While Splatoon 2 was the only multiplayer competitive game i actually cared “getting gud” at for a while, i also loved the campaigns, as the single player challenges and obstacles kept reminding me of classic Ratchet & Clank games, so i hoped they would eventually do a single player focused spin-off (Splatoon 3 didn’t grab me as much and so i kinda stopped playing it on the regular after a while)… and last year they did announced it, and now here it is, with Splatoon Raiders, the first game of the series to be on Switch 2 (as a console exclusive).

It’s a Splatoon 3 spin-off that has the Deep Cut trio go to inspect a mysterious new island on Salmonoid territory in order to search for treasures, only for the helicopter to crash. They manage to survive on a rig, find a robot that sees tailored made to explore and loot the wilderness of this archipelago, so – with the help of the pilot – decide to keep searching for more treasures as benevolent thieves, hoping the booty will help pay out the immense debt Splatville has amassed.

Gameplay wise, it’s actually more than just them repurposing the Salmon Run mode from Splatoon 2 and 3, it uses that as base but eventually becomes its own thing, while keeping some “trials/challenges” testing-teaching how to use both old and new weapons and subweapons alike, which now can be combined and dual wielded depending on your playstile; plus it looks great, can be fairly challenging and there’s always something rewarding you, in terms of items, gear pieces, custom modifiers, materials for upgrading the base and obtaining new facilities.

Honestly this is exactly what i wanted and expected from a single player focused (though there is local and online co-op) Splatoon game.