Splatoon Showdown Series Announced

If you’re like me and thousands of other Splatoon fans you couldn’t help but be disappointed when Nintendo stopped hosting monthly Splatfests. While not exactly the same thing, this new type of engagement looks like a lot of fun.

Nintendo has announced the Splatoon Showdown Series for North America. This is an open, online tournament that will take place every weekend of November for a chance to win prizes. The first type of game mode will be Turf War. Tower Control, Splat Zones and Rainmaker will be featured in the following weeks.

To compete you’ll need to have a full team of four players. You must register your team for the tournaments of your choice at www.battlefy.com/splatoon. You will want to show up early to the the Tournament Bay and check in using the button during the hour leading up to the tourney. Once the bracket is seeded, you will set your game up with your opponent using Battlefy’s private match chat. The top four teams from each qualifier will be invited to the finals the following week.

The first showdown begins on Saturday, November 5 at 1 PM PT / 3PM CT / 4PM ET. May the best team win!

Rules:

• You must have at least four players on your roster
• You must have one team representative in the support chat
• Please take a photo of the victory screen in the case of a dispute
• The team captain MUST check in to the tournament and each match!
• This tournament is only open to players in North America

The top four teams will move on to the finals the following week. Good luck and have fun!

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Tournament Format

• Qualifiers will run as a best of 3 single elimination bracket in the selected game mode
• Maps will be chosen by the tournament admin and announced before the bracket starts

Registration & Check In

• Registration is handled through Battlefy. Click the Join button to register your team for the tournament.
• You must have at least four members on your team to join.
• You may include up to four substitutes but only the players who played in the final match will be eligible for prizing.
• You can swap in substitutes between games but you must have them in the game within 5 minutes
• The captain should be on Battlefy to click Check In in the hour leading up to the start of the tournament
• The captain will have 10 minutes after each match starts to click Ready Up on Battlefy and begin setting up the game
• If a match has not started within 15 minutes after the round has opened, the captain is expected to contact support on Discord
• Support must also be contacted in case of delays during a match
• If a match has not been completed 40 minutes after the round has opened and no contact with support has been made by either captain, both teams will be disqualified

Hosting & Disconnections

• This tournament is open to North American players
• The player from the team with the fastest but more importantly most stable connection should host (a wired connection is preferred)
• If there is a dispute on who should host, the team with the higher seed number will host
• If a player disconnects, the team will need to finish off the game without that player.
• If the host disconnects, their team will receive a game loss and the opposing team must host the next game

Communication

• Set up the game with your opponent using the included Private Match Chat on Battlefy and the tournament Discord server
• The winner should report the score on the bracket once the match is complete
• Both teams should take a picture of the victory and defeat screen in case of a dispute
• There should be at least one representative of each team in the tournament’s support server on Discord
• If you have any problems, please contact a tournament admin on Discord and link them to your match with full details of the issue

Seeding

• Seeding will be done by the tournament organizers for the first tournament of each mode
• After this first tournament, results will be accounted for in seeding
• Only the top 32 teams will be seeded, the rest will be randomize

Captains can report their team’s score.

Prizes:

The top four teams from this event will move on to the Splatoon Showdown Series: Turf War Finals on Saturday, November 12th, 2016. In that tournament, you will play for:

1st Place Prize (x4)

• Exclusive Poster Autographed by the Splatoon Development Team
• Splatoon Plush
• Splatoon Series amiibo Figures (3-pack set)
• Squid Pin
• Splatoon Squid Collectible Figure

2nd Place Prize (x4)

• Splatoon Series amiibo Figure
• Splatoon Plush
• Squid Pin
• Splatoon Squid Collectible Figure

3rd Place Prize (x4)

• Splatoon Plush
• Squid Pin
• Splatoon Squid Collectible Figure

Only four members from each team will receive prizing.

Schedule:

• Check In: 12:00 PM to 12:59 PM Pacific
• Tournament will begin once seeding is complete. Please play your match each round as soon as you have an opponent.

Turf War

1. Qualifier 1: November 5th, 1:00 PM Pacific
2. Qualifier 2: November 6th, 1:00 PM Pacific
3. Finals: November 12th, 10:00 AM Pacific

Tower Control

1. Qualifier 1: November 12th, 1:00 PM Pacific
2. Qualifier 2: November 13th, 1:00 PM Pacific
3. Finals: November 19th, 10:00 AM Pacific

Splat Zones

1. Qualifier 1: November 19th, 1:00 PM Pacific
2. Qualifier 2: November 20th, 1:00 PM Pacific
3. Finals: November 26th, 10:00 AM Pacific

Rainmaker

1. Qualifier 1: November 26th, 1:00 PM Pacific
2. Qualifier 2: November 27th, 1:00 PM Pacific
3. Finals: December 3rd, 10:00 AM Pacific

Craig Majaski

Craig has been covering the video game industry since 1995. His work has been published across a wide spectrum of media sites. He’s currently the Editor-In-Chief of Nintendo Times and contributes to Gaming Age.