About

Foamstars is an upcoming online party shooter video game developed by Square Enix in which two teams of four players attack each other with guns that shoot foam representative of their team's color. Upon its reveal during the May 2023 PlayStation Showcase, the gameplay drew comparisons to Splatoon but also mixed reactions, as some expressed excitement for the game and others trepidation.

History

On May 24th, 2023, Square Enix revealed Foamstars in an announcement trailer during the May 2023 PlayStation Showcase^[1] (shown below).

Square Enix states that a key aspect of gameplay will be using foam to alter an arena's terrain, allowing players to surf and climb on foam to reach their opponents. There is no release date for the game as of May 26th, 2023.

Online Presence

Upon the trailer's release, the game instantly drew comparisons to the Nintendo series Splatoon, which also features teams competing using similar paint-based weapons. For example, on May 24th, 2023, Twitter user @FAR5222^[2] called the game "bootleg Splatoon" in a tweet that gained over 2,800 retweets and 7,900 likes in two days (shown below, top).

In Splatoon, players compete to cover the majority of an arena in their team's paint color. The win condition of Foamstars was not made clear upon the game's announcement. That ambiguity was pointed out by Twitter user @FehdenCY^[3] on May 24th, who posted Splatoon's announcement trailer to make the point that the objective of Splatoon was clearer in its trailer, gaining over 220 retweets and 1,900 likes in two days (shown below, bottom).

Square Enix made a bootleg Splatoon but with foam LMAO FoamStars #PlayStationShowcase pic.twitter.com/LqbABYA4Qv

— FAR (@FAR5222) May 24, 2023

Just want to compare the Foamstars trailer to the beta Splatoon trailer from 2014. I have some major bias to Splatoon, but even in composition, the Splatoon trailer shows and tells so much more about gameplay than Foamstars 👀 https://t.co/oKluJfDhYr pic.twitter.com/3ZegEmASjq

— • Fehden • (@FehdenCY) May 25, 2023

On Reddit, the game was the target of mockery from many, particularly in the subreddits for Splatoon ^[5] and the Persona series. The Persona fandom took issue with a headline from IGN^[4] that called Foamstars "the Persona Splatoon Game We've All Been Waiting For," as few saw the connection between what was present in the Foamstars trailer and the Persona series.

On May 25th, 2023, Redditor Over_Engineering_ posted a screenshot of the headline to the /r/PERSoNA^[6] sub, titling the post "Please Don't," gaining over 1,600 points in one day (shown below).

However, not all the reaction to the trailer was negative. For example, on May 24th, Twitter user @ArcanaLegacy,^[7] while conceding the game looked like "PlayStation Splatoon," said the game "looked like a blast," gaining over 30 likes in two days (shown below).

Search Interest

External References