A grand new New Player Experience

[KaeseSchnitte]

This is an idea I had on how to improve the beginning tutorial of Warframe drastically. I've split my idea into what is going on, written out as normal, and what the Lotus, fully voiced, is telling you, written italic. This is obviously only a rough sketch, but in my opinion already better than what we have currently. I hope you enjoy:

 

Loading screen -> Mastery Rank test transition

Player is dropped into the Simulacrum

"Tenno? Tenno! It is time for you to awaken."

"I am the Lotus, I will be your guide"

"Your time has come, but you have slept for so long. We will have to test your memory before we can begin"

Warframe selection screen appears

"Test out these Warframes. They will be your armor, your surrogate through which you will interact with the world and MURDER THE SH*T OUT OF- and face enemies of old and new."

"Each Warframe has its own, unique abilities, test them out."

Enemies in their Mastery Test paint job appear

Player can test out the abilites with unlimited energy. enemies will attack but deal no damage

"Abilities draw their power from your energy pool each ability consumes energy. If your energy pool is depleted, you will have to refill your energy first before you can use your abilities again"

"For this test however, I've overcharged your energy pool. You can test out your abilities freely."

"If you want to test out a different Warframe, go to the arsenal"

Player can use the arsenal to switch Warframes

"If you wish to continue, interact with the console next to the arsenal"

After the player interacted with the console

"The Tenno are powerful fighters, feared by all of their enemies. They gained their reputation not only through strength, but also through mobility. It is time for you to show me how agile you can be."

Basic tutorial of how to move as Tenno

"Duck and then jump to channel your energy into a bullet jump. Jump again mid-air to increase the distance of your jump"

"Excellent, now aim mid-air to level your jump"

"Now, climb this wall by jumping forward repeatedly. Aim to cling to the wall, or jump sideways to move alongside of it"

After that, the player can test out different weapons.

At last, the player is familiarized with the basics of customizing appearance of and installing upgrades on a Warframe

"There are many Warframes, and much more weapons to acquire, but for now, you will need to use what you are most familiar with."

"Tell me, Tenno, which Warframe do you call yours?"

And the tutorial continues where the game starts currently, with Vor using his Void Key.

Edited November 28, 2018 by KaeseSchnitte

[(PSN)wolf-MAN010]

tbh i like the current one more

[5H4DE]

This is way too much hand-holding, it'd be yet another case of "let me tell you how to do everything because you can't think for yourself".

[Marvelous_A]

The current one is fine, what they need is to gift all basic mods (hp, shield, energy and 4 basic power mods) after tutorial and their first warframe should come with reactor.

Edited November 28, 2018 by Marvelous_A

[Firetempest]

The more 'real' intro I think is better. But I do think the codex training guides like advanced movement tutorial could be reimagined. Like its own segment in the orbiter. Loading up simulation and going into a large room like custom parkour room in clan, being able to load up different training sims on the fly using the new OV open roam bounty systems as a base. Then offer upgrades to this base simulation via simaris. Forcing travel to relays for testing weapons alone is not populating relays DE. You load up, fast travel, then blip out of existence. And new people have to be told about this because when are you naturally directed to simaris... And then 50k rep for a key. With days of standing caps to reach it. That's a critical flaw for such a useful system.

[KaeseSchnitte]

I disagree with the sentiment that the current introduction is fine. For example, the very first thing you're asked to do is to pick a Warframe, when you don't know what a Warframe is, what it can do, how much weight your choice has, if your choice is permanent or not, and all you're left with is a screen describing things that don't mean anything to you.

The movement in this game is complex and apart from sliding, nothing is explained in the tutorial.

Customization is not explained, the range of different Warframes is not explained, nor are the weapons. Hell, the first time you come in contact with the fact how many different Warframes there are, it's either in the Arsenal where a big pricetag is plastered on them, or in the market, which isn't any better. Coming into the game now, a player can very easily get the impression that 95% of this game's content is locked behind a paywall. My suggested tutorial aims to fix the above problems. And if you don't want your hand to be held, you can just interact with the console I mentioned to skip all the steps.

Edited November 28, 2018 by KaeseSchnitte

[Firetempest]

12 minutes ago, KaeseSchnitte said:

I disagree with the sentiment that the current introduction is fine. 

I disagree that the first image a new player should experience is the sterile VR environment and blah blah mom handholding. There is no urgency or importantance in absorbing that information first without a reason to use it. Much of what you want changed could be adjusted within the low stakes of the Vor intro itself or the UI.

[wtflag]

The proposed feels kind of spoiler-ly because the game kind of makes you think that you are the warframe at the start. Of course serious questions start to arise when you obtain a second warframe. But it still was not explicitly telling you about the history of tennos.

I like the current one better in which the many clues in the main quests are like jigsaw pieces that slowly form a picture in the player's kind until the revelation that is Second Dream.

As for new player experience, the issue is (1) how badly and misunderstanding microtransactions are being promoted and (2) not starting them off with something cool and attention grabbing.

Let's face it, the three starting frames are plain looking and it takes a while to level up the skills to a point they became useful.

Many MMORPGs will show you your "future self" in middle/high tier armor in character creation. The "coolness" of your character matters! Especially if you did not know that you will be acquiring prime frames later.

True story: my brother did not make it pass the first hour because he did not like his character ...

 

[Firetempest]

2 minutes ago, wtflag said:

Many MMORPGs will show you your "future self" in middle/high tier armor in character creation. The "coolness" of your character matters! Especially if you did not know that you will be acquiring prime frames later.

Which is weird how the tutorial plays out fully as a solo endeavor as all the trailer vids and DE paid for 100 days of warframe animation has a elite cell of badass tenno roll in and stomp Vors goons helping you escape.

That could have been shown to the side with Fancy NPC frames attacking Vor after he blows up the first Liset set to pick you up, distracting him and giving you time to find your original ship. Though its been a long time and their cinematic quest quality has improved a lot since the last vors prize refresh.

[KaeseSchnitte]

I'd liken my suggestion to how the first Assassin's Creed introduced the player to the game; with a dream-like sequence explaining the movement and stealthy takedowns. At that time, I didn't wonder how this sequence fitted into the game's narrative, it was merely a way to explain basic mechanics before the game started. Of course, aftet learning how the Animus really worked, it was cool to see the parallels I didn't know to look out for earlier.

 

As for lacking urgency, you could of course show Vor first, but I think that games that give you an objective first and then trying to teach you mechanics on the fly have the player not paying proper attention and don't have the players try out the features the game is presenting them with.