Warframe How to Play Quests Again
Digital Extremes on Warframe's "Infinity War" moment as its biggest story expansion yet approaches
The New State of war arrives next week.
The New War is an end of sorts; not a definitive end - Warframe'southward continuing status equally an enormously successful costless-to-play alive service shooter does rather dictate that - only an end to a chapter that'due south been nigh viii years in the making.
The New War, for the uninitiated, is a 3-act slab of strictly single-player, heavily cinematic sci-fi risk telling the story of a massive Sentient invasion from the perspectives of multiple playable characters - including a Grineer Lancer chosen Kahl-175, Corpus engineer Veso, and Conclave Master Teshin. It's also a culmination of - and, in many means, a celebration of - every major narrative arc and mechanical addition Digital Extremes has brought to the game thus far, laying the groundwork for new adventures to come up.
Or equally Digital Extremes' live operations and community director Rebecca Ford puts it to Eurogamer, "Information technology's kind of like we're releasing our Infinity War... we're getting to the point where everything nosotros've done since 2013, 14, 15 has been leading to this moment. It'due south the finale of sorts for the story we've given you and then far almost who yous are".
"We don't tell players the truth well-nigh Warframe until they reach [acclaimed story quest] The Second Dream," Ford elaborates, "which for some players is 100 hours into the game. The New State of war takes everything The Second Dream introduces and concludes the chapter in a way that you'll know the stakes of the universe. And you'll know what you'll demand to do side by side. Information technology's not the stop of Warframe's story, it's a way for you to motion on to what's side by side with closure."
It'due south also an event Warframe fans take been anticipating for a long fourth dimension, with Digital Extremes initially teasing The New War all the mode back in 2018. "The truth is," Ford admits, "we're kind of a yr backside. Nosotros would have liked to start 2020 off with The New State of war in the form you're going to play it this Dec. But sometimes yous get a pandemic while y'all're making things and decide yous can't exercise it. You decide it's not possible, logistically; information technology's not possible from a safety perspective; it'south non possible to use the studio at all because nosotros're non allowed in the building. There's a lot of reasons we had to say, 'No, nosotros need to change tracks hither'".
"Having said that," Ford continues, "the track nosotros changed to, which originally we didn't know if information technology would connect to The New War, is now a role of The New State of war. Then ultimately, it got ameliorate because of the delay in terms of the scope and the story, and there'due south things in it that wouldn't have been if we released information technology in 2020. And and so now we're in a state of affairs where nosotros've taken the stuff we released, and made it matter in the purposes of the quest, in setting everything up."
And as anyone who'due south been following Warframe's development over the concluding few years volition know, that 'stuff' encompasses an enormous number of features. "The New War touches the open up worlds we added," Ford continues, "it touches [Warframe's deep-space combat component] railjack, it touches on NPCs nosotros added, and it touches on other systems we introduced effectually our evolution timelines. So it wouldn't exist a stretch to say everything nosotros've released in Warframe that's been a major update has a function to play in The New State of war."
Indeed, for those players still comparatively early in their Warframe chance - and I count myself in these ranks, with 'simply' a hundred or so hours under my belt - the sheer scale and ambition of The New War might come equally a surprise. There's the obligatory cinematic bombast most would likely await at this climatic signal in Warframe'southward story - Digital Extremes demoed a frantic moment of deep space warfare during its press event - but information technology finds time for some very dissimilar, significantly more low-cardinal moments too.
1 demoed sequence in particular - offering a dramatic shift in tone and form which I won't spoil here - completely caught me off-guard. When I tell Ford this she jokes, "I have to laugh. I have to imagine you lot came to that press issue and probably thought you were in the incorrect game... simply I think it's a practiced reflection of what Warframe has become."
"We started off making a complimentary-to-play action game with tonnes of cool sci-fi stuff," Ford explains, "then we started to realise it was working." That success gave the team both the drive and the opportunity to have Warframe into more aggressive territory - "to make it more than than only an action-RPG", as Ford puts it - and it'southward hither information technology began to detect its story.
"In that location'due south a lot of means you can approach storytelling in video games," Ford continues, "that's the most obvious statement I could ever make. But we wanted information technology to be as personal as we could possibly go far to direct contradict the world we had built in its about core gameplay class - because there's no real story when you're going in and killing mobs, doing your horde modes, doing all these things... But what if all that came from something very personal?".
"And that's how it all started with The Second Dream," recalls Ford. "We turned it into a very, very personal journey... and for players waiting for The New State of war, they know what it ways, they know what the stakes are. The world is in a very specific state with very, very specific consequences that we're taking very seriously. We're earning ourselves moments of darker tones, serious content matter, all for the purposes of making that personal story."
"In a lot of ways," Ford adds, "the content yous're still playing through in that early on game is from a time when we had a smaller squad with smaller tools. It'due south kind of interesting to exist able to use the quests equally a mode to reflect on the team's competencies in making content and the team size.
"For The 2d Dream [released in 2015], we had the size and telescopic for some cinematics... and I call up 10 minutes of original music in a medley of sorts at that place. And at present we're in 2021, we have 70 minutes of music, nosotros have a multitude of increased cinematic scope and calibration. And it reflects the squad size, team competencies, team conviction - like, 'Nosotros could exercise this, we shouldn't be afraid to take risks because look at how information technology paid off back in 2015'."
Some of these learnings have now started to bleed back through the years; last August saw Digital Extremes revisiting Warframe's introductory mission - which structurally had remained largely untouched since the game's launch back in 2013 - giving it a considerably more cinematic, emotionally impactful overhaul that establishes the stakes of Warframe's story in more immediately engaging ways. And information technology'south something the team is already looking to practise more of, albeit with ambitions that go across simply refreshing older quests.
"We practise want to have a moment of 2021 quality early on", explains Ford. "I retrieve the style to practise information technology is in the facets of explaining a system, to emphasise the complexities of the globe and the game, but to practise information technology in more than than a text carte du jour, which is probably what you're enduring right now - read, retain, then motion on to the next thing. Whereas what if we presented it in a way that had a quality bar and an emotional reasoning for it all?".
For all the axiomatic excitement effectually Warframe's The New War - which Digital Extremes has variously called its "biggest narrative expansion so far" and the "most aggressive matter we've done" - information technology'd exist remiss non to mention the barrier of entry. As the culmination of almost eight years of story content, at that place's a long list of pre-requisites players will need to complete before they're finally in a position to feel the bravado spectacle of The New War themselves.
It's a non-insignificant time investment - past Digital Extremes' reckoning, it'll take newcomers around thirty hours to reach The New State of war, assuming they don't become mercilessly sidetracked along the way - and I ask Ford why she believes it's one players should make. "I think if you commit to playing Warframe's story," she says later on some thought, "you'll feel a narrative unlike whatever other in a game that's unlike whatever other. I recall it's incredibly unique.
"Information technology'south authentic, because we're doing the story we want to tell and we're taking the time to practice it. It doesn't hesitate to be weird and original in a landscape where players might be looking to find something that's incredibly wacky - only ultimately it will make y'all experience something too. I think the feeling behind everything nosotros're doing has always been to brand it as man as we can make it in a visual setting that couldn't exist further from man."
Past Digital Extremes' own admission, The New State of war is an end of sorts, and so the question inevitably becomes, where does it get from here? One thing on the horizon is the delayed Duviri Paradox update - Warframe'southward fourth open-world expansion, first announced at Tennocon 2019 for a planned 2020 release - besides as the long-awaited inflow of cross-play and cantankerous-saves, originally planned for this twelvemonth only now due in 2022.
Ford says the studio is "very excited" most the internal prototypes it has up and running for cross-play and cross-saves, "but we demand ridiculous testing. And we need ridiculous attention to particular because it'due south a free-to-play game. And there'due south economic consequences to everything one time cross-platform hits. And so nosotros need to be very, very, very detail oriented in how it all works."
Before all that, though, there's The New War, and later its long route to release, Ford says she's simply looking frontward to seeing how information technology's received by fans. That moment finally arrives on 15th December, when Warframe's The New War update launches on all platforms.
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Source: https://www.eurogamer.net/digital-extremes-on-warframes-infinity-wars-moment-as-its-biggest-story-expansion-yet-approaches
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