The Archive

Twelve thousand years ago the seas rose and the old world went under. What crawled out afterward built a society on ink, music, and a sport that used to be a war. These are the records: assembled from the Sunken Scrolls, the Alterna Logs, and everything the idols let slip on air.

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Official render of Judd holding a flag from Splatoon 3

History · 12,000 years ago

The Drowning of the Old World

How rising seas ended the age of humanity

Roughly twelve thousand years before the first Turf War, the seas rose and swallowed human civilization. Everything in Splatoon grows out of that flood.

Official render of Craig Cuttlefish from Splatoon 3 Return of the Mammalians

History · 100 years before Splatoon

The Great Turf War

The century-old conflict that shaped every game

A hundred years before the first game, Inklings and Octarians fought a war over the last dry land. Its outcome decided who lives in the sun and who lives underground.

Official render of Judd holding a flag from Splatoon 3

Culture · Present day

Turf War as Sport

How a war became a game, and why the game is the point

The Inklings took the deadliest conflict in their history and turned it into a three-minute sport with a cat referee. That transformation is the moral center of Splatoon.

Official render of Callie from Splatoon 2

Culture · Splatoon through Splatoon 3

The Calamari Inkantation

The song that won a war and freed a people

The Squid Sisters' signature song is more than a pop hit. It weakened DJ Octavio, reached the Octarian domes, and inspired a generation of Octolings to leave.

History

From the drowning of the old world to the founding of Splatsville.

12,000 years ago

The Drowning of the Old World

Roughly twelve thousand years before the first Turf War, the seas rose and swallowed human civilization. Everything in Splatoon grows out of that flood.

100 years before Splatoon

The Great Turf War

A hundred years before the first game, Inklings and Octarians fought a war over the last dry land. Its outcome decided who lives in the sun and who lives underground.

Splatoon (Year 0)

Octo Valley and the Zapfish

Beneath a manhole in Inkopolis Plaza, Cap'n Cuttlefish recruits a passing Inkling to become Agent 3 and rescue the stolen Great Zapfish from DJ Octavio's Octarian army.

Splatoon 2 (Year 2)

Octo Canyon and Callie's Fall

Two years after Octo Valley, the Great Zapfish vanishes again, Callie disappears with it, and Marie recruits a new agent to find out what DJ Octavio has done to her cousin.

After the flood, and Splatoon 3 (Year 7)

Alterna and the Last Mammal

The Alterna Logs tell the story of humanity's last survivors, their liquid crystal sky, and the rocket they launched with a bear aboard. That bear came back as Mr. Grizz.

World

Places, cities, and the places under the places.

Inkopolis: A City Built on Ink

Inkopolis is the beating heart of Inkling society, a neon city where a giant catfish powers everything and the biggest news is who won the last Turf War.

Octo Expansion (Year 2.5)

The Deepsea Metro

An Octoling with no memory wakes up in an abandoned subway run by Kamabo Co. To reach the surface, Agent 8 must survive a gauntlet of tests with a sea cucumber conductor and a very old squid for company.

Splatoon 3 (Year 7)

Splatsville and the Splatlands

Far from Inkopolis, in a sun-baked desert region called the Splatlands, the city of Splatsville grew up around chaos, treasure, and a crater with a secret at the bottom.

Culture

Turf War, idols, Splatfests, and what freshness means.

Turf War as Sport

The Inklings took the deadliest conflict in their history and turned it into a three-minute sport with a cat referee. That transformation is the moral center of Splatoon.

Splatoon through Splatoon 3

The Calamari Inkantation

The Squid Sisters' signature song is more than a pop hit. It weakened DJ Octavio, reached the Octarian domes, and inspired a generation of Octolings to leave.

Splatoon 2 (Year 4)

Chaos vs. Order: The Final Splatfest

The last Splatfest of Splatoon 2 asked the world to choose between Chaos and Order. Chaos won, and everything about Splatsville, the Splatlands, and Side Order follows from that result.

Science

Ink, evolution, and the machinery humans left behind.

After the flood, over thousands of years

Rise of the Cephalopods

With the land drowned and the sea everywhere, squids and octopuses evolved into the two shape-shifting species that would fight over the world.

Splatoon 2 onward

The Salmonids and Grizzco

Salmonids are the series' most alien society: a tide-driven warrior culture with a strict life cycle, guarded by Boss Salmonids and exploited for their Golden Eggs by Grizzco Industries.

What Is Ink, Anyway?

Ink is more than paint in Splatoon. It is biology, infrastructure, weapon, and medium. Here is what the games tell us about how it works and what it means.

Mystery

The things the scrolls only hint at.

The final battle of the Great Turf War

The Loose Plug

The Octarians did not lose the Great Turf War in a fair fight. They lost because their Great Octoweapons' power cord came loose. Everything since has been about energy.

Sunken Scrolls Explained

Every Splatoon story mode hides collectible documents that reveal the world's history. Here is what they are, how they work, and why they matter.

12,000 years ago through Octo Expansion

Commander Tartar and the Thangs

Built by a human professor to pass on humanity's knowledge, Commander Tartar spent twelve thousand years watching cephalopods evolve. It did not like what it saw.

Side Order (Year 8.5)

Side Order and the Memverse

Splatoon 3's expansion drops Agent 8 into a bleached copy of Inkopolis Square inside Marina's Memverse, where a program called Order is quietly erasing everything that makes the world colorful.