Splatoon 3 Releases Update 8.1.0

Splatoon 3 has just released its latest 8.1.0 update, which adjusts a number of aspects to Nintendo’s colorful third-person shooter. The most prominent changes to Splatoon 3 are in regard to the player controls, multiplayer, smaller fixes and tweaks, as well as multiple bug fixes. A full list of these changes coming to the game was cataloged by Nintendo for fans to view.

Splatoon 3 was first released in 2022 and has gone on to be one of Nintendo’s most popular games on the Switch. The game’s content has been consistently updated for the past two years with free updates and events like Splatfests. Splatoon 3‘s 2024 Sizzle Season is the game’s eighth season, having started last month, and will continue to run until August 31. Splatoon 3‘s version 8.0.0 update was one of the biggest shake-ups to the game, as it added a number of new weapons, titles, and gear, among other things, for players to experiment with. Nintendo has released a follow-up update, changing a number of aspects to Splatoon 3‘s multiplayer.

The full list of changes in Splatoon 3‘s version 8.1.0 update made many changes to the multiplayer modes, controls, and Splatoon 3‘s various weapons. These changes include making it easier for Squid Beakons and Big Bubblers to be placed close together due to elevation differences, or making it easier to jump while moving along the edge of the map’s terrain. Points required to acquire certain special weapons have been adjusted as well.

Some quality-of-life changes were also implemented in this update, such as being able to press the A Button to fast-forward during the animations where XP is earned in the lobby after battle or earning Grizzco Points in Salmon Run. A lot of changes have been made to the signal functions, making it easier for players to relay information to their teammates during Salmon Run.

Some other changes were made to make it easier to use Splatoon 3‘s photo mode during Private Battles, such as being able to start recon even when only one team has players, or making the This way! and Booyah! signals visible to all players on the map. As such, a lot of these changes were focused on balancing the game’s multiplayer and making the gameplay more comfortable.

Splatoon 3 appears to be nearing its end of its lifecycle, with the game having had nearly two years of support. While rumors of a Splatoon 4 for the Switch successor are swirling, the stream of updates for Splatoon 3 are going to keep players invested for the time being.

Splatoon 3 Ver. 8.1.0 Patch Notes

Changes to Player Controls

• Made it so that when a player opens a brella’s canopy, the canopy opens on other players’ screens quicker than before.
  • This is to decrease the delay between the canopy opening on the user’s screen and the canopy opening on other players’ screens as much as possible.
• Made it easier to place Squid Beakons and Big Bubblers close to elevation differences.
• Made it so that the scattered weapon and gear of a defeated player vanishes quicker than before.
• Made it so that, when a swimming player returns to Inkling form and uses a weapon right away, the ink on their body vanishes quicker than before.
  • This is to alleviate the decreased visibility when the player is the same color as the ink on the ground even when in Inkling form.
• Made it so that when a player is moving at the edge of an elevation difference, the phenomenon where that player moves back and forth between the higher and lower elevations in a short period of time on other players’ screens will occur less often.
• Made it easier than before to jump while moving along the edge of terrain.
• Made it so that, when equipping the Mint Decavitator and the Charcoal Decavitator and holding the ZR Button, the sight that indicates where the attack will impact or terminate displays just like when not holding the ZR Button.

Changes to Multiplayer

• Main Weapon Changes:

  Weapon	Details
  Aerospray MG Aerospray RG	Radius of ink splatter at the point of impact increased by approximately 3%.
  Blaster Custom Blaster	Amount of time to start recovering ink after firing decreased by about 1/20th of a second.
  Clash Blaster Clash Blaster Neo	Movement speed while firing increased by approximately 4%.
  S-BLAST ’92 S-BLAST ’91	Continuous fire interval has been reduced by about 1/12th of a second.
  Carbon Roller Carbon Roller Deco	Adjustments have been made to damage-falloff rate based on distance for horizontal swings, allowing it to deal 50.0 damage/100 damage farther than it did before. Vertical swings’ collision detection has been expanded, making it easier to hit opponents.
  Dynamo Roller Gold Dynamo Roller	Horizontal swings flinging ink has been adjusted to leave fewer gaps in inking or attacks.
  Big Swig Roller Big Swig Roller Express	Horizontal swing damage to distant opponents increased from 35.0 to 40.0. No change to the damage at distances that deal 50.0 damage or higher.
  Inkbrush Inkbrush Nouveau	Collision detection with players has slightly expanded for the ink flung when swinging the brush to make it easier to hit opponents.
  Octobrush Octobrush Nouveau Orderbrush Replica	Collision detection with players for the ink flung when swinging the brush has been expanded to make it easier to hit opponents.
  Douser Dualies FF Custom Douser Dualies FF	Amount of ink consumed when firing reduced by approximately 14%. Amount of ink consumed by Dodge Rolls reduced from 12% of the ink tank to 10%.
  Recycled Brella 24 Mk I Recycled Brella 24 Mk II	Time required for canopies lost by being launched or broken by an opponent to recover has been reduced by about 1/3rd of a second.

• Special Weapon Changes:

  Special Weapon	Change Details
  Reefslider	Radius of the explosion area that deals 70.0 damage increased by about 10%. Radius of the ink splatter from an explosion decreased by about 5%.
  Ink Vac	When the ink shot impacts a wall, the explosion will also ink nearby ground. When the ink shot impacts the ground, the explosion will also ink nearby walls.
  Super Chump	Time between decoys falling and exploding reduced from about 4.0 seconds to about 3.5 seconds.
  Trizooka	Damage dealt to Big Bubbler has been decreased to about 67% of what it was before.
  Inkjet	Damage dealt to Big Bubbler by direct shots and explosions has reduced to about 67% of what it was before.
  Kraken Royale	Increased the amount of time to finish charging up a charge attack by about 1/12th of a second.

• Points required for some special weapons have been changed.

  Weapon	Before	After
  Krak-On Splat Roller	180	170
  Bloblobber Deco	200	190

• In X Battles, the conditions changed for players’ current tentative rankings during a season to display on-screen from within rank 3000 to within rank 50000.
• In Clam Blitz mode, when a player throws a clam or power clam into the goal right before it closes on their screen, the count will progress, and the goal will open up again, even if at that point the goal was already closed on other players’ screens, so long as it is within a certain amount of time since the goal closed.

Other Changes

• Pressing the A Button will fast-forward the animations on the screens where XP and Grizzco Points are calculated after returning to the lobby or Grizzco.
• In battles, pressing Down will not send the Booyah! signal for a short period immediately after a player is defeated.
  • Change made to prevent unintended signals from being sent in the event that a player is defeated while trying to Super Jump to the spawn point.
  • When a teammate is using a Booyah Bomb, players can send a Booyah! regardless of this change.
• In Salmon Run, pressing Up will not send a This way! signal for a short period immediately after a player is revived from being in a life ring.
  • Change made to prevent unintended signals from being sent in the event that a player is helped by a teammate while trying to send a Help! signal.
• Several changes to make it easier to use Photo Mode in Private Battles.
  • Players can now start recon even when there are only players on one of the teams.
  • During recon, This way! and Booyah! sent by players on the other team will now display too.
  • During recon, when another player repeatedly uses This way! or Booyah! in a short period of time, it will now be shown without omission.
• Shortened the time until a match is deemed no contest when another player is disconnected immediately after starting a match.
• Adjustments make it harder to cause camera shake due to motion controls when pressing the ZR Button to zoom the screen in Splatsville, Inkopolis Plaza, Inkopolis Square, and Order Sector.
• Adjusted the player’s position when leaving Grizzco in Splatsville to make it harder to accidentally reenter Grizzco by keeping the Left Stick tilted.
• Players battled within X Battles do not display in the Users You Have Played With system feature.

Splatoon 3

The third installment of Nintendo’s popular paint-style ink-slinging third-person shooter. Splatoon 3 gives players a whole new world to explore with an interesting singleplayer mode and all the multiplayer madness that players have come to know and love from the series.

Released

September 9, 2022

Developer(s)

Nintendo

Publisher(s)

Nintendo