the cutting room mirror

Unused Animations

This is a sub-page of Splatoon 3.

Splatoon 3 has many unused animations leftover in the 1.0.0 release of the game, including some animations that could hint to cut content.

Sub-Pages#

Shiver#

News_Joy#

An unused Anarchy Splatcast animation for Shiver. Frye and Big Man have no such equivalent. Notably, it seems this animation was scrapped early on, as it only has the key frames mapped out.

News_GreetingZuizui#

An exact copy of News_Special, except for her hair, which is oddly posed directly upwards. It is unknown what it could've been used for. This animation was removed from the files at some point.

News_GreetingZuizui_Ed#

Like News_GreetingZuizui, this is an exact copy of News_Special_Ed, with the same upwardly bent hair. This animation is meant for holding the pose after she completes the above animation. Also like News_GreetingZuizui, it was removed from the game at some point.

Early Animations#

Amiibo Pose Animation#

The generic "three fingers" pose referencing Deep Cut that is used in the Amiibo photo mode added in 2.0.0 had early animations added in 1.2.0, sporting a slightly modified pose with a different hand placement amongst other differences. Notably, this seems to represent Deep Cut's Shiver instead of Frye, as the animation has one hand facing forwards and one facing backwards similar to how Shiver poses. Due to Shiver being declared the 'official leader of Deep Cut' for winning the Shiver vs. Frye vs. Big Man anniversary Splatfest, it's possible that this may have been a better representation of "Deep Cut" in retrospect.

Early

Final

Commemorative Photo Animations#

The animations in the 100x/333x battle "commemorative photo" had beta animations in 1.0.0 before being properly integrated into the game in 2.0.0. These range in quality, with some looking almost completely similar to their final counterparts and others looking very unfinished.

SPL3_Wait_Fes_RidingMikoshi01.gifSPL3_Wait_Fes_RidingMikoshi01_Union.gif
SPL3_Wait_Fes_RidingMikoshi02.gifSPL3_Wait_Fes_RidingMikoshi02_Union.gif
SPL3_Wait_Fes_RidingMikoshi03.gifSPL3_Wait_Fes_RidingMikoshi03_Union.gif
SPL3_Wait_Fes_RidingMikoshi04.gifSPL3_Wait_Fes_RidingMikoshi04_Union.gif

Splatoon 2 Leftovers#

Pearl and Marina#

Pearl and Marina have many unused animations carried over from Splatoon 2, including the animations used for Splatfests, Inkopolis News, and "Tstance." While their "Color Pulse" dance returns during the first day of Splatfests in Splatoon 3 (along with a new performance made for the first part of the Grand Festival), it was reanimated from scratch, leaving the Splatoon 2 version unused.

Removed Special Animations#

Most animations for Splatoon 2 specials such as Bubble Blower and Ink Armor, which lack assets of any kind, remain in the game's code.

Locker customizations#

Barricades#

The barricade locker decoration items Fig_Bunker01 and Fig_Bunker02 have six unused animations each. These animations have varying frame lengths but contain no actual animation, instead instantly placing the bumpers at a -90° angle. These seem to be blanked out remainders of being copied over from the full-size barricade models Obj_Bunker01 and Obj_Bunker02, as those have actual animations under the same animation names.

SPL3_Bunker01_animation.png SPL3_Bunker02_animation.png

Placeholder texture pattern animations#

The locker decoration items which are variants of a base model (eg. the squid friends) have their alternate texture variants handled through texture pattern animations. Several locker decoration items contain texture pattern animations set with several placeholder 8x8 black squares alongside their standard textures, suggesting they were intended to have variants, but currently do not. As such, the relevant texture pattern animation appears broken. Each of these decorations has five unused placeholder textures. These items are:

  • The ST-G2TS electric guitar decoration
  • The mango juice box decoration
  • The aqua water bottle decoration
  • The purple loose-leaf binder