The Zipcaster is a special weapon in Splatoon 3. It temporarily allows the user to stretch their arm to quickly grapple to walls, causing damaging explosions on impact.
Activating the Zipcaster coats the user in team-colored ink. It also gives the user a "helmet" resembling their squid or octopus form and a "scarf" resembling their tentacle, both of which depend on the user's species. The user can also stretch their arms while in this form.
When in the special's form, the user can stretch their arms with to grab onto far-off walls and travel quickly to the targeted spot, creating a small explosion of ink upon impact.
If the player hits a wall (even if it cannot be inked), they will stick to it. While stuck to a wall, the player can throw out another tentacle without letting go, or jump off the wall to gain extra height. Going into swim form or using a main weapon will unstick the player. The Zipcaster cannot stick to ceilings or floors.
The player can still attack with their main weapon (the sub weapon cannot be used as it is replaced by the Zipcaster's grapple), although both grappling with the Zipcaster and attacking with the main weapon depletes the special gauge faster. When the special gauge runs out, the player will jump back to where the special was activated, ending the special. Like the Inkjet, the return spot is visible to all players.
▲ Ink consumption when using a main weapon while the Zipcaster is active has been decreased to about 67% of previous.
— Fixed an issue where a player who activated the Zipcaster while holding and then immediately releasing would result in a sub weapon being used despite the Zipcaster being in use, making the time of the Zipcaster's continuous use shorter.
— Fixed an issue where after having used the Inkjet or Zipcaster without once touching the ground, the player lands in an unintended location.
Quotes
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Transform into an ink-cloaked acrobat, and sling your stretchy arm to zip around the battlefield! Use to aim and stick to walls. You can still use your main weapon like normal with . When your ink runs out, your transformation will end, and you'll Super Jump back to your starting location.
When the special has almost run out, grappling again, then the special running out will cause the player to go to the grapple destination, but on the way and while super jumping back to the activation spot, the player's ink tank will run out, and 'low ink' will flash next to the player. However, once the player returns to the activation spot, they will have full ink.
When jumping down from the spawn drone a player can jump to an ineligible surface for the recall point. If they activate the Zipcaster, the first eligible surface they stand on will have the recall point placed there. This allows the player to reach spots only possible with the Zipcaster while it not being active.
As the special runs out the ink that covers the player will slowly fade away.
If the player falls out-of-bounds while the Zipcaster special is activated, they will simply Super Jump back to their recall point—or the player's last eligible surface if activated out-of-bounds—similar to the Inkjet.
