Splatoon 3 shines in its opening hours

gamesradar.com:

I really like games like Splatoon 3, where you can switch at will between a kid and a squid. No extra tiers of nonsense. No microtransactions to wade through. No endless list of perks to mix together. No DLC splitting the player base. Just squids, kids, and downright impeccable vibes. 

That's basically been the elevator pitch for all three Splatoon games. The zany third-person shooter from Nintendo, where you splat opponents and your surroundings with colorful ink, is returning for a third round September 9, and I recently had the chance to try out a sampling of the threequel's many offerings.

Splatoon 3 is expanding its single-player campaign offerings, pitting a brand new protagonist against a series of increasingly difficult levels, aided by the return of icon duo Callie and Marie. Splatoon campaigns of yesteryear have typically been suped-up 'Hero Modes,' basically handing the player unlimited power and weaponry and tasking them with gunning down as many enemies as possible. 

In the opening few levels, Splatoon 3's campaign feels a little bit more Octo Expansion. The superb 2018 add-on for Splatoon 2 deserves to be mentioned alongside the likes of Titanfall 2 for sheer creativity – molding Splatoon into more of a puzzle-platformer instead of a corridor shooter. Players had their unlimited ink cut off, and were forced to get creative to make it from point A to B without their ink tanks running dry. 

There's no ink drought as such in Splatoon 3's first three levels, but the DNA of Octo Expansion is there. A common theme in the opening three missions was searching the map for keys to advance, forcing me to explore every avenue in a mission level, riding along jets of ink and up time-sensitive walls that periodically