Far too difficult for its own good. I'm aware that I completely suck at Splatoon and I'm willing to admit that, but the difficulty here is just overboard. I appreciate the aesthetic, overall presentation and tightened up experience way more, and in those areas this far outshines the base game's story mode, but my god... this just dumps you straight in the deep end and you don't stand a chance unless you've extensively played the multiplayer or know the ins-and-outs of mechanics.

I really went into this feeling good about it and wanting to enjoy it, but after sticking with a couple EARLY missions for an hour each to just even attempt to get anywhere near finishing them and failing miserably, nah. I'm good.

Also: there's a huge reliance on motion aiming here. After trying to stick with it so many times throughout the years in this game, I still hate it and will take the devil I know in the form of stick aiming anyday. Other Splatoon campaigns are designed to facilitate this, Octo Expansion is not. Far too many areas require quick camera movement yet pinpoint accuracy, something which just isn't possible on a control stick, so it's clear that they forgot to keep that in mind when designing the stages here. That was also a huge dampener.