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Prerelease:Splatoon/Early Development

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This is a sub-page of Prerelease:Splatoon.

Bunny Game Concept

Around 2009-2011, according to conceptual art dates, concepts for a shooter game involving bunnies were created likely during development of the Wii U.

Conceptualizing Bunnies

The developers wanted to go for a world based on street culture, due to its contemporary design and due to its derivation from counterculture, acting as a rebellion against the mainstream.[1] Thus, the bunnies were apparently designed to be like that. Bunnies were originally conceptualized in Splatfest shirts representing teams before it was decided to give them Gear.

SpatoonEarlyBunniesConceptArt.png
SplatoonBasicBunnyConceptART.png
First draft conceptual art. Slightly later draft of a male and female bunny, showing a simplified style.
The shirts represent team dichotomy between udon (うどん, left) and soba (そば, right) noodles.

Hub World

They also did concept art of the hub world, which interestingly shows the idea dating back to September 10, 2009 in the second image.

SplatoonHubworldMiiverseConcept.png
  • Miiverse posts were originally text rather than drawings. They also had Miis displayed next to the message.
  • The buildings appeared to be displayed in Japanese and English, rather than the ficitious Inkling language.
  • There's a road marking called "MY ROOM", which probably hints at a scrapped room customization feature.

A slightly later revision, showing the earliest layout of the plaza but with semi-finalized buildings that would appear in slightly later concept art. It also seemed to be the stage that bunnies could wear various types of Gear.

SplatoonEarlyHubWorldDraft2009.png

The following changes were made in the final;

  • The kitsune and tanuki statues were originally two lion dogs, which seemed to be gods.
  • The shoe, shirt and hat shops were all separate, all of them would be together in the final game.
  • The box on the left says "Jump Practice" (ジャンプ練習), implying that jumping was an element in battles. It's also likely an early version of the recon system. The supposed mechanic would possibly be reworked into the Extreme Jump Battle Challenge introduced in Version 4.0.0. of Splatoon 3.
  • Oddly, there's no headgear shop despite bunnies being shown wearing them in other concept art.
  • On the left seems to be a scrapped store near the train, saying "General Goods Store" (ざっか店)
  • The cat in the middle of the plaza may be an early Judd.

Splatfest Concept

Concept art of a Splatfest, dated September 3, 2011.[2]

SplatoonBunnySplatfestConcept.png

There are some differences in this concept art. The team they're fighting for is Udon (うどん) vs. Soba (蕎麦) noodles.

  • The Judge appears to be some sort of sinister robot-like figure that bears resemblance to the Flatwoods Monster (a famous extraterrestrial cryptid), with a gigantic golden crab next to it.
  • The top right concept is a parody of the Glico Man, the mascot for the Japanese confectionary company Glico.
  • This concept art appears to take place in a completely different area due to more television screens, the lack of the bunny-eared tower and the two giant statues.
  • The Splatfest was originally more of a Japanese traditional festival as opposed to a modern-day festival with a concert. The former would be loosely revisited in Splatoon 3, carrying Deep Cut's chaotic mix of Japanese, Brazilian and Indian cultures.

Weapon Concepts

Not only the iconic Splattershot existed at that point, but a few other weapon concepts were drafted too.

SplatoonSplattershotConceptART.png
SplatoonAerosprayMG ConceptArt.png
Early concept of the Splattershot Jr., looking more like a water pistol. Early concept of the Aerospray MG.

Wii U Game Design Concepts

So many ideas, so little time...

After the Wii U's launch in November 2012, Nintendo's developmental team were tasked to created a "new type of game, not bound by existing genres". So they thought up of a total of seventy video game ideas in the span of six months after the Wii U's launch, one of them notably which would later be Splatoon. Initially, they didn't want to create new characters, but rather a game with a "new structure".

The developers stated that quite a few of the concepts made it into the final game, but that some of them were reworked into other video games;

  • The image on the left showing the hexagonal panel spaces, tucked in with the others bears a striking resemblance to the Desert Island Escape mode that was introduced in Animal Crossing: amiibo Festival.
  • The bottom right image where a space-based panel is seen may have been reworked into Super Mario 3D World's Captain Toad mode, and eventually its spin-off game Captain Toad: Treasure Tracker.
  • The picture of spacemen shooting enemies seemed to be the closest idea to what became of Splatoon in the end, though it may have also been reworked into Metroid Prime: Federation Force. The concept also seems to have been loosely reworked into the Salmon Run mode in Splatoon 2, while the blobby enemies are reminiscent of the Jelletons in Splatoon 3 Side Order.


SplatoonSpacesuitConceptArt.png
Concept art of spacemen shooting enemies of liquid mercury.

Tofu Blocks Tech Demo

Splatoon image-tofu.jpg
SplatoonGDC2018 TofuGamePad.jpg
This is the very earliest screenshot of Splatoon. Map screen on the GamePad
Video footage[3]

The very first prototype of Splatoon was created in late 2013, where it showed incredibly primitive blocks that were supposed to resemble plain tofu and sesame tofu, representing contrasting colors. The initial game was to play as them, and shoot ink around a maze to cover turf. They could not dive into ink, and instead used the ink of their color to hide in. The tofu and ink were almost the same color, so the tofu essentially used the ink as camouflage.

The prototype was also initially envisioned as an online game[4], which established the classic 4-vs-4 online battles, causing the overall playability led to this tech demo being the biggest out of the many ideas.