Warframe: The New Player Experience 

0:58 "us experienced veteran warframe players" he says while still having the cyst on his neck

Dog. You forgot the other pet. CAT.

Any money i spent on warframe is because i want to reward the people who made it, and I never payed for it, and i want them keep doing it.

>story is a nothingburger Here is me unironically playing Warframe for the lore and story.

when you go against the murmur faction in late game the music becomes a banger

The biggest issue with Warframe's early story is it was time limited. A lot of relevant story progress was only seen during the time limited event that introduced new bosses. Which means most people never got to experience the conflict/story that resulted in bosses presence in their system. It's a huge flaw that I wish they resolved because they have the story there, they just never actually implement it properly after the introduction events conclude.

To say the Starchart takes only 100 hours is an understatement on its own. Not only does that mean you solely focused on missions, there’s a few that are locked behind story missions that, without proper time to grind out gear and items, will be incredibly difficult. If they don’t completely block you from doing them until you craft certain items, *New War PTSD*

oh my sweet baby tenno. Good luck and may your soul rest in peace...

The warframe story is this Start : okay I’m a cool space ninja Middle : Idk what’s happening and tbh idc End: OMG THIS IS AMAZING

DE's worst mistake with the story is that for the first 7 years or so (up until Plains) there's a lot of things they put into Events, which are just gone (if you're lucky you can read about them on the wiki). Alad V's story is the worst offender for this.

as a Warframe Veteran, the story is in this unfortunate place where some of the pre-Natah quests do actually tie together with the main story, but they're often spaced far enough away from those later quests that you forget about the specific pieces of dialogue in the earlier quests (looking at Stolen Dreams and Heart of Deimos here). Other earlier quests are simply related to a smaller part of the game and while interesting, not everyone is going to care about (Gara's quest, for instance, most people do the quest to get Gara, not to understand her lore). Once you hit Natah, things start falling into place as the quests from there are largely sequential and their cinematic nature (most of them) lends itself to make them more memorable before the next one. Heart of Deimos would benefit from that too if it wasn't so far back in the star chart comparatively that it gets forgotten between Mars and Uranus. Other than that, a lot of the other lore/story of the game is harder to find, hidden in little areas like in the Codex, Luverian, and other smaller spaces. Annoyingly some of it is also lost to old events, only to be found on the wiki or in a youtube video going over all the lore of the game. Some other parts are deliberately mysterious, not fully detailed, leaving some parts untold (yet, at least)

Random fact: Bullet Jumping through the game, the main form of movement, started out as a bug that players enjoyed using, so the devs decided to keep it in and make it a mechanic.

Warframe Veteran™ here: Yeah, most of the game's issues have always stemmed from the early game stuff, and it's been like that for years now. I do wish DE would spend a month or two overhauling the older systems and content, at the minimum. But! The stuff they've been releasing as of late has been banger after banger (at least, I think so) Welcome to Warframe, and enjoy your stay, Tenno!

the only real complexity of warframe is the shear amount of systems stacked on top of each overall working in unison. Mods, Arcanes, Focus Trees, Weapon traits, Companions, Ability buffs, external buffs, weapon types, statuses, critical hits, ect. So many systems are just thrown at you without much explanation. However youtube guides are everywhere.

my first 100 hours in warframe was just research and in my 200 hour i was leveling up my frame then in 300 hours i was grinding plat and the rest was just being AFK doing trades and survival missions.

The thumbnail is high art. I learned all in this game alone at the begining because I'm scared of people, the wiki is my best friend

I'm like 2500h in and have no fking idea what is going on in this universe or what characters are related to whom. Started in 2015, did all the quests and uninstalled. Reinstalled in 2017 and run the second dream quest which was just confusing as I was lacking context. Now one of the most important and emotional quests is 7 years ago and I can barely remember a thing of all the crap that happened back then. But it's still my favorite game, as I love to play around with gear and experiment. I've like 300h in the Simulacrum alone and love to play the hardest mission in different variants and frames. This game is truely special.

1000+ hours into warframe and I still don’t know the story 😂

I could imagine if later on when they ever fix the issue of the game not telling you about the premium currency, Ordis just breaks the fourth wall and tells you all about where to farm the warframe/weapon, how to get the currency without buying it with real money, and other methods of farming said warframe/weapon. Though it might “break the immersion” it’s there to help guide players from buying platinum to buy a warframe they can easily just farm a boss for.

when u complete the star chart is when u are done with the tutorial and the actual game starts

I would add few more criticisms on the early game (new player experience specifically): - lack of gun variety - tons of weapons, but almost nothing is available at the very start/easily, most likely need a friend to taxi you to higher tier planets to farm materials for even MR2 weapons (thats how I was getting Vectis) - lack of slots for everything - if not for that said friend to just gift me dozens of slots when I started, I would've dropped it, because early on it is very predatory - "pay platinum to own more than 3 guns or else!" - lack of customization options - tons of color pallets, can customize every color on your frame... and you only have one ROW of a basic pallete. Everything else - 75p! And while yeah, that's just a decoration, but that creates this illusion of inaccessibility - where to have any choice of anything you would have to pay. Its only when you accumulate a huge inventory of prime junk that's worth way more than you thought and you start actively trading and get thousands of plat easily, you finally realize how petty those prices were and how tiny those barriers are. But until then, unless someone proves to you otherwise, you'd be under impression that this is yet another scammy predatory cash-grabby F2P title. Honestly its just sad how the game manages to misrepresent itself to the newest players and its only a loyal fanbase that is actively fixing that. Now I'm part of that fanbase, gifting slots to newbies left and right, sometimes even gifting prime frames (no MR restriction).

The second dream was the first real story mission. Everything before that had lore sure but it wasn’t a focused narrative. Warframe does actually have some amazing story and lore, and as you get to more recent content it’s a bit more woven in, but much like the new player experience, the “wanna learn about the story” experience involves a lot of RU-vid videos and a lot of research through the wikis.

Something very important I want to mention that I have never seen any other mmo do is that the daily login rewards arent for _consecutive_ days they are for _total_ days. I genuinely didnt know this at first so when I started warframe I logged in daily just for the "reward streak" but when I got burned out and then recently returned to the game I saw that my "streak" was still intact. Its one of the most player friendly and least predatory systems i have ever seen compared to the industry standard. I do have my own problems with the grind of the game, which is why I quit for a long time, but I appreciate that they dont indulge in these tactics to get you addicted like most other mmos.

just got back into warframe and I’m glad i found your channel bro, incredibly underrated

Yo I'm a new player. This video felt like someone spilling my excited thoughts about the game. Subscribed, the game slaps and you have great presentation.

Good delivery/presentation, funny guy, you will go far

The best way to spend time I’ve heard in long time. Be strong

Having almost 3k hours in this game I think you hit the nail on the head on a lot of issues new players have. The biggest one is absolutely the market. Flashing a premium currency price-tag first-and-foremost can be a huge turn-off to a lot of new players. Now, if you got to market and click a Warframe or weapon it THEN shows you the blueprint/aquisition. But that's only if you bother to open the tab, which a lot of new players simply do not do. A market UI rework would help tremendously I feel. Another huge flaw of the game in my opinion is while, yes, everything save certain cosmetics can be obtained 100% free via player-trading, the fact that you *need* weapon slots and Warframe slots to progress and can *only* get them from the market for platinum (a pitifully small amount, but still) and occasionally from the nightwave--which a lot of new players probably wont even know to engage with--and which only offers a very limited amount of said slots. Tying into the market rework, having the slots be available as a craftable blueprint would be a massive improvement. ...which leads me to the final of my Big Three Complaints: The crafting times. Now, I'm a patient guy. And after the thousands of hours I've spent on this game, I'm used to it by now. And yet, wouldn't you rather have that shiny new Warframe you spent the last 4 hours farming NOW rather than 84 hours from now? I know I would. Or how about that new weapon you've been aching to try ? Waiting anywhere from 12 hours on the short end, to 36 hours and rarely even more, depending on if the weapon has requisite components that also need crafting (I.e. the Ruvox) it can take a tremendous amount of time. Being forced into a time-gate via the crafting just feels so outdated and ruins the flow of the game for me. Rushing things for platinum also seems like a huge waste and just feels so out of place. At most warframes should take an hour to build, weapons maybe 30min. Even then, that's a lot of time to spend waiting. Thankfully, it's not like you have nothing else to do while you wait--which is probably why so few people seem to complain about crafting times--as you have a MOUNTAIN of other content to dive into while your frames/weapons/etc craft. TL/DR: Market needs a UI change, slots need to be more easily available, crafting times need to be reduced or outright done away with. For every thing Warframe gets wrong, It also does a half-dozen things right. It's a great game overall--even given it's numerous flaws--and I'm glad the Devs have stuck with it for over a decade and continue to make improvements and listen to community feedback as much as they do. It truly is a passion project and it's rare to see something like it in this day and age, especially with the current climate in the gaming world. In any event, I hope you continue to enjoy your journey into this game lad, happy farming.

subbed bc you're a 100k+ (min) reviewer. keep at it man the commentary was great!

1000 hours to go is the craziest take ive ever seen in my entire life, 1000 hours and you MIGHT be entering mid game

as someone with thousands of hours in the game, i agree. the new player experience is genuinely bad even tho it got reworked. the story feels super disjointed unless you read it like a book from the wiki. another issue youll realize that DE kills its own game and missions by trivializing older content. eg. eidolon hunting killed by events, vosfor and focus rework. archon hunts killed by netracells, index killed by profit taker.

i was thinking about returning to warframe after some years, but i always get reminded of the 9 to 5 that it is

Really great video my dude, but you better don't forget about that lamborghini now! I'll be waiting for it

These jokes are amazing 💀"Sniffed me out as the tight little Warfare virgin that I am." "Petite little sugar baby." I love it

New player here (120 hours) and I agree with every single word you've said. Especially, surprisingly enough, with your take about the story. Everyone is like: "Warframe story is on the next level". Well...maybe I'll see more unique interesting quests later but for now the only good quest I've seen was second dream.

about the story i think we also have to remember when the first story missions was made the company was really small a decade ago. seeing how the story expands because their budget is higer to put more quality in is like its own journy on it self and maybe also there for the OGs to remember what they came from and what we have now

To be fair, a big part of the lore needed you to be there to experience them on the day of release, considering alot of them came with operations that gave them more depth. Kind of similar to Helldivers's Malevelon Creek. And also to add years of build ups for some major story quests.

As an almost 10k hours played on Warframe (god help me) and played since like u7, i completely agree with the criticism. I've seen again and again new player get confused about the system and just...bail, not knowing that the meat of the game is behind that atrocious new player experience. I can list a can full of worm about Warframe's HORRIBLE new player experience but for now, at least for us vets what can we do is guide our little Tenno and gifting stuff to ease the grind to get to the meat of the game! Welcome young Tenno! Hope you enjoy your stay

Lmaoo this video is amazing bro

Yes, they should add text to explain where to farm each frame. As a veteran this never comes to my mind but that’s a great idea. Players shouldn’t have to google.

The thumbnail is crazy vibes lol

Very well spoken. Amazing video. You gained a sub.

every player that i've spoken to or had in my guild that has played for a long time has invested real money at some point, it's not just whales that drag the game along it's people that like the game and therefore support it when and how they can.. even if it's to wait for that sweet 70% off plat offer .. you don't get a game lasting over 10 years without a huge loyal playerbase .. nice vid you've earnt a sub

Been watching several tutorials on everything even the hidden abilities that warframes have you really got to watch so much of it or else you’ll make a mistake that you might regret

You're fkn hilarious and that gotdamned thumbnail is cursed.. W yt recommendation👊🏽

“As soon as I did they…” Hush tenno, this is the way. 😂

A good amount of quests are introduction of warframe and as a reward you unlock the part to build it. And then their are main quest where the story unfold

Hey there. Happy to know you're loving warframe. Good luck with the job hunt. Tines are tough. Maybe the warframe community might be good enough to get you one of thoee as well.

0:04 uhh.... no, just no.

After seeing the Squirt Duration mod, I NEED to add that to my Nezha build

If you go to buy somthing in the market you can also see where to farm that weapon or frame

I picked Volt as well... Do you also think he would look better without his skirt?

While I agree with you about the first few missions but everything after second dream the story and game in general just gets sooo good. And then it jumps up again after war within and then once you play the new war you won’t be able to stop playing there’s just so many cool and fun grinds and different game modes with always something to work for

My biggest tip to a warframe newbie would be to learn the market. There are plenty of insanely simple ways to make hundreds of plat, and there are a couple things in this game that take much longer to farm for themselves rather than just farming plat from trading and buying it from the market. Also having constant access to boosters is a godsend early game when resources are low and you’re crafting like 50 weapons and warframe

When I started playing in 2014, I thought that to get Warframe, colors, and cosmetics you had to buy platinum with real money, even so I continued playing and discovered that almost everything can be obtained in the game.

the jump scare got me.. "HAY!" haha

1:30 The entire movement system is based off a bug. You used to be able to jump in the air and swing a heavy melee weapon which would send you flying through the air "coptering". Everyone did it and loved it so they fixed the bug and then added "bullet jumping" to the game. I never took issue with the games total lack of a tutorial. The gameplay loop is so fun i just immediately started going through the star chart and figured it out as i went along. It seems that lately they're making a lot of rewards only available if you're in a clan to force people to interact and learn that way.

The early game definitely needs some improvements. We've been screaming (respectfully) this for years. And you're pretty spot on with the quests being meh up untill the second dream. The worst part about that is they could really easily fix that. For a lot of the characters in game there was a special event with a semi quest related to it that introduced the characters spot on, their personalities, intentions and location. But after that event was gone they simply removed those special semi quests from the game. They could really easily fix the world building before the second dream with just making those semi quests playable again when you first encounter those characters. Not only would that give you a reason to give a shit about The characters because you actually get introduced to them instead of. "He bad guy, go kill bad guy!" It would also really help with setting a clearer progression path on game. And there have been some improvements. Believe me, the onboarding process was way worse like 4 years ago. But they definitely still need to address the fact that they don't really teach people how the modding system works, what types of currency there are and how you can obtain them. (there is a lot and I include platinum in that. I totally agree with you that the game should explain how you can obtain that stuff without pulling out your credit card) And also please fix the codex! (Ingame wiki basically) The codex just act like a wiki but most of the information in there is just. "Go get the item first and then we will tell you what it does." Just make it so that the codex will just have all the information from the start and then have a little icon form completion in the corner once you actually get the item. This is especially bad with mods in the codex. Like, it will show all the mods, their names and what enemies drop it. That's good. You don't get to see what the mod does though untill you actually aquire the mod and good luck finding out on what planet/start chart note those enemies that drop it come from. If you want to farm basically anything you are required to have the wiki open at all times. Warframe is a good game. If you know all the systems. For new players you either just quit or have someone guiding you trough. Because trying to learn all of what the game has to offer by yourself is nearly impossible. And this comes from someone who has spend over 5000 hours in the game. I love this game with all my heart, but god does it have problems. Luckily the team has really been focusing on quality of life this past year or so. Let's hope they also improve the new players experience soon.

2:25 I can see how a new player would think circuit is optional, but unfortunately when you start going for incarnon weapons, easily the strongest weapons in the game for most things, you have to do steel path circuit every week and fully get each reward. Also because of all of the content specific rescources and rewards, you’ll eventually be forced to interact with all of it to some degree. Things like index is way outdated so you can ignore that for credit farming, but you’re going to have to fight profit taker whether you want to or not, since he’s by far the fastest way to earn standing in that faction.

The new war is like such a jump from anything

I played this when it first went live years ago. I reinstalled in a couple weeks back and had zero idea wtf was going on

"Just farm whatever boss drops the parts" Oh you sweet summer child. The grind for Harrow, Gauss, Nidus and more can take forever. Although with Duviri tou can get them a lot less painfully.

That's a good use of time my friend

I understand your take on the "void" of the story in warframe, as i recently bring my girlfriend to start the game, and seen the game through the eyes of a new player in 2024. Those quests may look meaningless when you are playing them in rapid succession in 3 hour long daily sessions. But I started back when Warframe was a corridor simulator, and the only lore was availlable through the codex pickup you can scan in missions. And when those story quest were drip-fed over years to us, and tied the lore we until now had only read about : it was well worth it. Most notably, all of the Alad V arc fell flat in front of me when replaying it. Because without the gameplay events, the time needed to build his character as an ally, then a traitor, then coming back begging, etc. all the quests are doing is picturing this guy in differents situations, without any apparent connections. The story of Warframe is great because of how deep and fleshed out its universe is, unfortunately most of the lore stuff you can only get through text (codex or wiki), discontinued events, obsolete missions quotes, etc. And unfortunately, you will be served a story, but without the lore making it special, it's just like a cold burger. My take on a lore-friendly new player experience : - do not try to rush the star chart to get to Nathah/ The Second Dream faster - try getting some lore from the codex and other ingame sources along the way - if it exist find a video essay about "Warframe Lore : the basics before the second dream [no spoilers]" (if it doesn't please someone make one :D )

You’re funny asf brodie! 😂

You cannot spend traded platinum on the market. Only bought platinum is good for the market. But you can still trade things with platinum

Q&A chat is such a valuable tool once you know it exists. i always poiint people to the Q&A chat. youll usually find that 1000 hour freind there

One thing I think you could have mentioned here is prime resurgence and vaulting, being that only a few prime items are in circulation at once and other ones can take a year to come back. This means there is kinda a time lock on getting some of the best weapons as if you miss it it's gone for ages, plus the vaulted relics being so damn hard to grind for

The reason veteran players don’t mind the game being like league is cause like u said earlier in the video the star chart and quests are the progression of the game. U don’t really need a billion hours in a build to take on all the content which is tbh really good and new player friendly. There isn’t anything ur forced to go do and can take it at ur own pace. I think the actual problem like u stated in the market part of the video is none of the actual systems of grinding or playing are ever explained and that still leaves me as a vet very frustrated because I wish it was easier to explain things like relics for prime parts or grinding for warframes by killing bosses or even how to navigate the hellscape of early game trading.

As a long time Warframe player all of your points are completely valid and I agree with them. I help my friends with figuring the game out all the time , but the fact that I have to is a fundamental flaw in the design that should be looked into. The new content in Warframe has been fantastic recently, but unless the old content gets some TLC, new players will be hard to keep as they may quit before reaching that actually good content.

Best part about bullet jump is that it came from a bug with dash attack mechanic. And people abuse this as hell. So DE fix the bug and create bullet jump.

Warframe is that type of game of you either have played from the start and learned along the way where times were simpler or join through a friend who has played an excessive amount of time and can help you along the way. I was part of the later half, and I do my best to help others getting into it.

I just started playing warframe this last week. Your review completely accurate to my experience minus the clan to carry. Hit mr6 and just finished the second dream and got xoris. How do you get the stronger galvanized and other rare mods? Are they all from factions? Should I keep merging the 4 basic ones and roll for better?

I almost, almost got angry when you said the quests were bad then I realized, yep all the early game quests are bad and dated, I know it's not a priority rn but it would be nice if DE can revisit the early game quests to bring them on par with the sacrifice quest and the Jade shadows quest. I agree Warframe has an issue with the lack of hand holding, they should really get new players acquainted with the game systems but even then there is so much that I can't imagine how DE can even tackle this. Like I'm a new player in league, just begun yesterday and even with the small amount I know I can't see Riot being able to teach me the intricacies of the champions, gear and tactics. Though for the fact that there is no hand holding you would then say it brings players together, you had to seek out a clan and talk to other players, and even seemed out guides and builds on RU-vid for weapons and game modes feeding more into that community aspect. So while typing this I can say that actually maybe not having any handholding has huge benefits when it comes to community, like without this way of setting up your game I'm sure both league and Warframe wouldn't have as big of a fanbase

Ya... there is a massive learning curve. The massive variety of things that you can do in the game are both it's strength and it's weakness. They have been churning out new content at a breakneck speed for over 10 years. They try and go back and streamline things periodically, but it is difficult to make the insane number of systems digestible.

Once you get to endgame and casually start doing dps numbers that would realistically nuke a planet you’ll start helping noobs just to have a reason to keep playing outside extreme min-maxing and *THE GRIND*

Started playing about two months ago, nearing 200 hours of playtime. I keep thinking I finnaly got a grip on most things and understand the game and then new things just keep popping up, and I say that in a fully positive way. Decided to not join an existing clan and make my own instead, so far just me and my little brother but I got some friends that are starting to show interest in the game so hopefully we'll expand with more members. Never liked getting free stuff and instant access to things in games, I want to work for everything and experience the whole process.

Warframe was honestly my favorite game to learn how to play. It was absolutely confusing as hell but in the end i became max mastery

i thought that when you click into the warframe in the market it shows the blueprint underneath the price stating how to obtain it for free

i was about to comment like a page of stuff and decided naaa so heres this but ye good job btw did you do new war...

I guess I'll be waiting for a Lamborghini but thanks tenno

I started playing almost 10 years ago on Xbox. Since i’ve gone through 3 different accounts ( all on different platforms before cross progression was added) and i JUST now got my first prime warframe from grinding. Back when I originally started the game was only a fraction of what it is now. I’ll get on for a month every few years or so, and every time I get on, there’s an entire new realm to explore

100 hours on tutorial, 1 hour of fun, 10000 hours forma and strengthening Warframes, 9999 billion hours for 100 Kuva 😅

351 days = 8424 hours of playing Warframe. Still have no idea about most of the stuff. Playing with Wiki opened, getting frustrated for selling something that i didn't need, but i absolutely need NOW, wishing i've known not to sell it. Getting angry for not knowing about the second Daimos segment for the Helminth, or for not getting tauforged shards, or for spending hours getting something i need to make something i need to make something i need to make something... you know the game. It is frustrating, it is complicated, it is complex, it is fun. Hope you keep playing it, because it is only getting better. GL #havefun

The game actually DOES hint at how to unlock new Warframes, when you're going through the star chart and fight the boss that drops the items. Of course, it doesn't ever actually tell you what's going on, you have to get the drop and realize that the boss drops the parts, but that's pretty much as esoteric as how the game tells its story so.

Best lore and story, but it doesnt start until after natah and the 2nd dream.

6:15 - YES. As a guy who's been playing since 2015, and whonis also a (beginner) game designer, this speaks TRUTH. Warframe devs really don't know what a tutorial is. They need to learn how to not only make it to explain all the thjngs, but also to make it seamless.

FINALLY, a review from an actual new player that isnt biased. As a veteran, gotta say, it hooks you off of fun and just fun. If your not having fun, leave and come back. Seriously, half the veterans in this game tap out and just come back because they hear about a new cool update. On that leage comparason, you're exactly right. Ive even compared the slot based build crafting system. It doesnt click unless you're aware of a, the base stats of a weapon and why/how they matter, b, whether or not it does a thing you need it to, and c, none of that matters because 99% of the time you can turn your brain off if you just coppy paste someone else's meta build. There's a lot of that in this game, but its in a way thats less destructive and much more exploratory in terms of build crafting, and that's what's kept me for so many years.

New player exp: this is so sickk Veteran exp: damn I wasted 2000 hours for nothing

POV when you’re a 2000 veteran and you see the new game struggle. As for new players, yeah… I get it. I see all these new systems and think “yay, more new stuff to do.” But the new players I imagine get fuck tons of analysis paralysis.

Do they have tires or something on the warframes? All those sliding and knee slide

I allready had a spare stake ready for you when I saw this video . Fit 2 parkour mods onto every warframe you use , thank me later :)

My first mission with the Railjack was a blast.. I was shocked that Warframe has space combat and games like D2 don't...

I've been watching my husband plsy for years. It wasn't until Jade, the newest warframe, csm out that i actually started my game. He has been teaching me how to play and the ins and outs of the game. He started playing shortly after warframe originally came out.

I've been on an omega long break from Warframe like Second Dream long. And I wanna get back in but I'm worried I just wont know which direction to go.

Once you get through that horrible necramech grind and get to new war there so much great music and a great story. Kahl is the goat!

then here begs the question : who's the best squirter in Warframe ?🧐

Your content is so underrated

Unrelated but if you like playing Necro have you seen the new Witch gameplay video for Path of Exile 2? The new minion system they came up with looks great

Ya thankfully the story does get really involved and really good starting at second dream and war within, but it’s unfortunate it takes so long for new players to experience it