Fixing Frye and Shiver in the Play Nintendo Deep Cut Popularity Poll

By LUDWIG VON KOOPA - It was an off-brand Stroop Test. I got it fixed.

Which of Splatoon 3's new idols, the three members of Deep Cut, do you like the most? That's a hot conversation topic in the Splatoon 3 fanbase right now. So Nintendo of America's site for kids, Play Nintendo, outright asks “Which Deep Cut member would you want to jam with first?” You should consider this an official popularity poll.

Unfortunately, when the poll first went up a few weeks ago—and had already gotten hundreds of votes—it mixed up Frye and Shiver. See the screenshot below.

Shiver is given Frye's photo, while Frye is given Shiver's photo.
Big Man is still Big Man.
See this archived link.

According to someone I asked—I didn't want to vote in the poll myself since I wanted to vote for Frye, but it's unclear which option to pick—as of the evening of September 11, Big Man has about 55% of the vote (177 votes). Frye, with the picture of Shiver, has 30% (96 votes). Shiver, with the picture of Frye, has the remaining 15% (50 votes). However, according to unofficial polling, as well as the World Premiere Splatfest, Shiver is way more popular than Frye is. The explanation is that people voted for Shiver's picture rather than Shiver's name. The mismatch between the picture and the name, and the decision that people take based on that, is called the Stroop effect. You may remember the Brain Age DS's Stroop test (or Quick Brain Age Check), where the words blue, black, yellow, or red would appear, but in a different font colour than what the word means, and you had to say the font colour instead of the word. It tests your prefontal cortex—and who knows if the Play Nintendo base passes or fails that.

I want an accurate poll and not a test, so I tried to contact Nintendo of America to get them to fix it. For that, I used their PR Contact form around midnight of September 12. First time using it. On their “How can we help? (200 word limit) *” question, I said,

“On the Play Nintendo poll https://play.nintendo.com/activities/opinion-polls/splatoon-3-deep-cut-band-member-poll/ ; Deep Cut members Frye and Shiver have the other's photo listed. Please fix the poll so the photos match the poll options.”

After weeks of waiting, it seems that the poll has finally been corrected. Well, I don't know precisely which day it was fixed, and Nintendo never sent me an email about it. (I'm taking full credit for bringing that the poll was faulty to their attention, which is the cause for them correcting the poll options. In other words, without me, it'd still be wrong. No one else!) I know it took over a week since I sent the message, since I did look intermittently. In any case, Shiver now has Shiver's picture, and Frye has Frye's photo. Here's an update as of September 25:

I voted for Frye.
If you want an archived version of the correct poll, here you go. It's the current live link though.

If you want an answer as to whether Nintendo believes the idol's name or the idol's photo is more important, I believe they believe the latter. The official Shiver option is the old Shiver-pic-with-Frye-name on the left, and the official Frye option is the old-Frye-pic-with-Shiver-name on the right. Shiver has 33% of the vote, Frye has 16%, leaving Big Man with 51% of the vote. (Note these are rounded.) You shouldn't put any thought into the minor differences in vote %s between earlier a few weeks ago and now.

As for why I voted for Frye, so far, to answer the question, I'd like to jam with her the most. I like her musical style the best out of Deep Cut. Plus, Frye's vocals are from a singer-songwriter with a jazz background, and I'm into that.

I still haven't committed to being a fan of one of the three the most. After all, I heavily supported Team Paper (Frye's team) as well as Team Gear (Shiver's team)... so my opinion can change. But as of now, I like Frye's deep cut of her jive the most.


Feel free to comment about Frye's and Shiver's mix-up... or actually share your own answer to the poll question.


Despite this article being about Ludwig's efforts to actually resolve a problem not of his own creation, he still asks you to vote for him as the biggest troublemaker of all the Koopalings in the most important Play Nintendo poll of them all.
By comparison, TPCI STILL has “Shinning Pearl” on their Pokémon HOME website, despite Ludwig getting an email response with that confirming they read him asking them to fix their typo.
If you want an interview WITH Frye, Shiver, and Big Man themselves, click here.