Here's a really dumb and crazy idea for what Splatoon 3's Hero Mode could be like!

When you boot up the game for the first time, the new hosts have a news flash for Inkopolis. Radar has detected that Salmonids are beginning to congregate in large numbers in an area very near Octo Canyon. If that weren't enough, the Squid Sisters, and Marina of Off the Hook, are all missing.

Hopping down a grate in the game's hub area deposits you on the edge of Nikko National Park, near Mount Nantai (as it is in real life). Here you find Pearl in her MC.Princess clothes, seeming troubled. She seems to be a little excited upon noticing you, until realizing you're not who she thinks you are. Pearl fills you in: Finding the recent Salmonid activity suspicious, Cap'n Cuttlefish assembled Agents 1 (Callie), 2 (Marie), 3, 4, and 8 some time ago, and took them on a recon mission to see if anything was amiss. None of them have returned. Marina, Pearl's old partner in crime and the other half of Off the Hook, soon started to worry about her missing friends, and--after an uncertain goodbye to Pearl--headed down to the national park alone to find out what became of them. She hasn't returned either.

In Cuttlefish's absence, Pearl takes on the old commander's leadership duties. Instantly dubbing you Agent 5, she gussies you up in a leftover Hero outfit, hands you an old Hero Shot, and sends you on your way. The first sector of Hero Mode 3 plays out like any given Hero Mode sector in Splatoon 1 and 2, with a key difference: no Octarians. Instead, the only enemies you'll encounter are Salmonids of all shapes and sizes--Chums, Smallfries, Cohocks, and maybe a few new varieties not seen in Splatoon 2, with the occasional Boss Salmonid appearing as a midboss fight or obstacle. (A few stages might revolve around sneaking through a large area while trying not to alert a Stinger, for instance.)

This all changes after the first boss, when a cutscene starts to play. (Like in Octo Expansion, the cutscenes are fully animated, not just radio transmissions.) You and Pearl sit on a ledge overlooking the next area of the national park, as Pearl talks about her concerns. She's a little anxious about whether or not the Squid Sisters--two people she's always respected--are OK. She doesn't know if "the old guy" will make it out of this one alive, and is particularly worried about Marina for obvious reasons. Then she stands up and makes a declaration. She doesn't want to just be a voice on a radio, like she was the last time. This time she's gonna get out on the front lines and HELP. Help Callie, Marie, Cuttlefish, Three, Four, Eight... and especially Rina.

Here the twist of Hero Mode 3 is revealed: Instead of unlocking new weapons every so often, you unlock new playable characters after each sector. Each one uses a different weapon and has slightly different stats, and sometimes they'll even take an alternate route through a stage. Like in Splatoon 2, completing all stages with one character will unlock a replica of their weapon for use in multiplayer. Each character can level up their weapons and bomb strength individually from an Ammo Knights Enhancifier at the beginning of each sector, depending on how many Power Eggs and Sardinium they've collected through the stages.

As it turns out, the bosses--especially large and brutal Salmonids, even stronger and more intimidating than the Boss Salmonids faced in Salmon Run--are keeping the other idols and agents captive. Defeating that boss will set them free.

Agent 5 - Unlocked by default. (Hero Shot)

Pearl - Clear Sector 1. (Pearlescent Dualies)

Callie - Clear Sector 2. (Rushing Roller)

Marie - Clear Sector 3. (Low Tide Charger)

Agent 4 - Clear Sector 4. (Hero Splatling)

Agent 3 - Clear Sector 5. (Hero Blaster)

Marina - Clear Sector 6. (Marinated Brella)

Agent 8 - Clear Sector 7. (Hero Slosher)

(You would be able to pick the other agents' gender and designs before meeting them, like you could with Agent 3 in the Octo Expansion.)

Starting around Sector 3, the gang starts noticing some strange blotches of navy-blue ink splattered around the environment here and there. It feels... wrong, somehow. It doesn't quite look like how ink should--it's not as glossy and seems much stickier, and touching it makes them feel itchy, like they rubbed against poison ivy. Curiously, Marina and Agent 8, and potentially Agent 5 as well, are immune to the itching...

Around Sector 4 or 5, the NSS catches sight of some Octozeppelins flying into the park. It's assumed that the Octarians have also picked up on the strange Salmonid presence in the park, and are coming to investigate as well. From here on, Octarians join the Salmonids as enemies to fight, mostly buffed from the first two games to go with their later appearance. Strangely enough, they never seem to attack the Salmonids... although the Salmonids are more than happy to try and splat them.

Sector 8 has a completely different and much more sinister atmosphere than almost anything outside of the OE. It takes place in a series of caves beneath Mount Nantai: as it's a volcano, magma is a constant threat, and the stages and background music are generally much darker in tone and lighting. There are almost no enemies in here, just puzzles to solve and platforming challenges to overcome.

Soon, the magma caverns give way to a strange facility of some sort. There are giant tanks full of the weird, creepy navy ink that has been splattering the environment more and more frequently as you've progressed, along with unconscious Salmonids floating in tubes and capsules. Enemies start to appear more frequently, mostly just the occasional Octotrooper or Elite Octoling to begin with, but more and more are encountered the further in you go. As progress is made through the facility, you run into terminals, giving off testing logs that gradually spell out the truth about the odd ink...

It's made from Inklings. Somebody has been using the Salmonids in an experiment to create a special variety of toxic ink, prolonged exposure to which will kill an Inkling by slowly melting their body down until all that's left is another puddle of that navy ink, waiting for another victim. It's clear that whoever is behind this hopes the ink will spread like a virus and cause widespread destruction.

Towards the tail end of Sector 8, the mastermind behind this plot is revealed.

The species of the lab guards should make it obvious who it is.

DJ Octavio has broken out once again. Who'd have thought? He's been steadily losing his mind during the past two games (whether to senility, being locked in a giant snow globe for years, or just being tired of losing, who can say?), but now he's hit a breaking point.

Instead of just stealing the Great Zapfish and leaving Inkopolis without power, he now aims to create a bioweapon with the power to destroy their entire species, so he can seize their lands by force. He lured the Salmonids into this underground lab of his by kidnapping their queen (more along the lines of queen bee instead of queen regnant), causing her subjects to follow in an attempt to free her. The Salmonids he managed to capture he's been experimenting on, seeing what it's possible to create with the ooze they constantly secrete... and the end result is what he's dubbed "Toxic Goo." The Octarians the Splatoon saw flying into Nikko National Park were in on this plan the whole time--Octavio just needed reinforcements to keep the Salmonids in check.

So now the scheme is revealed. But there's still one loose end... Where's Cap'n Cuttlefish?

Octavio takes a vial full of Toxic Goo in one tentacle and a tattered Cap of Legend in the other.

"Let's just say... I've taken him off the charts for good!"

Everyone is horrified, of course, but none more so than Callie and Marie. (Marie has to hold Callie back from physically assaulting Octavio.) Cap'n Cuttlefish was their grandfather, and now...

There's no time to mourn. A huge boss fight against the Octobot King Mk. III ensues. Octavio's latest machine is bigger and more impressive than ever, boasting two great tanks of Toxic Goo that the DJ naturally uses as ammo in the boss fight. It's difficult, but simple enough--it still boils down to "shoot fists to knock them back at the main body three times."

At the end of the boss fight, one of the Octobot King's Toxic Goo tanks is ruptured, and its contents spill out across the battlefield. Most of the NSS gets out of the way just in time... but Pearl, Marie, and Agent 8 aren't so lucky, and become drenched in the sludge. Pearl melts into a pool of Toxic Goo with startling speed due to her height, barely having time to say goodbye to Marina and all her friends. Marina stands in shock, too horrified and grief-stricken for words. Marie, against all odds, is able to power through and keep her shape... though her ink is now the same color as Toxic Goo, disconcertingly. Agent 8, luckily, seems unharmed.

With Octavio out of a machine, and out of a plan, it looks like the battle has come to an end with just two casualties. A bittersweet ending to be sure, but at least they stopped a crazy octopus from killing millions of...

Wait. Why is the facility shaking? What's that tremendous roaring sound?

DJ Octavio is horrified.

"She's awake! And she's MAD! Time for me to BEAT IT!"

And with that, he runs for the hills, leaving the seven warriors who remain with no choice but to move on, now without Pearl. Marina scoops the Toxic Goo puddle that once was her precious Pearlie into a vial, corks it, and quickly hugs it to her chest before stowing it away and running after the others. Callie, in turn, makes off with Octavio's Cap'n Cuttlefish vial.

Throughout the remaining levels of Sector 8, the party slowly dwindles. Agent 4 falls from a crumbling catwalk to an uncertain fate, while Callie jumps down after in a blind attempt to save them. Marina is cut off from the rest of the Splatoon when the ceiling collapses between them and her, and Marie leaves with Agent 3 so they can find their own route towards the source of the roar... and hopefully Callie, Four, and Marina as well. (She does, however, keep in contact with the remainder of the group over radio.) By the end, just Agents 5 and 8 are left.

The facility is being torn apart by Salmonids as you continue, each one as red-eyed and crazy, if not quite as dangerous, as when lured in by Glowflies in Salmon Run. They're a fair sight more difficult than the pushovers they've been up to this point. Something is very wrong.

At the final stage, we finally discover what caused that horrendous noise. It is, of course, the Salmonid Queen: an enormous, hideous Salmonid monster resembling a mix between a Maws and an extremely oversized Cohock, brandishing a spatula the size of two city blocks. Marie theorizes that roar rallied the Queen's cohorts to tear Octavio's facility apart, make the Octarians pay for kidnapping her and abusing their kind, and afterwards turn their attention to the surface, so they can raze it all flat and create a new world order where Salmonids reign supreme.

Like the New Squidbeak Splatoon will ever let THAT happen!

The Salmonid Queen is huge enough to be an entire level in and of herself, around 1.5x to 2x the size of the NILS statue all told. You climb around her body, fighting off crazed Salmonids and the attacks of the Queen herself, while attacking boil-like weak points to pop open the Queen's armor-like skin. Dramatic orchestral music blasts in the background all the while.

Unfortunately, Five and Eight eventually find themselves overwhelmed. The Queen's scaly armor is replacing itself faster than they can destroy it, and it's not clear if their attacks are slowing her down at all. And the frenzied Salmonids aren't about to stop rampaging, either. It looks like the end...

...when, on a platform high in the titanic chamber where the final battle takes place... It's the Squid Sisters, Agents 3 and 4, and what's left of Off the Hook.

Together the three idols sing a medley of Calamari Inkantation and Fly Octo Fly, and, as if by magic... it all changes. The Salmonid Queen slows down, apparently weakened by the song. Her armor stops regenerating. Her minions calm down from insane bloodthirsty brutes to regular bloodthirsty brutes. Most importantly, Agents 8 and 5 are filled with the willpower to continue fighting. And continue they do--now with Three and Four lending twenty extra tentacles!

Eventually the last weak point, right on top of the head, is destroyed, and the Salmonid Queen collapses--alive, but barely. As the Salmonids swarm around their fallen leader to see to her wounds, the agents Super Jump up to the ledge where the idols stand to meet them. There's a touching group hug...

And Marie collapses. Her time is almost up.

Callie begs her cousin not to leave her. She already lost Marie once, and one family member is already a casualty in this stupid war. She can't let another meet the same fate. There's got to be a cure!

But Marie is already at peace. She never did want to live forever. Slowly, sadly, she struggles through the pain to sing a few bars of "Tide Goes Out" as a final goodbye to her cousin and dear friend... and she dissolves into Toxic Goo, and dies.

Callie is inconsolable, and spends a few moments on the floor bawling her eyes out.

Then something clicks. Earlier, Marina and Agent 8 were immersed in Toxic Goo... but they were fine. Their skin didn't itch and they certainly didn't start to dissolve. From that she infers that Octarians are immune to the Goo's effects. (After all, why would Octavio want to create a deadly bioweapon that could be used against him?) She thinks back to what she learned about vaccines and transplants in school. Maybe... just maybe... there's a cure after all.

Callie asks Marina to give her some ink.

"Um... Do you mean from my Brella? I can fire off a few rounds if you want."

"No. I need the ink that's INSIDE you. The ink in your veins."

"What?! No!!"

"Do you want to save Marie?"

"Well... yeah, but..."

"Do you want to save Pearl?"

That's all the convincing Marina needs. She nods.

Using the nearest sharp-edged object available to her, Callie makes a small cut on Marina's arm and collects the minty green ink that gently bleeds out. She pours it on the Toxic Goo puddle that was once her cousin. The goo fizzles, and smokes, and bubbles a little...

And then...

Nothing.

At first.

Right as Callie is about to burst into tears again... the goo starts to rise, and slowly forms into the shape of a familiar gray-and-green-haired woman...

It worked. Marie is alive again.

"Callie...?"

"Marie?!"

"...Did I just... die?!"

Callie squeezes Marie so hard she almost suffocates. There is a long, tight, and very, very teary hug between cousins.

Over the next few minutes, Pearl and Cap'n Cuttlefish are brought back to life through the same process. Pearl and Marina have a similarly heartfelt reunion to the Squid Sisters, whereas Cuttlefish has no memory of the past couple of days, and is mostly just confused. Where is he? Who's the new kid? Why are his granddaughters suddenly trying to snap him in two? You'd think he was dead or something! He's more than happy to see everyone is all right in the end, though he's... slightly worried to hear that Octavio has escaped, especially in light of his new MO.

All's well that ends well, right?

Sirens. The battle with the Salmonid Queen has sent the core of the underground Octarian base into meltdown, and it'll explode in less than 10 minutes. Time to get out of Dodge!

One last escape sequence follows, acting as a kind of final exam for the player. Every character receives their own segment to get through (receiving a unique frantic remix of their personal theme), and every Hero Mode mechanic up to this point returns in one last test of skill. All that you've learned about how to get around Nikko National Park comes into play here.

The NSS makes it out of the lair with just seconds to spare, and a massive explosion shakes the Japanese countryside. When the smoke clears, the DJ's lab is destroyed. All that is left is a huge hole in the ground right next to Mount Nantai, and a procession of (relatively) pacified Salmonids marching back to the ocean, their unconscious queen being airlifted behind them by an entire squadron of Flyfish.

DJ Octavio is long gone, but his ambitions are thwarted, his Toxic Goo supply up in smoke. He'll back someday to raise even more hell, and this time there's no snow globe to keep him locked up. But for now, Inkopolis has been saved from two threats in the same day, and everyone has survived.

Callie and Marie hug each other one more time now that it's finally over, and congratulate each other on a job well done. Cap'n Cuttlefish exclaims to Three, Four, Eight, and especially Five just how proud he is of their efforts. He even gives Three a promotion to co-commander for their excellent performance, suggesting they act as the other agents' new mentor. Pearl and Marina embrace, and snuggle... and maybe even...?

The credits roll as the characters watch the sunset over the ruins of DJ Octavio's lab, accompanied by a new song--a slow, sweet pop ballad, with bits of Bomb Rush Blush, Tide Goes Out, Acid Hues, and Ebb and Flow mixed in--sung by both the Squid Sisters and Off the Hook. At the end, everyone turns to the screen and smiles at the player, and the words "Thank you for playing!" appear in the sky.

And that's all she wrote.

In the postgame, Cap'n Cuttlefish appears in Sector 1 of Nikko National Park to tell you facts about your multiplayer games as well as provide some silly world-building elements, just like Callie and Marie did in Splatoon 2. Most notably, thanks to a mass ink donation from Marina, Agent 8, and the many, many generous Octoling boys and girls of Inkopolis, all of Octavio's Inkling victims have been saved offscreen--and indeed, returning to the sectors that were once splattered with Toxic Goo will reveal that everything has been cleaned up. You can also revisit the smoldering remains of the Octarian laboratory and replay the final levels with characters who couldn't go through them before, for the purposes of unlocking their weapons. Finally, an option to rewatch the credits is added near Cap'n Cuttlefish in the first sector, by pressing the A Button on a cliff near Cap'n Cuttlefish that overlooks Mount Nantai's new crater.