To get some things out of the way first, you can nickname any amiibo to whatever you want (provided it's under 10 letters). So, allow me to give off the names my copies have (as it'll make more sense in some pictures).
- Orange Inkling Girl: Anti FLUDD
- Green Inkling Squid: Squidward
- Blue Inkling Boy: Deep Sea
- Green Inkling Girl: Agent 3
- Orange Inkling Squid: Kracken
- Purple Inkling Boy: RedV.SBlue
- Callie: Squid Sis 1
- Marie: Squid Sis 2
- Pink Inkling Girl: 2 for 1
- Purple Inkling Squid: PurpleStuf
- Green Inkling Boy: TentaTech
- Pearl: MCPrincess
- Marina: HyperFresh
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| 2 for 1 wasn't interesting to talk to. She didn't think I was interesting either. |
So what do you get from using amiibo in Splatoon? In the first game, the amiibo was used for the single player revisits. Each of the Splatoon 1 Inkling amiibo has a series of Single Player missions that it can activate that are challenge modes. Most of the rewards get you money that you can use in the shops, but the final missions of each section do give you something better, an item of clothing that is unique to that amiibo, a game to play while waiting for multiplayer matches to start, or a weapon. The problem a lot of people, myself included, had with them is that the single-player levels really weren't designed for the different weapons (being the Roller and Charger, the only other two weapons in Splatoon at the time the first three amiibo were released). Did the second batch do anything different? No. Not at all. The Green Inkling Girl, the Orange Inkling Squid and the Purple Inkling Boy are exactly the same as the original Orange, Green and Blue Inkling set. What's weird is that the data in the amiibo NFC chips are different, the games don't register them as the same as the original three, and some games like Super Mario Maker and Poochy & Yoshi's Woolly world do give you different costumes to better reflect the changes. It's just strange that in both Splatoon 1 and Splatoon 2, there are no differences between the two sets.
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| My Inklings aren't very paitent, are they? |
Before going over to Splatoon 2, the Callie and Marie figures can be used in Splatoon 1, but do not give you any new gear or weapons. These are, however, the only way you can access Splatfest mode in the original Splatoon 1 now. In the plaza, while either of these two amiibo are in use, the background music can be changed to any of the Splatfest themes, the credits theme, or the first game's version of Calamari Inkantation. Along with this, the Callie amiibo allows you to listen to Bomb Rush Blush in game, while Marie gives you Tide Goes Out. All of the functionality tied into the fact that the final Splatfest (a timed challenge to see which team can win the most matches) of Splatoon 1 was Callie vs Marie. After that, there would be no more Splatfests for Splatoon 1. Out of all the functionality for Splatoon 1, I do prefer Callie and Marie over the inklings primarily due to the level design of the Single Player campaign. The three weapons (Splatterhots, Chargers and Rollers) do play completely differently, and it's why in Splatoon 2 and especially the Octo Expansion, the levels are designed around the weapons being used, rather than forcing a level designed for one weapon to work around another.
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| Trust me, I checked, the amiibo has the nickname, it just won't show up. And yes, the in game area to activate amiibo is a giant amiibo box |
In Splatoon 2, the amiibo do perform similar tasks, but in a different way. The gear you would unlock from the Splatoon 1 Inklings (a school uniform from the girls, power armour from the squids, and samurai armour from the boys) are the same, but instead of it being tied to single player missions, you have to level up a certain amount to get the gear. You can also unlock Splatoon 1 songs to play in the Squidbeats mini-game (imagine a simpler version of Dance Dance Revolution). The same holds true for the Pink Inkling Girl, Purple Inkling Squid, and Green Inkling Boy, however, they do unlock new gear that matches the Splatoon 1 Inkling gear (a new school uniform from the Inkling girl, a Samurai costume from the boy, and a new power armour from the Squid). Callie, Marie, Pearl and Marina also have gear to give you now, with Callie's being the Splatoon 1 Single Player clothes (along with Bomb Rush Blush for Squidbeats), Marie's is the Armour clothes that you would get in the Splatoon 2 Singleplayer when you find extra armour in levels (along with Tide Goes out for Squidbeats), and both Pearl and Marina give you their outfits from the Splatoon 2 Octo Expansion and new skins for Squidbeats. Overall this is far more streamlined and makes it easier to get the gear, all of which is pretty decent and can be upgraded like any other bit of gear you get in the game.
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| "For lunch, I think I'll have Squidward with a frozen coke" |
The other big function the amiibo have in Splatoon 2 is the ability to take photos with your amiibo. Here, I will admit, the advantage does go to the Inklings over the Squid Sisters and Off the Hook. For Callie and Marie, you are limited to anywhere in Inkopolis Square. While the same holds true, apparently you can use them during a Splatfest and get your photo taken with Pearl or Marina on stage (which is a nice bit of detail). For the Inklings though, you can also take photos at any of the Multiplayer stages, which does add a lot more variety to the feature. You can change the pose of your player character and any of the amiibo from a set of four poses, with the poses changing depending on your location. On top of this, you can take a photo with your amiibo wearing the gear you saved to it (for Inkling girls and boys, not the squids), or in the case of Pearl and Marina, either their Off the Hook clothes, or more casual attire from the Octo Expansion (the gear you can unlock from them). The final function the amiibo can do is honestly something I wish they didn't do. You can save any gear load outs you have to any of the amiibo, with each one being able to hold one each. This should have been something you can do in the base game, but to be fair this is the same development team that turned every button on the Switch into a music modifier while in the match waiting room, instead of giving one button that lets you quit a match before it starts, their priorities aren't all there.
To talk about the plastic itself, the Splatoon amiibo line is currently my favourite of the amiibo lines we have so far. Most of that's down to how unique the designs for the Splatoon characters are, there aren't any video game characters that I know of that come close to this kind of design. What also helps is how they can mask support structures in the figures. For a lot of amiibo, in order to make the figures more stable on the base, many figures either use designs that have both feet planted on the ground or use an opaque plastic in order to provide better stability. For the Splatoon series though, while normally they'd need support structures for the majority of them (the exceptions being the original and repaints of the Inkling girl and boy), the designers have used the ink the games are known for in order to mask the supports, its why most of the ink is attached to either the feet or backs of many characters. It comes off as more natural looking for a lot of the designs, though an exception does come from the Callie, Marie, Pearl and Marina amiibo, where the ink looks to be moving a lot more than it should as all four of them are doing their band poses (which in game are all very stationary poses). Thanks to the added support though, a lot of these figures are very durable (though it's recommended not to throw them around). One thing I wish they did for the Inklings though is to show off more of the weapon variety. All of the Inkling Boys have a Splattershot and the only Inkling Girl to not have a Splattershot is the Pink Inkling Girl, who instead uses a weapon type known as the Dualies. The recently announced Octoling amiibo look to be fixing this as the Octoling Girl has a Charger, while the Boy has a brush (yes, one of the weapons in this game is a giant brush) so I hope this continues if they do a series of amiibo for a possible Splatoon 3.
The big thing with amiibo is that they have a lot more worth if you have games they are compatible with. If you don't, then they might as well be little collectible figures. These are still very nice little figures though and if you do get Splatoon 2, their made even more useful. Depending on when the announcements are made, next week will either be a look over the reveals from San Diego Comic-Con, particularly around the toy reveals for "Transformers: Generations: War for Cybertron: Siege" (see why I change how the names are supposed to be said when I review Generations figures?), or a review of Power of the Primes Battleslash. On the main site though will be a review of Kirby's Epic Yarn.
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