Splatoon 3

About

Splatoon 3 is the third installment of the Splatoon video game series from Nintendo, which follows the roots of the other two games as an arena-based online multiplayer territorial shooter. After its initial announcement in early 2021, the game inspired fan art, memes and discussions around the web, particularly surrounding the characters Frye and Big Man in mid-2022. Splatoon 3 is scheduled to be released on the Nintendo Switch console on September 9th, 2022.

History

With confirmed development following the success of Splatoon 2, an official announcement trailer^[1] was released as part of the February 17th, 2021, Nintendo Direct, showing the beginning of the game in which the Inkling character is customized by the player (shown below).

As the release date drew closer, memes and fan art of Splatoon 3 started to appear online, ramping up in mid-2022. For example, a Twitter post by @HasiratS^[2] on July 11th, 2022, showcased a prominent sentiment of overwhelming hype felt by the fanbase that anticipated its game coming out in a few short months (shown below).

On August 10th, 2022, Nintendo announced a special Direct livestream that would be entirely focused on the upcoming Splatoon 3 title, with the whole direct being uploaded to the official Nintendo YouTube channel^[3] that day where it quickly went on to garner over 2.1 million views in five days (shown below).

Online Presence

Frye and Big Man Reveal

On August 10th, 2022, following Nintendo's Direct presentation focused on Splatoon 3. The Direct introduced the "hosts" of the game: Deep Cut, a band consisting of manta ray Big Man and squids Shiver and Frye. Nintendo also tweeted images of all the Deep Cut members, including Frye, after the Direct (shown below).^[5]

Out of all the new things seen as part of Splatoon 3's online presence, one of the biggest things that the audience grabbed onto and focused on making memes of is Big Man, the manta ray that is part of the commentators for the game. This is evident in the post by Twitter user @Nyanoruu^[4] in which he drew fanart of Big Man on August 11th, but as a mock parody of Shaq and the Icy-Hot commercial (shown below).

Various Examples

Search Interest

External References