As the longtime Smash faithful can attest, Nintendo's interest in esports has been frustratingly minimal over the years. But when the Switch was finally unveiled in late 2016, the initial trailer included a very unexpected scene: Two teams of Splatoon 2 players preparing backstage before entering a packed arena to battle for ink-spattered supremacy. It was Nintendo's strongest nod towards high-level esports competition to date, surely to the chagrin of Smash fans.

Granted, that scene was just for show — we haven't actually seen that level of competitive spectacle around Splatoon 2 just yet. But seven months after the game's release, the community that suffered through the original Wii U game's limits and quirks has built excitement around another Nintendo esports scene, with more and more LAN events and online tournaments popping up for the sequel.

And this time around, Nintendo isn't just watching from the sidelines.

A competitive boost

When we last profiled the competitive Splatoon scene in late 2016, it was clear that there was a lot of enthusiasm around the one-of-a-kind game, which plays like a squad-based shooter ... albeit with ink guns and paint rollers. But while the game reached millions of players, the Wii U console itself was a bleak failure compared to the mainstream success of past Nintendo devices. The prospect of Splatoon 2 on the new Switch was a beacon of hope, albeit an uncertain one.

Luckily for Splatoon fans, the Switch has been wildly successful, selling nearly 15 million units worldwide by the end of 2017 — in just 10 months on the market. And one-third of those Switch owners also picked up Splatoon 2, with sales just under 5 million last year. Millions of people are playing this bold and bright competitive game, and those numbers should only expand as hype around the system persists.

"The road to a competitive scene for Splatoon 2 has honestly been a rollercoaster," admitted A.C. Williams, events manager for community Splatoon and Smash organization, EndGameTV . "Thankfully, the original Splatoon on the Wii U had a growing competitive community, especially towards the end of its lifetime. With increasing amounts of interaction between players around the world and the appearance of more frequent LAN events, the community wasn't going away any time soon."

"An absolute barrier existed here though: the amount of Wii U systems in circulation. The Wii U, simply put, was not a successful console," he continued. "Thankfully, the Switch overcomes this issue of such a small potential player base. More consoles, combined with strong initial support of the competitive community by Nintendo, puts Splatoon 2 on track to become a successful esport."

Splatoon 2 doesn't make any dramatic changes to the gameplay of the original; it's still all about four-player teams battling it out to cover the majority of the terrain in their ink color, while other modes put unique twists on that already-distinctive theme. The sequel carries over many of the weapons and maps from the first game, while also spicing in plenty of new content along the way.

Splatoon 2 makes tournament organizers' jobs much easier © Rachel Dua

More importantly, however, Splatoon 2 has been a huge technical and logistic upgrade for the competitive scene, both for players and the people behind the scenes. The addition of LAN support and spectators makes running and streaming events significantly easier than before, plus players can swap in and out quickly and the Wii U's obnoxious interference issues are thankfully gone.

"Running a Splatoon Wii U LAN was, to put it simply, designed to be impossible," Williams conceded. "The Wii U presented many difficulties — the worst being that too many consoles in a room can lead to connection interference issues where one person starts to control others' systems, and the video signal sent to the gamepad is out of sync. Additionally, the game had no LAN support or spectator mode. I'm not sure how I got through four events with this system; it was a disaster!"

More events, more squids

Between rising player numbers and a LAN-friendlier version of the game, the Splatoon 2 competitive community has grown steadily in recent months — and it got a big showcase with last month's Genesis 5 tournament in Oakland.

While primarily a Smash event , Genesis 5 featured side tournaments for games like Street Fighter V and Pokkén Tournament DX — and it was an opportunity for Splatoon 2 to shine alongside Smash. They had 30 teams playing, with peak Twitch viewership topping 4,000 simultaneous users. That might be small for established esports, but it was more than any community event for the original Splatoon, and a sign of expanding interest in the competitive scene.

Splatoon 2 LANs are getting larger, and so is stream viewership © HelloItsLi

And Splatoon doesn't necessarily need Smash to throw meaningful events. November's dedicated Squidstorm 2017 event in Boston hit the venue cap of 144 competitors across 36 teams, which Williams said made it Splatoon's biggest event outside of Japan thus far. In March, the Splatoon community will descend upon Long Island, New York for Beakon 2018 , a major that could have a prize pool of almost $3,000 if the competitor cap is reached.

Between those live showdowns, the competitive community stays busy online. Williams pointed to Bleck n Spoon as one of the key weeklies, with about 25 teams on average and a unique focus on banning certain maps and weapons to shake up the still-evolving meta. The monthly Squidboards Splat Series is another popular one, typically pulling in 90-plus teams, while EndGameTV's InkStorm+ tournament last year had nearly 60 international teams in play.

"Every online major tournament leads to new teams and players coming out in droves. What is more surprising though is the influx of players coming to LAN events," Williams explained. "As someone who makes it their goal to connect with as many LAN attendees as possible at Splatoon events I help run, this proves to me the Switch is growing our community."

"New squids around the country are actively interested enough to get on a plane and find others as obsessed as they are," he continued. "For most, it doesn't matter that they got knocked out by veteran teams — these players are coming because they love the game."

And there's a lot of game to love, too. As with the original, Splatoon 2 has been growing steadily by the month as Nintendo rolls out new maps, additional modes, and tweaked weapons. Right now, the game has 16 different maps and four very distinct play modes — the latest of which, Clam Blitz, finds players collecting clams (and a clam-filled football) to throw into a goal near the enemy base. All of that diversity is great for viewers, especially, but it can be daunting for players trying to perfect their team strategies.

"The current amount of map and mode combos is getting a little overwhelming for players," Williams claimed. "With four modes and 16 maps (and more on the way), competitive players have to prepare for 64 possible map combinations. That is an insane task if a team wants to become a master at every map and mode combination. Because of this tall task, many TOs are starting to look towards rotation or banning systems, possibly similar to those used in the Overwatch League."

Squid squads to watch

With free DLC still flowing into the game, it's no surprise that Splatoon 2's meta remains unsettled. Everyone we spoke with in the community said that players and teams often have to shake up their tactics and team compositions with each new update, as different weapons become advantageous.

"Sometimes a certain weapon will become the meta for the game for a couple weeks, or for a month — but as soon as a new update comes out for the game, you never know what will fall or rise in the tier list of competitive weapons," said Francisco "MrChillax" Cassolopez, a player for Genesis 5 runner-up team Legacy. His team always works to adapt to the changing meta, but they also try to "catch other teams off-guard" by using uncommon weapons.

"As a general rule of thumb, the Splatoon 2 meta centers around using special abilities and pushing in with those," explained Jorge "2dos" Dosdos, a player for Monarchy. He said abilities like Sting Ray, Ink Armor and Bubble Blower are the most effective in the current version, and that team compositions "generally have two out of those three specials minimum." In terms of weapons, he added that "the N-ZAP '85 and Splattershot tend to have a very nice balance of range, time-to-splat, and painting ability, making them the top weapons of choice."

According to Williams, some of the most impactful weapon, sub-weapon, and special ability combinations aren't in Splatoon 2 yet, so "it's hard to judge the overall health of the community in terms of weapon choices and strategy diversity." Even if tactics could keep changing for some time as new weapons enter the fray, Splatoon 2 already has a handful of teams that have established themselves as competitive powerhouses.

SettoDestroyX is arguably at the top of that list. The Genesis 5 champions, who rose up from the lower bracket after losing an earlier series, are the rare team with an organization — StDx sponsors a wide range of players and teams across 15-plus games .

SettoDestroyX won last month's G5 tournament © HelloItsLi

Before signing, the North American team made a big splash as Deadbeat by winning Nintendo's World Inkling Invitational at E3 2017. Since then, Williams claimed they have "been a dominant force in every in-person LAN they have attended." According to SettoDestroyX player Austin "Penguitt" Whitt, their mentality helps set them apart from the pack: "I believe what makes our team so effective is our ability to take criticism and adapt to each other's gameplay," he said.

Saikai, formerly sponsored by Silver Sanction, is another top NA team that Williams suggested has been "the most dominant online Splatoon 2 team outside of Japan," and that rivals are "only just now starting to reach their level." Williams also pointed to Europe's Team Olive as a fan-favorite who may "not always [clinch] a place on the podium," but who lead the community in terms of content creation with popular Twitch streams and YouTube videos.

As Williams hinted, Japan has typically been a dominant force in Splatoon — and he pointed to the current team Libalent Calamari, which is comprised of four of Japan's top players. However, the international skill difference has faded lately. "The gap between Japan and the rest of the world is much smaller in Splatoon 2 versus the original," Williams claimed. "Frequently, Western teams like StDx place top three at Japanese tournaments, which was unheard of in the first game."

Nintendo's role

Here's something else that has changed from the original Splatoon to the sequel: support from Nintendo itself. After that Switch trailer tease, Nintendo put on the aforementioned E3 tournament last summer, where Deadbeat (now StDx) took the win over Japanese team Dynameu. Williams said that their support didn't stop with that promotional event.

"Nintendo's support is much of the reason I'm confident Splatoon 2 has a bright future," he claimed. "With the World Inkling Invitational to kick off the game's release, Nintendo has been right there with us trying to grow a competitive audience. What is especially interesting about their involvement is that Nintendo traditionally stayed away from the esports scene pre-Switch. With the launch of @NintendoVS and the work of a few amazingly dedicated staff members, it looks like Nintendo is willing to change this stigma."

Will we someday get the big arena showdown seen in the Switch teaser? © Nintendo

Even so, Nintendo doesn't have its hand on the steering wheel — it's still the community that is primarily powering Splatoon 2's competitive growth. Nintendo plays more of a support role from behind the scenes, sharing highlights, results, and information from the Nintendo Versus Twitter account (which has almost 50,0000 followers), as well as sponsoring and providing equipment for Genesis 5. But that's a lot more than what the Smash scene experienced for years, and any kind of esports support is a step in the right direction… even if Nintendo doesn't seem to want to lead that charge.

"I think I can speak for everybody that we are all so grateful for what Nintendo has been doing to promote the game and the scene," Legacy's MrChillax said. "Showing highlights from these tournaments means a lot, because it helps showcase the game to people who aren't really familiar with Splatoon … they can see that the game is interesting and can get more involved."

Nintendo isn't done putting on tournaments, either. While there's no sign of a dedicated esports initiative, Nintendo recently announced the Splatoon European Championship for the Polymanga convention in Switzerland on March 31. The latest Splatoon virtual concert starring Splatoon 2's Pearl and Marina will also be held at the event.

We may not see a Splatoon 2 league from Nintendo anytime soon, but between those signs of support and others, Williams feels like the competitive community's efforts are being recognized. "Since the free DLC is still flowing, I don't expect Nintendo's support to slow down in the future," he said. "The development team obviously cares for this game's competitive future, releasing things like patch notes, whereas Smash never did. I'm excited to see what is up their sleeve!"

Monarchy's 2dos sees Nintendo's stamp of support as critical to Splatoon's future as an esport. "The company's support of their own game in the esports community provides a certain kind of trust in their game that can be built upon by the competitive community," he said, "which is something that's essentially required to have a successful competitive game."

Community service

Even so, it's the community organizers that have gotten Splatoon 2 to this point, tolerating the original game's design headaches out of a sheer love for it. And that same community is still working to further establish Splatoon 2 with larger and more plentiful events. It's a relatively small competitive scene right now, but given the sales success of the game and its console, Nintendo's added push, and their progress so far, there's reason to believe that they can keep pushing the competitive community to new heights.

"While I believe Splatoon 2 has a good future, the community as an esport still has a long way to go as far as growth. The Melee community didn't grow to the size it did overnight," 2dos conceded. "The Splatoon 2 community is certainly doing the right things at the moment to maintain its current community members and expand and attract new players, based on the constant growth of recent online and LAN tournaments."

Splatoon 2 action enthralls the Squidstorm 2017 audience © Rachel Dua

And Splatoon 2 has a very unique edge in the esports scene. It's colorful and cartoonish, which you could also say about Overwatch — but Overwatch doesn't have paint rollers and buckets as weapons, nor does it find you sloshing ink all over a history museum, skate park, or concert venue. Even with its oddball tone, high-level Splatoon requires serious and steady teamwork as you push back the rival squad and try to assert your inky dominance.

StDx's Penguitt believes that the game's fast-paced combat, dynamic battles and wide variety of weapons and specials really give Splatoon 2 an added punch for viewers. "With two good teams against each other, the momentum of the game can change during any second and in anyone's favor," he said. Furthermore, with top players streaming often and some regional rivalries building up, he has seen much more fan engagement over time.

As 2dos suggested, the community is putting in the work to establish and expand Splatoon esports. Furthermore, the people coming into the scene aren't necessarily hardened esports fans or competitive players. That might end up being another big advantage in the long run.

"I think Splatoon 2 has a bright future because of the community it has developed," Williams asserted. He said LAN attendees have sent effusive praise after past community events, which has only emboldened his EndGameTV team's efforts. "I realized this community is worth growing, and will succeed because of the impact it has on people's lives. For so many people, Splatoon 2 is their first chance at joining a competitive scene because of the system it is on and the diverse audience it attracts. For example, we have more female players in our community than the majority of esports titles!"

"This environment is why sponsors are joining the scene and players continue to pay to compete. If our community can continue to reach wider and wider audiences, I think that Splatoon 2 is one of the most exciting up-and-coming esports out there," he added. "Genesis 5 was a great opportunity for growth, but it is not enough. With more opportunities to have it on a big stage, I think Splatoon 2 can shine."