Daily Thoughts: Coming back to Warframe- a newbie’s perspective

Okay, before I begin, I want to make one thing really clear: I really don’t like the idea of committing extremely hard into one thing and one thing only. I never commit thousands of hours to one game- to me, that seems like quite a waste when I could have enjoyed and completed other games countless times. Hence, it can be reasonably inferred that I am a newbie here (I’m still stuck on Jupiter). I’m not trying to diss any hardcore players here- it’s just my personal experience and opinion.

Because of this, the MMO genre in general never really attracted me- the entire genre is built on the premise that players will constantly spend their time and money into it, and that type of commitment is something that I can neither afford nor really give. For the same reason, loot shooters were also not my thing; I would try them out if they were up for free, sure, but I didn’t like the idea that I have to spend at least ~200 hours to fully experience the game.

Loot shooters, by my definition, are multiplayer online FPS/TPS games, usually with a sci-fi background, that includes class-based action, item-based experience progression, and experience-based story and content progression. They are geared towards co-op play; the story can or cannot be the main component of the game. They feel more like Diablo or Torchlight than other MMO games, and accurately translating this feel is essential to the whole experience. Examples include Destiny, Borderlands (to a certain extent, follows the typical FPS experience more in my opinion), and Warframe, the game in question.

I first found out about Warframe about 3 years ago on Steam. Their Steam catchphrase, “Ninjas play free”, summarize the feels of the game pretty well- space ninjas doing Cool Things^TM in Space^TM. Since I love mech animes and tokusatsu, I was hooked almost instantly. Its design was also radically different from other games of its genre: there was some beauty very hard to describe in those curvy, Gieger-esque “tin-suits”. Somehow, the uncanny valley suddenly felt very attractive. So I downloaded the game. “It’s free to play, after all, I can just quit and uninstall when I feel like it” was my thought process behind it.

After around 15 hours into it (and half the playtime spent on updates), I leveled my Excalibur to level 17 and quit the game. There were mainly three reasons:

1. Very unfriendly, absolutely no tutorials (besides walls of text) on key elements like mods and relics

2. Flashy action with smooth edges causes some 3D nausea (I usually don’t have a problem with these, but it became one when I played this game for more than 2 hours at a time)

3. Feeling useless in group missions; I really don’t have to do anything most of the time, so what’s the point?

Then months or years passed and I came back during the Plains of Eidolon update. Open world content was still very unfriendly, UI was still hard to absorb and also no tutorials on important mechanics, and even with my Twitch Prime gear, everything felt slow and clunky. I quit the game soon after.

(and if you are thinking that these aren’t valid criticism, I will go in-depth later).

            And then I got Destiny 2 for free, tried that one out, quit, and just overall not interested in the genre anymore. Main reasons were that:

1. Skill gap often feels too great, and following the story content isn’t enough to enjoy the latest content the game has to offer.

2. Grinding often feels pointless when loots are completely random- plus, they often don’t aid me in enjoying new content, they just fill up the skill gap a little bit and that isn’t really enough.

3. All the designs, visuals, etc. are too common; I’ve seen this already and I know how this looks, feels, and ends (or, how it doesn’t)

Couple months fast forward, Tennocon 2019 hit and they announced that spaceship combat was coming soon. I figured that this time, something (please god anything) would be different.

            And I was right.

Let’s get back to my three main criticisms and how DE dealt with them.

1. New user experience- overhaul in UI design helped me out here. I was still frustrated that tutorials were mostly just blocks of text, but at least now they were easier to read. Plus, objective markers on planet junctions now showed instructions on how to complete objectives to progress. Now my question of what the hell is a cephalon fragment was solved and I was actually able to progress further.

Renewed combat also helped out as well. Last time I visited Warframe was before the (widely hated) Melee 3.0 update, but the changed system for me felt more direct and easier to understand. I would also argue that taking a couple of seconds during combat to switch between melee only and ranged is against the ninja theme- they should always be prepared to quickly lunge a weapon, aren’t they?

I really do hope that they add some interactive tutorials on things like mods, fragments, relics, etc., but I think making everything easier to read and follow helped me out a lot.

2. 3D Nausea- Somehow, the game doesn’t feel much nauseating to me anymore. Maybe my eyes have changed, but combat, in general, feels a bit smoother and in control. Cameras now feel a lot more stable so I can clearly frame the action going on in the screen. Also, the map updates really helped me out here. Moving and parkour, in general, feel a lot smoother now because of map updates; better textures and models helped my eyes a bit while making maps more open and guided helped me see where I am going and alleviated the sense of completely losing track of everything, which did contribute a bit to my nausea.

3. Group experience- I still sometimes get the feeling that the level difference is too high and I’m not doing anything. However, I definitely sensed that I am getting matched with more similarly-skilled players when I opt-in for a group, My prime gears helped me to close the skill gap a bit, and those two in combination helped me to gain the sense that I am actually doing something.

Finally, let’s compare how Warframe is faring compared to my criticisms of Destiny and the whole loot shooter genre in general.

1. Skill gap- unlike Destiny, Warframe’s story content matches the experience and skill progression nicely; by the time I reach important story quests like ‘the Second Dream’, I am skilled enough and I have the items good enough to enjoy the content in level footing with everyone else, whereas in Destiny, the story content is too short and doesn’t really match with the whole experience of the game.

2. Grinding- More explanation can be given, but Warframe does give the location of each material in its description page. So even if loot collection is random, I know at least where I am supposed to go loot things. Narrowing down the focus helps me regain a sense of direction in the game.

3. Design- Warframe’s design philosophy is very unique; its emphasis on curves, a mix of organic and inorganic, and the emphasis on uncanny valley effects all contribute to a unique taste that is very hard to find in other SF games.

I am still quite critical about the genre in general and still quite much about Warframe; but I think it’s safe to say that developers constantly keeping their vision and constantly applying it to the game while constantly improving the whole experience is its main reason for its massive success while others are losing their player base to Warframe.

I will get back once I played enough to judge the experience holistically.