Hullo all, I am a low/midlevel (Div 4) player who has some (maybe spicy?) opinions on map design, and game design in general. In the recent push of this website, I am going to use this post to gauge my newfound ability to not be limited by Tweet characters. This thread will be extremely nerdy, please be warned.


So, first of all, the established norms: The way I interpret the current way of understanding map design (good or bad) in Splatoon is what I am going to refer to as "Overlapping Route Theory", which I will define as the following: "By creating new routes or flanks that counter other positions, usually by using various levels of height difference to create new ways of attacking the same area at the same angle, the map will avoid stalemate and you will always have options, thus creating a more fun playstyle.

I want to note that in this post, I will not entirely be focusing on fun, because I believe that to be entirely subjective; what one player finds fun, another may not, and while consensus can form, I do not believe that one of this nature actually has. Because I do not believe that this theory actually explains the good map design in Splatoon, and I believe some terminology has actually lead people to thinking that it is one and the same with say, The Reef.

Next it is important for me to establish another definition, one that you may not have thought about defining. What is a route, or a flank? These are often used interchangably in discussion, as if they are synonyms, but I do not agree. A route (more synonymous with a "lane") is not the same as a flank. A flank, to start, is both an action and a type of map part. Here is how I define the two:

A route is a stretch of the map which offers tactical/positional advantages, with no clear disadvantages in a vacuum.
A flank is an area that stretches around a route which offers no tactical advantage whatsoever.
A position will also be defined here: A position will be used as a metagaming term in this post that is defined as the following: "An area of the map that gives the team on top of it a way to exert pressure on the enemy, or deny the enemy from exerting pressure." It effectively just means any strong point of control that is worth playing around.
This is in my opinion an effective definition that covers differences between a route and a flank, and allows you to distinguish them in conversation. Is the drop from Museum D'Alfonsino from spawn a drop or a flank? It is a flank, because standing on top of that area waiting to drop, by the map's design, does not give any real advantage. You cannot paint much of the map, or exert more pressure outside of your presence, which is not deadly until you drop. Thus, it holds no real tactical advantage to hold that position, thus it's a flank.

Meanwhile, the path through court that allows you to exert pressure onto ramp, top mid, or even further is definitionally a route, as holding it gives a positional and tactical advantage. So now that I have made definitions, I believe I can truly show more of what I mean in terms of "people have been thinking about this wrong", in my opinion, especially regarding the public: In my opinion, strong maps should form a good balance around good strong positions that can be held reliably on the defensive, and positions that are harder to reliably hit on the offense. This may sound annoying at first, because that would mean we are trying to favor defensive play, no? The core of this ideology revolves around the fact that Splatoon is a swingy game.

Splatoon is not just a game where you get a few kills so you push up some score, it's a game where if you go two down twice in a row, it can end the match. Splatoon game timers are low for a reason, because it only takes under a minute to end the game optimally. However, this also means that it is easy to make a comeback, which is good, but a problem with bad maps is that they make it too easy to get offensive positions in the enemy base, thus locking them out easily.

Many have categorized Splatoon 3's bad maps as being really easy to lockdown, but hard to push past chokepoints. I do not actually agree with the second part, the real change is that the maps now disagree with spawns and where the spawn truly is. Many tend to articulate The Reef's strength as having many routes to play the game, and I do agree it has plenty, but it isn't good because of some flank safe-haven. It's because the spawn is layered and you actually have the ability and space to get specials and defend- while this was annoying in Splatoon 2 because the special design was bad, it also is just how the game is played. If you get wiped, you need to either get nice picks off the bat, or more realistically, get specials (even more realistic with things like Tacticooler).


I am going to fill in what I consider the Safe Area for the defending team, where enemies cannot simply run into the top of their base and attack, without the defending team dropping, or trying to attack back at bad angles; ie. making mistakes, which is what you want, you want players to be punished for making mistakes, but not really otherwise.



Green is space that is entirely for the defending team. The purple is area that is definitionally the defending team's spawn area, but the enemy can hang out in, even if they may not want to.The only way to get up to Green here is to use specials, or maybe some bug I dunno about, but intentionally, this is all free space. And in my opinion, this is something every actually good map has. One thing you may also realize is that the worst mode on this map is Rainmaker, which is partially because Rainmaker is whacky (especially without checkpoints), but it's also because now the spawn is way more similar to a Splatoon 2 spawn. Because now the enemy can just waltz up with specials and you have no ****ing space to defend yourself. Splatoon 2 LOVES doing this on Rainmaker, albeit probably because of the flaws of the mode rather than bad map design itself; The Reef is a great design, but it would need major, major overhauls to fit Rainmaker, which almost inherently demands larger and longer spaces the Rainmaker has to travel, and thus without going through the effort to do that, the developers usually just open up the spawn and put the ending in there. On one hand this may sound good because it means that on respawn you are just moments away from punishing the carrier, but in practice, that'd mean getting pelted with specials, bombs, etc. even in Splatoon 1 or 3. As long as you can effectively fight on the enemy spawn, it is not truly a good spawn.

Now, I started this talking about the differences between things like old spawns and Splatoon 3's, and it should be obvious where I am going. There is almost no ****ing free space to play the game. This is why I do not agree with the criticism that it is too hard to push, it is too EASY to push, and not get punished; the maps have such little free space, that the swinginess of the game is in full effect.

Look at Eeltail Alley. Some may complain that the area "into the spawn" is a chokepoint, but the truth is, you basically cover the entire spawn by just having one Crab or Trizooka, and thus rhetorically that is not true in my opinion. You are actually holding the enemy spawn by just using one special, because there is no safety.



So, why would they do this? For the flashy new spawn system, of course! They want us to just run in, and run in, and push push push. It increases the pace which is appreciated, but I feel they missed the mark on seemingly thinking this means that spawns shouldn't be as big of a deal, because they are everything. You need that safe space to recover as a team and to actually play the game when put down. On The Reef, the game does not believe that if you win a teamfight, you should automatically be on equal ground for the next fight. Splatoon 3's maps generally do, you make one mistake in one teamfight, and they seemingly feel you deserve to be at, at best, equal positioning with the opponents. While this may sound cool and sound like something that appeals to competitive play, I do not agree. You need an actual flow to the match for it to feel good, and not be rocketing back and forth into spawns. The Reef isn't just good because I said so, it's good because almost everyone says so.

Addendum / Some Nuance: This does not mean any map with a subpar spawn is bad, of course. It's that these maps have to get around that in some way. Crableg has low free space, but outside of maybe Clam where I feel AOE weapons can position under ledge extremely easily (the clam basket itself is nice cover), it is generally defendable in spawn because it's open enough and has a height difference. If you just paint back and push them out, it's not like they can just run back in quickly, they have to give up ground. This is strangely uncommon in Splatoon 3 maps. Also, good spawn does not = good map either. I'd say Inkblot has a pretty good spawn region in most modes, but it being a good map or not is debatable (it's probably just Mid).

Now, I am running out of steam, but this is not the last I will talk on this subject. Especially on the mysticism regarding "flanks" and how they are supposedly the solution to all problems (they aren't, and in some cases can cause problems, in my opinion). But I want to open this up for other thoughts first, especially as Squidboards is only now regaining popularity.

Thank you for reading!