The freemium FPS/RPG Warframe has slowly crawled its way into being one of the most popular games over the last few years, and is consistently one of the most popular titles in its genre. Over the years of building, a bit of content has gotten stale.
One of the first bits of content introduced was all the way back in 2013 with the Corpus Faction, a cultish group of greedy villains that make up the brunt of the upcoming Deadlock Protocol update. The update brings a heavy overhaul of tuning, graphics, and gameplay to make the title much more fitting for a 2020 audience.
As the update comes closer, PlayStation Blog interviewed producer Dave Kudirka and Mat Tremblay. Through the interview, the pair discussed the past and future of the game, and how they’re working to bring it all together.
“One of the best things about working on a game that has been going for this long is that you get to revisit things,” Tremblay stated, discussing the long life of the title. “The game, our engine, our universe, all these things have evolved over the life of Warframe. This means that the content and levels we made in 2012 can now get the benefit of what we know in 2020.”
This Corpus Ship is one of the first tilesets that was created for Warframe, which has caused it to be dated significantly. Over time, the story of the game changed, to say nothing of the technology that drives the creation of it.
With the Deadlock Protocol comes a new Warframe named Protea, as well as a new Corpus character and another secret, unrevealed character. Additionally, the AI and many other mechanics have been reworked, including some boss fights.
Of course, the graphics are being brought up to date as well. Seven years may as well be an eternity when it comes to the graphics that bring a game to life, and there’s a clear bit of dating between the 2013 content and the 2020 content just off of graphics.
The minds behind the title are also bringing the Corpus more to life, utilizing the opportunity to make them considerably more cultish in their worship of wealth. They’ve also implemented the new updates into other aspects of design, such as making more areas where the skybox is visible to help the updated skyboxes shine.
Speaking on the new Warframe Protea, the pair seem extremely excited and confident that players are going to love the new frame. This time-bending fighter is tied with the Corpus and the way in which the Protea Story Quest will interact with the new content.
All in all, this rework of the old instead of leaving it to rot is an incredibly refreshing thing to see. Rather than letting the old content stay there and forgotten, Digital Extremes are going back with a bucket of paint and providing a whole new level of polish.