what is the point of inoswap?

so i'm playing thought for the first time, and just unlocked ino, but the whole thing just isnt making sense. yeah, i get that it's call back to poppiswap, but it seems pretty useless. it doesn't affect party members (far as I can tell) and you can't control hero's. maybe it's just a me thing, but I don't really care about upgrading people I can't control in games like this.