Everything New in Splatoon 3 v11.0!

Splatoon 3 just got a major update with version 11.0 released this evening, and we've been working on gathering all the details from Nintendo's @SplatoonNA X account and North American support pages. This is a pretty major update--so without further ado, here's everything we've learned!

Flow Aura

"Flow Aura" is a new ability players will gain in battle. As players "splat" multiple opponents, they'll ink the ground around them and gain more physical abilities. Nintendo demonstrates this in the above videos on X, but we've also linked them here.

Health Bars

Now, upon inking opponents with any weapon, a health bar will appear above them for an appear for the person who inked them -- but only for a short period of time. They'll have to be in the player's line of sight for the health bar to appear, however.

Hitbox Changes

Nintendo also noted on X that Inklings and Octolings' hitboxes are now smaller and harder for players to hit. You can see the comparison between the previous version and 11.0 above.

Other Changes

As mentioned, we've been digging through Nintendo Support's article, and we found Nintendo's remarks rather interesting. Here they are:

This update focuses on making changes to battle-related systems and multiplayer balance.

Among the balance changes, the updates for the L-3 Nozzlenose and Dynamo Roller are not simple upgrades. Rather, they are performance changes to help those weapons’ unique properties stand out.

For the L-3 Nozzlenose, we raised the speed of shots to make it easier to utilize the weapon’s unique property: its ability to maximize power by successfully hitting opponents with its three shots. On the other hand, we lowered its inking ability to make it more difficult to fight by lying in wait without proactively approaching opponents or fighting in ways that rely on the rate of turnover for special weapons.

For the Dynamo Roller, in order to make each of its swings even heavier and more powerful than before, we expanded the area of inking and the area that allows players to defeat opponents with one swing, and also increased the amount of ink consumed.

As for the other main weapons, we have made changes to make them easier to use or to emphasize unique traits among weapons with similar properties.

For the Reefslider special weapon, we improved its ability to defeat opponents by expanding the area of the explosion capable of defeating opponents in one hit, as well as making it harder to avoid the explosion using a small height difference. On the other hand, we reduced the maximum distance of the charge and decreased the area inked to make it harder to rely on the strategy of taking back Splat Zones using the ink from the explosion by pointing it toward a Splat Zone from a safe area and then charging.

Because this update includes changes to the multiplayer system that go beyond simple multiplayer balance changes, we anticipate that it will have a bigger impact on gameplay than the average update. For that reason, the next update will be sooner than normal and will focus on changes to multiplayer balance.

Additionally, there was a small change to SplatNet 3 related to X Rankings, along with various bug fixes. You can see the full changelog on Nintendo's site here.

[Sources: @SplatoonNA / Nintendo Support NA]