INKWAVE: Turf Riot

INKWAVE: Turf Riot is a third-person ink shooter where painting the floor can matter more than winning a duel. Cover the arena in your team's color, turn into a squid to travel through friendly ink, and use that same ink to refill before the next fight.

Created by Jayden Davis, the game offers solo bot matches and online rooms. This expanded, touch-enabled edition includes Turf War, Zone Control and a cooperative boss battle. Build a loadout from a main weapon, sub weapon and special ability: a rapid-firing Spritzer, broad-painting Roller or charged long-range weapon calls for a different approach.

Paint a Route, Then Fight

Start by laying down connected paths of friendly ink. Squid form lets you move quickly through them, refill your ink supply and climb painted walls. Enemy ink slows you down and chips away at your health, so repaint a route before pushing into hostile ground. Open water is a hazard, not another swimming lane.

Your main weapon and sub weapon draw on ink, while painting also builds your special gauge. Retreat into a safe painted patch when supplies run low instead of taking another fight with an empty tank. After being splatted, you can use the tactical map to plan a Super Jump back to an ally or your base.

Turf War and Zone Control

In four-versus-four Turf War, the team with more painted ground at the end wins. Eliminating opponents opens space, but leaving that space unpainted wastes the advantage. Solo matches use bots, with three difficulty settings.

Zone Control changes the priority: paint and hold the currently marked objectives to bring your team's counter from 100 to zero. Zones rotate, losing control can add a penalty, and overtime can keep a contested finish alive. Painting a distant corner is less useful here than helping secure the active zone.

Cooperate Against Hullbreaker

Boss Battle puts your squad against a giant armored hermit crab, with bot help in solo play or friends online. Defeat Hullbreaker before time runs out; territory coverage is no longer the victory condition. Shoot its glowing eyes and punish exposed weak points after a stun. Leave marked impact circles, sidestep charges and repaint corrupted ink so the squad has room to dodge and refill.

Movement and Weapons

• W A S D: move
• LRMove Mouse: look around and aim
• LRLeft Click: fire the main weapon
• ⇧ Shift: enter squid form and swim through friendly ink
• ␣ Space: jump; some weapons combine jumping and firing for special movement
• LRRight Click or E: use the sub weapon, not precision aim
• F: activate a charged special ability

Map and Menus

• Tab or M: hold to open the tactical map
• 1–3: select a teammate for a Super Jump while the map is open; 4: return to base
• Esc: pause or open the menu

On phones and tablets, use landscape orientation. The left stick moves your character; the right-side controls handle aiming and firing, with separate buttons for jumping, squid form, sub weapons, specials and the map.

• Connect your paint. A continuous ink lane gives you a fast escape and refill route. Isolated patches are much less useful when an enemy pushes you back.
• Use a splat to claim space. In Turf War, repaint the ground an eliminated opponent was protecting instead of chasing the next duel immediately.
• Keep an ink reserve. Throwing a sub weapon just before a close fight can leave too little ink for your main weapon. Refill behind cover before committing.
• Match the weapon to the route. Use a Roller to cover broad ground, charged weapons to threaten longer sightlines, and the Bucket's arcing shot to pressure enemies behind cover.
• Check the landing area before a Super Jump. Choose an ally with room to support you rather than jumping straight into the enemy's strongest position.
• Make breathing room in Boss Battle. Repaint unsafe ground during attack gaps, then focus exposed weak points. Chasing damage through corrupted ink makes the next dodge harder.