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[inkantation-arch]

grizzco industries: a fuzzy, off the books nightmare.

a synthesis of ideas from conversations with @lipsyncdripink & @octaling & @jukkumi​

a few notes: throughout this, i’m going to refer to real life incidents of advertising to youth, workplace malpractice, and the skirting of, and outright breaking of, labor laws.  i will sometimes refer to splatoon 3 spoilers, but never in an overt way.  this post also assumes that the fucking splatoon 2 app is canon.* there’s definitions in this fucker. i’m in deep, folks.

summary: Grizzco Industries. is a black company in which workers are hired as gig workers instead of true employees. By exploiting the Inkling and Octoling prey drive, creating illegal weapons that give them a high they can’t get elsewhere, and preying on the unemployable and too young to know better, Grizzco. creates its ‘bright future’ through harm. The life threatening job, the ( definitely below the board ) gachapon payment system, it all goes hand in hand with Grizzco’s ultimate goal.

black company: A black company (ブラック企業, burakku kigyō), also referred to in English as a black corporation or black business, is a Japanese term for an exploitative sweatshop-type employment system. //  gig-economy / gig worker / etc: Gig workers are independent contractors, online platform workers, contract firm workers, on-call workers, and temporary workers By classifying their workers as "independent contractors", instead of as "employees", Gig-Economy jobs are not required to provide the full suite of employee benefits. 

Though Grizz often refers to the player as an employee, the inconsistent ( or never ending, as in Splatoon 3 ) availability of shifts that are signed up for, rather than having consistent hours, and a lack of actual benefits ( not being paid an actual wage, no healthcare, etc. )  the for the workers seems to imply that the employees are not true employees, but rather independent contractors. The terminology is loose and vague on purpose, in order to avoid the boneless arm of the law. 

* a defense of the app being canon: It’s referred to in game as Splatnet, and is presented as if it were diegetic to the game. It also has an in game function ( ordering clothing from Annie for Murch to deliver to you. )

all ages and backgrounds welcome.

This line, and other variations on it, are mentioned in a lot of places - but, most specifically, it’s on the banner for Grizzco on Splatnet 2′s C-Pod. A constant advertisement for Grizzco shifts, right next to Turf War rotations and online shopping. All Ages and Backgrounds Welcome. Turf War is cool with teenagers, and there’s certainly something to be said about that. Grizzco Industries consistently is seen to advertise to the young. On Splatnet, by taking out adverts with Inkopolis News Time, or on Anarchy Splatcast.

Maybe you’ve had a losing streak in Ranked, maybe you just need a few thousand to make it through the end of the month. Grizzco Industries is hiring, all ages and backgrounds welcome. 

You know how, in the real world, vape companies were caught actively advertising on websites that were targeted at kids, and then it was found that a significant portion of high schoolers were vaping? Yeah.

Extrapolating this further, it has implications beyond just the cephalopod kids and Turf War scene. When people are desperate, they’ll work wherever. That’s where that ‘and backgrounds’ bit comes in. Much like our real world low paying / gig-economy jobs, it is usually the already trod upon who end up in these positions. ( for my own two cents on who this would entail, I imagine you see a lot of college students, a lot of adults who never finished school, the physically disfigured, and non-verbal people.  People who are considered ‘unemployable’ in white collar work - ie, office environment jobs. )

This also sucks in combination with Splatoon 3′s Splatsville, where it’s mentioned that a lot of people do, genuinely, suffer the effects of poverty. Then a nice, shiny company opens its doors, ready to pay the people willing to risk their necks.

As per my previous email, Inkopolis as a whole values independence - kids move out as soon as they can, play in Turf War after school, and provide for themselves. There’s a focus on making a name for yourself. Grizzco certainly plays on that. All one needs to sign up is to be level 4 in Turf Wars. You’re only one capsule away from financial security. 

Actually, let’s talk about the capsules.

the gambler’s fallacy & you

As Inkipedia points out, the capsules in Splatoon 2 are reminiscent of pachinko parlors giving away prizes instead of cash in order to skirt gambling laws. These prize windows are outside the business, and usually right next to a pawnshop, so one can exchange the prizes for cash. Now, Grizzco Industries isn’t running a casino illegally; they’re committing the worst crime of all.

Grizzco Industries is dodging taxes. 

Okay, Grizzco dodging taxes is like, the lowest sin. In fact, most real world companies dodge at least some taxes all the time. But it’s not just about Grizz’s taxes - it’s about the employees too. In the real world, independent contractors are required to report income over a certain amount, and that income is then taxed. 

Now, suddenly, the capsules serve a lot of purposes. Because it’s not pay per hour, not even pay per shift, really, as it’s based on points accumulated and one shift does not evenly equal a capsule, there’s not a wage to report. Scores of employees who don’t have to worry about a percentage of their wages ‘disappearing.’ You just open a capsule, and if you get lucky, you’re set for the month.

If you get lucky. And if you don’t, well, you can always work another shift. Bring in more Golden Eggs, and you’ll reap even bigger rewards. And if you’re farming for chunks for better abilities on your gear, Grizzco’s got you covered too. Even the company store has its own currency, the scales, which require even more and more shifts to get the different kinds of scales. One more shift means you might get to a fight Cohozuna. 

One of the art books ( I believe Haikara Walker ) refers to Salmon Run as particularly addicting, the feeling of power and the fantasy of defending the city, like a real hero, but there’s something subtler too. The comparison to a Pachinko Parlor isn’t random. Grizz is using the allure of bright colors, the thrill of suspense, to perfectly replicate the feeling of gambling.

( in the real world, it’s just good game design, allowing the player to feel rewarded without the rewards becoming stale.  but hey, we’re taking things to the logical extreme, right? )

rare weapons - the logical extreme.

So like, what are the Grizzco Weapons? Powerful, illegally modified weapons, yes, ones that are implied to have been placed in rotation by a ‘tentacle error.’ ( from splatoonus’ post, “If you happen to come across it, don’t even think about stealing it or go blabbing to the media about it.” ) But... There’s just something about them. Maybe it’s the prescription pill motif that all but one of them have, but combining it with the statement that the job has an addictive quality, well...

I do not think that Grizzco Industries is actively drugging its workers. Rather, I think the nature of the job, ‘cooperative’ team job that involves killing scores of enemies that are seen as feral* and using incredibly powerful weapons, with the thrill of randomness, is designed to exploit everything about Inklings and Octolings, particularly the teens.

( * We know this isn’t actually the case, given that they have trade agreements with the Octarians, music, and their own culture, however wether or not that’s public knowledge is debatable, given that the Sunken Scrolls are only ever seen by the player. ) 

They have high prey drives, thus the high contact sport of Turf Wars. They don’t know better when it comes to labor laws - kids are rarely taught about the kinds of protections afforded to workers. ( Even above the board, as legal as can be business benefit from their workers not knowing their rights. Join a union. )  And when it comes to trying to band together against Grizz.... Well, it’s so much easier to blame the low performers, than it is to give up on what seems to be the perfect job. 

pitting workers against each other - for fun and profit!

( I owe this section very specifically to octaling, so, shout out to them. )

A Salmon Run ends in defeat - wether a crew wipe or a quota unmet, you’re brought back early. It’s explained that any excess from the collected Golden Eggs are used for extraction, as the Run itself hasn’t actually ended, and the employees are still in danger. Sure, you brought in your quota’s worth of eggs in the two waves preceding, but Grizz barely gives you 10 points towards a capsule. Upon returning, you’re shown everyone’s statistics, 

And you see someone didn’t pull their weight. 

It is one thing to be in a competitive environment. In fact, it can be really healthy to be in a competitive environment, where people work together to better each other and themselves. Actually, Turf War would be a great example of that for the Inklings and Octolings. It’s just a sport, after all. If someone doesn’t play well, it’s just a game. Some people might take it too seriously at times, but unless you’re seriously playing in the upper levels professionally, it’s not personal. 

But Grizzco Industries is a job. And that kind of competitive, bonus-driven employment is designed to prevent people from banding together. Grizz has perfectly designed a job where forming a union is antithetical to the job. 

After all, you can get docked for someone else’s poor performance. If that poor performer complains, the perfect response of “you didn’t die.” sits there waiting for you. Anyone talking about exploitation, about the lack of compensation for injuries, they just didn’t know how to do it right. The gambling-like hooks are already in the top earners, and to walk away now would be stupid. To risk the retaliation would be stupid. A captive work force, in many, many ways. 

All this, in service of Mr. Grizz’s fuzzy future.