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The Time For Warframe's Story Is Running Out


Licter
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It seems clear that DE began developing Warframe from a conceptual and play-style approach from the beginning.  The lack history and lore of Warframe is so complete, that the players, who are controlling the titular Warframes, aren't even certain what exactly a Warframe is.  Is it alive?  A suit?  A proxy?  If it's a suit, why does my character undergo a gender reassignment procedure when changing clothes?  Way more questions than answers right now.

 

To be clear: this lack of story and lore doesn't in any way detract from enjoying the play style of the game.  I enjoy it immensely, not having any idea where any of this cool-looking stuff came from or why I'm using it to blow up other cool-looking stuff.

 

The point is, if DE is going to develop a cohesive story and lore, they need to do it sooner rather than later.  If DE finally formalizes and releases a 'canon' account of the Warframe world, they are going to receive criticism from the fans for not doing a better job than the fans did in creating that lore.  The more information they leak, slowly, to the community, the more the community will conjecture and invent.  That paints DE into a very tight corner, as very creative fan fictions gain more details and can end up being better than the answers and details that the DE creative team decides on.

 

So DE: nail it down.  At this point, making a poor choice in lore is better than allowing the community to continue to conjecture, invent, and speculate.  Leaving things mysterious is incredibly dangerous: it either gets old if left obscure too long, or creates an impossible expectation of "awesomeness" when the truth is finally revealed.

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I created my own theories from the information given, but as a player that has given over 700 hours in over 1.5 years, im slowly getting bored of Warframe. My play time has reduced already to 1-2hours a day, and not everyday. Sometimes i just login for the reward thing. But i am not bored of killing things, making new frames or weapons, testing new mod builds etc, im bored from the lack of story.

At first i was excited to play warframe, hoping the story would be good etc. And that it wouldnt be one of the hundreds of no story shooters, but now those hopes are long lost from lack of real lore releases.

Yea they release new information here and there, but its simply not enough.

For those tjat are vets, they are hit the hardest with so much time and money spent with no story of what we actually are doing. For new players theres some lore that makes it interesting, but after what, 10 hours max? Theres nothing more to figure out.

In short, we need lore, from new to vets, and we need it now, and not Soon!

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Iiiiinteresting. I don't disagree half as much as I'd like to, this is actually a very valid concern for that particular aspect. Already, we're seeing fan works become widely followed and discussed. Expectations are mounting, and while I would never ask them to focus on this over gameplay development, it's clear it needs to become a corequisite, and keeping it in mind would be desirable for a fully fleshed-out product in the end before players gain enough traction to be justifiably disappointed.

Edit: also would agree with the poster above me. Additions like small, immersive missions, tilesets to explore planets and discoverables to unlock lore would all help with retaining old players too. Shifting focus away from the grind and towards the background story would be a practical, workable thing to do to more fully engage and immerse players.

Gratuitous subliminal messaging to check out my own fanfic here. Or don't. It's nothing to get hooked onto. :x

Edited by Vastaren
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Not really people can have there own theories all they want but as long as DE's official canon is not a cheap cop out (Mass Effect I am looking at you) most of the theories will be forgotten.

I'll have to disagree here. Don't underestimate the power of a well written AU. Most fanfic writers do that now anyways. When I play the game, I use my own lore, and I just ignore the rather messy, half arsed and somewhat lackluster lore. Lets say the final product is well done, and has no issues or loopholes like it does now, its still not mandatory for that canon to be "accepted" by the fans. Sure, it exists. But it might not be as cohesive or fantastic as something fanfic writers have. The chances for the canon being rejected grow as the fan made theories get better and better. After perusing the forums for a year, I can say that this is on its way. Fan made lore is several times better. The OP makes a valid point. Lore needs to be released faster. Much faster.

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I'll have to disagree here. Don't underestimate the power of a well written AU. Most fanfic writers do that now anyways. When I play the game, I use my own lore, and I just ignore the rather messy, half arsed and somewhat lackluster lore. Lets say the final product is well done, and has no issues or loopholes like it does now, its still not mandatory for that canon to be "accepted" by the fans. Sure, it exists. But it might not be as cohesive or fantastic as something fanfic writers have. The chances for the canon being rejected grow as the fan made theories get better and better. After perusing the forums for a year, I can say that this is on its way. Fan made lore is several times better. The OP makes a valid point. Lore needs to be released faster. Much faster.

But rushing the lore will do nothing but cause that which the OP wants to avoid.

 

The current lore in game is well thought out and pretty good lore, there are loop holes that have not been addressed sure but if they De continues making lore at the current quality I have no doubt that the official canon will be great.

 

I have never seen a case were something canon is that bad that the average player rejects it in favour of some fanfics, and I have seen some amazing fanfics but I have always seen the title "fanfic" take away from instead of adding to a pirce of work. 

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Not really people can have there own theories all they want but as long as DE's official canon is not a cheap cop out (Mass Effect I am looking at you) most of the theories will be forgotten.

 

When it comes to clearly-ended story plots I couldn't agree with you more.  I love movies and games that finish with enough ends tied up to be satisfying, but with enough questions left unanswered to give people something to think about for hours after the credits have rolled.

 

When dealing with an open-ended, ever developing story it is entirely a different matter.  Warframe's stories (faction changes, event weekends, even new Warframes) need to have cohesive, well-made lore in place first in order for the game to be anywhere near consistent months and even years down the road.

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Perhaps it would help to clarify my position slightly.

 

I don't demand that DE release absolutely everything thing there is to know about Warframe's lore.  Nobody starts into a mystery story knowing everything, that's literally the opposite of the word "mystery."

 

My issue is, even the authors of Warframes stories and lore don't seem to know what the mysteries are, let alone what the answers are.  I gave an example in terms of "What is a Warframe?".

 

Here's some more: What is the Lotus?  What are the Tenno?  What were the Orokin and Sentients?  Are they all human?  Is Warframe in the same universe as Dark Sector?  Because it has a lot of tie-ins either way.  Did Hayden Tenno exist in Warframe?

 

DE doesn't need to release everything, but they need to project confidence to the community that those questions are answered, and that things will become clearer over time.

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Writting lore is very, very easy (especialy if only one person does it at a time) 

 

 

If anything, I don't like how they write in more lore. Like how they're shoehorning lore explanations for things like "why there's now infested ospreys". because It doesn't make sense when you see them in any tileset that isn't the infested corpus ship. You should just work under the assumption that it's beta and there were always infested ospreys.

 

 

OP, I disagree with you completely. Not only is your title full of melodrama, but the story is suffering from DE's need to rope in crap lore to justify what they're adding. 

Edited by Innocent_Flower
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OP, I disagree with you completely. Not only is your title full of melodrama, but the story is suffering from DE's need to rope in crap lore to justify what they're adding. 

 

I love that you disagree with me.  Now allow me to respond to your criticism.  The title was intended to catch attention in a fast-moving forum with lots of topics.  I take your posting to this topic as a compliment, as the title I chose worked perfectly as I'd wanted.

 

Your comments seem somewhat self-contradicting to me.  If writing lore is "very, very easy", then why should we work under the assumption that "it's beta and there were always infested ospreys"?

 

You seem to be coming from a perspective of "bottom up" design for Warframe, in which the mechanics, equipment, and enemy models and behavior are by far the most important (if not only important) aspects of the design process.  I'm coming from a "top down" perspective, in believing that the mechanics, equipment, and enemies should be designed from a fully developed and consistent story of lore.  I believe that from my perspective, infested ospreys would have had a place in the Warframe universe before they were implemented in missions, and therefor wouldn't have to be "shoehorned" in with "crap lore."

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I'll always welcome more lore and story, on the Warframes and the factions especially. But like I've said in many other things, I vehemently believe the one thing that should stay ambiguous is the appearance/nature of the Tenno themselves. Knowing how the Tenno were created and all that would be fine, but how they look, behave, their backstories, and whether they are energy/corporeal need to stay at least a little ambiguous.

 

Other than the Tenno, more lore and story is welcome.

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I'll always welcome more lore and story, on the Warframes and the factions especially. But like I've said in many other things, I vehemently believe the one thing that should stay ambiguous is the appearance/nature of the Tenno themselves. Knowing how the Tenno were created and all that would be fine, but how they look, behave, their backstories, and whether they are energy/corporeal need to stay at least a little ambiguous.

 

Other than the Tenno, more lore and story is welcome.

 

I agree that mystery about the Tenno is a great story-telling device for making the plot of Warframe interesting.  I do have issue with having an in-game avatar that I have complete control over, and yet have no idea what that avatar is.  How can I be a Tenno, and change Warframes without having any idea whether I changed clothes, inhabited a new body, or just morphed into a new form?

 

Having no idea where I'm from or what I may have done in the past (but don't remember) can be a great story.  Not knowing what's just below my own skin strikes me as odd.

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Evident from the many threads from confused players about the recent addition 'Latron Wraith', speculation is rampant and no efforts to curb it are seemingly forthcoming from DE.

 

The important distinction to make is that lore-appropriate mystery and annoying, contrived ambiguity aren't the same thing. The lack of backstory on the ages-ago war where memories were lost/suppressed helps to create a certain tension (though this isn't used to any advantage outside Ordis' occasional thought-bubble) which is fitting with the events alluded to, but clear discontinuities such as the recent confusion over the naming of the Latron Wraith (even though people have come up with an accepted theory) is just downright avoidable with a simple announcement on nomenclature.

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