Splatoon 2's Mario-Themed Splatfest Dates Announced

Splatoon 2's next Splatfest, which is a part of Nintendo's special celebration of Mario's 35 anniversary, is coming in early 2021. The Mushroom vs. Superstar Splatfest kicks off on January 15 and runs for two full days.

The Splatfest will start at 2 PM PT/ 5 PM ET on January 15 and will run until that same time on January 17. The Splatfest is global, so it's going to start and end at the same time in all regions. Nintendo announced the news earlier this week on its official Japanese Splatoon 2 Twitter account.

This Splatfest announcement came alongside the announcement of Super Mario 3D All-Stars back in September. Nintendo is also releasing special Nintendo items and hosting special in-game events in other games like Animal Crossing: New Horizons as well to celebrate Mario's 35 anniversary.

Some Splatoon players believe that this will be the final Splatfest for Splatoon 2. Nintendo had already stopped hosting the events before the pandemic, but decided to re-host Splatfests that had already ran once worldwide stay-at-home orders went into place. The Splatoon community is still running their own Splatfests, even if this is the last official one.

Nintendo unexpectedly canceled the livestream of a recent Splatoon tournament due to controversy surrounding the Super Smash Bros. Melee community. Nintendo had forced The Big House, a Smash tournament that was running a "Slippi" mod that added reliable online play to Melee, to close down earlier this year. Splatoon players put variations of the trending hashtag #FreeMelee in their names to show support of the Super Smash Bros. community. Nintendo then canceled the livestream for the Splatoon 2 North American Open due to "unexpected executional challenges."