Splatoon 3’s multilayered grind has me completely hooked

digitaltrends.com:

I can’t stop playing Splatoon 3. With 70 hours currently logged, it’s the most I’ve ever played an entry of the series. My hour count has already eclipsed Splatoon 2, a game I thought I was obsessed with at the time. I recognize that I might have a problem here.

What surprises me about that is that there’s not a huge difference in quality between Splatoon 2 and 3. As many critics pointed out in reviews, the threequel is largely the same as its predecessor. It brings key quality of life improvements and ratchets up the intensity in content like Salmon Run, but its online modes remain virtually unchanged. If you played Turf War back on the Wii U, you know exactly what to expect here. So why am I more hooked than I ever have been?

The more I play, the more I uncover Splatoon 3’s most impactful change: its approach to rewards and progression. There’s rarely even a moment where it feels like my time is wasted, making it easy to let myself sink into the ink.

No matter how you spend your time in Inkopolis, there’s something to earn. That’s thanks to the way Splatoon 3 builds on the hooks in its predecessors to create a multilayered approach to progression. Your play time in any given mode isn’t just fueling one or two universal progress bars; you’re usually growing in at least two ways at any given time. Here’s an exhaustive breakdown of each layer.

Multiplayer

Story mode

Salmon Run

Tableturf battle

Gear

There are so many aspects to Splatoon 3’s progression that I’m positive I’ve forgotten something on that already long list.

All of those little hooks have made it easy for me to spend dozens of hours playing without growing bored. When I go into Turf War, I’m grinding perks on my gear while getting Catalog rewards and unlocking