The issue is Splatoon was never good to begin with

I don't know, I think there's not a single doubt in my mind that Splatoon 2 is better. There's nothing worse about it.

Well, maybe the campaign's final boss is weaker, but... that's about it.

Splatoon 2 was pretty disappointing imo. While the first game was a fresh and innovative game, the second one was just a lazy port. I didn't play it nearly as much as the first one, because quickly got tired of it.

What turned me off from Splatooon 2 was that they just ported Splatoon with the same mistakes from that game, (poor map rotation, no real voice chat, no gear changing in the lobby, etc.) and adding other problems like lhigh latency in motion controls and low tick rate but of course S2 has some new cool things that make it fun.

Amen. Almost literally the same game but highly tweaked with more features.

What? It's one of the best modern shooters. Objectively it is a tremendous game

I think it has to do with Splatoon 1 being a fairly new and "fresh" experience. At first we got only a few weapons and stages, but the game kept adding more to which you would have to change strategies to adapt to the new stages and combating other weapons as well. Plus the splatfests were also kind of a new and fun experience as well. Splatoon 2 was more straightforward for those who played the first. Overall I prefer the 2nd one.

Try again to play Splatoon 1 and see again if its more fun than Splatoon 2.

There is gear changing between each match in Splatoon 2 now.