I'm gonna give you my opinion anyway, and you're going to like it.
Yeah but (and I'm obviously simplifying here) turf wars =/= sports. Video games in general work very differently from sports in general when it comes to rulesets. Most competitive video games don't use the goal/point system, opting for an objective instead. As you yourself admitted to, all the splatoon modes (technically) have swing potential not found in sports. there may be a variety of places where sports and competitive gaming, such as strategy, mindset, training, momentum, etc. but when it comes to objectives it often doesn't translate well. There are exceptions obviously, but that just makes the rule :P
On the note of the other modes; the fact that it's harder to make the comeback in other modes is basically meaningless. the difficulty of something has nothing to do with how competitive it is.
You sound very assertive and confident in stating that swing/snapshot is one of the reasons the mode isn't competitive, but I don't see you giving any definitive reasoning or proof as to why it is. You can't point to it giving either team an unfair advantage, or letting the team who played the mode better in that match come out on top.All you've really done is compare it to sports, and other modes and talk about the fact you can't get knockouts.
Speaking of which, teams at every level are able to get knockouts, in all modes. It's not at all indicative of being stellar. Also the fact that you can end the game preemptively doesn't intrinsically make it more competitive, and it certainly isn't the only way for a mode to be competitive. Saying that the fact you can't knock people out, which makes you more likely to mess up late game and lose is not an argument for non-competitiveness.that's like someone trying to say sprints are more indicative of who is the better runner, because longer races gives the other person a chance to catch up and maybe win. If the mode is about being incredibly consistent, and not giving your opponents so much as an opportunity to cover an equal amount of turf, then that's just what the mode as is about. you can't say the fact that some people aren't consistent enough to achieve that makes the game noncompetitive. If that's the case, they just need to -as the phrase so famously goes- "git gud", so to speak. If they can't handle that pressure, blaming the mode is a wuss' way of handling that fact.
Also I don't think Helio was implying that the game being fun actually makes it more competitive, he gave it as a reason to be played in competition. Different things.
Anyway, look, I'm a strong believer in the "innocent until proven guilty" thought process when it comes to what should and should not be banned in a game, and many around here at least claim to be of a similar mind. The evidence you've given is far from damning. As I mentioned before, competitiveness is mostly decided by a game's balance. generally, as long as both/all teams/players have an equally opportunity at winning, or even a reasonably close chance at winning, the game is competitive. This is the case with the snapshot/swing feature. At least until you can give a factual reason as to some way this provides an unfair advantage to one player/team over the other, I think it's best you stop stating it as a reason for the mode not being competitive, and simply state the truth instead: it's frustrating. remember, frustrating =/= noncompetitive
And once again, there are other arguments to be made for a lack of competitiveness, I'm just saying this isn't one of them.