I see where you're coming from, but according to current definitions Splatoon can't be considered an "indie" game.

That said, I think you might have discovered something important. And that is: so-called "AAA" games aren't the best on the market, and haven't been for some time. I look at my list of the best games of the 8th gen and I see titles like Freedom Planet, Severed, Rocket League, Song of the Deep, and Runbow. And I also see modest games like New Super Mario Bros. U, Virtue's Last Reward, A Link Between Worlds, and Splatoon.

Games don't need a huge budget and cutting-edge graphics to be great. They just need a solid formula and the staff qualified to tease the best gameplay experience from that formula.

Not gonna read op but thanks for the joke

The definition of an Indie games is falsely used. .

"Independent video games (commonly referred to as indie games) are video games created by individuals or small teams generally without video game publisher financial support. "

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Indie_game

Publisher is Nintendo. Developer is also Nintendo as far as I am aware of.

Being it a completely IP, I suppose they went carefully with it and see how it is being received by the audience.
I suppose the next installment will be probably bigger. Hopefully with a real SP Story campaign.

Splatoon was developed and published by one of the biggest publishers in the gaming industry. It had a major marketing campaign, rivalling that of Mario Kart, arguably Nintendos biggest IP.

It was not, however, independently funded and published. Ergo it's not an Indie in any way, shape or form.

Indie is not an indicator of budget or quality. It has a specific meaning that has no bearing on anything you've asked with regards to Splatoon.

Now, do I think Splatoon has a AAA budget? No. Frankly not much besides Zelda has a conventional AAA budget at NIntendo and I don't think they realized what a gem they had on their hands when the project first entered developement.

It was regarded as a playground for younger developers, so it's save to say Nintendo probably didn't allocate a full blown AAA budget to it's developement. Once they realized they had a hit on their hands they gave it an AAA marketing budget though (and cudos to them fo realizing in time and deciding to push it), so in that sense I guess you're right. It was developed, probably on an AA budget but got an AAA marketing campaign.

Also wtf id 'less HD'? Something is either HD or SD. Maybe they have some low res textures in the plaza?

Splatoon was certainly a low budget game, otherwise it would have been in development for far more than a a year and a half, plus it would have packed various features from launch that it didn't have at the time, which makes it one of the biggest successes of Nintendo this generation given that the game was sold at 60$ in most countries. Of course I don't consider the marketing part of the budget, Nintendo certainly decides how much they'll invest into advertising a game only after it's development has ended and when they have a clear picture of how well they think the game will sell.

I dont think you know what indie means.

It's funded and published by Nintendo... and developed by Nintendo EAD, so no. Budget has nothing to do with indie or not indie.

I mean, The witcher 3 is an indie game, distributed by warner bros and bandai namco.

Indie? What the hell. How is a game developed by Nintendo EAD even remotely considered indie? A full price retail game also.

Its def. not an indie game. Wether it has a big or small budget has nothing to do with it.

It's an indie game in the same way Puppeteer and Viva Pinata are indie games.............. It's not!