A review of Warframe after 5000 hours.

[eXotic]

Original review posted on steam.

Before i start, i would like to adress some of the feedback that was given to me in this thread ( Thank you! ) :

For the newcomers, those that just started playing warframe:

It is not my right to tell you not to play the game, you can decide for yourself and if this review helps you decide then i am eternally thankfull for your time.

This is my review, my personal belief and my experience with this game over the 6 years i've known and played this game. When i first started the game, you had to pay platinum for revives, the game's UI was totally different, the modding screen looked like a skill tree and warframes had stamina. This game changed so much in 6 years that it is honestly brethtaking, alot of the changes that happend were for the better, but some were obviously not.

When you first get in to the game, you might be overwhelmed with the amount of 'content' this game has to offer, it has 100's upon 100's of weapons, companions, frames, gear etc, over a dozen quests and 100's, even 1000's of hours of play time, the game is a massively grindy looter shooter with an insanely devoted core community.

The game might feel amazing in the beggining few 100 hours but you will soon start noticing its flaws and practices,

these are some of the things i thought i'd highlight;

-----------------------------


When i first wrote this review in 2015, i was in love with the game, it felt refreshing and nothing like anything I've played before i couldn't recommend this game more if i could, sadly, this has changed.

At this point in time, i cannot recommend you to play this game.. here's why;

;TLDR;
-----------------------------------------
The game in it's current state is extremely bad, with a shallow surface level amazing community plagued with a toxic white knighting extremely vocal minority.
The story is stretched thinly over 100's of hours of grind with gameplay on par of a AAA title plagued with bad game design, willfully ignorant devs (to the people with the most knowladge), a looming increase in Microtransactions with every new update (but the updates keep getting pushed back / delayed or even totally forgotten and unreleased) and a non existant endgame

You might hear raving reviews about this game from so many people, but they're all surface level reviews..
You might hear how the community, game-play and story is amazing, but is it really?

Community;
__________________________
- Most people you meet in your missions won't speak to you, we mostly just keep to ourselves, even when somebody does communicate it's mostly just telling you how you're doing stuff wrong and how to play the game by their opinion, you will never be good enough.
- Region chat is pure cancer, filled with elitist, tyrant mods that censor almost any negative/critical opinion about them or the game,
the players are no exception to this.
- Trade chat has been ruined by the Riven market (mods that are basically steroids for your weapons, these mods can go to upwards of 20.000 platinum - warframe's in-game currency (4.300 platinum is 45 Euros with a 75% Off)).
- The forums are a dumpster fire of censorship and hate, most valid criticism can get your post removed and get you muted for hate speech but not before DE (Digital extremes, The developer) white knight fan boys come to attack you and tell you to quit the game because you're trash just spreading hate..
- The good thing about this is that these people are in the minority, sadly this minority is the most vocal part of the community.

Story;
____________________________
For what it's worth, the story is quite good, for a new player you have 3 main storyline quests that answer quite a lot about the universe, but what's the point if the story is spread so thinly throughout the game that i can take you around 100 or more hours to complete it, these 3 quests got released in the span of 4 years, with the first quest being released in 2015, DE's release plans are the worst i've seen from any developer, they show you teasers, promise you the update's are coming soon only for the update to be inevitably DElayed 3 times taking some updates to be released for upwards of 1 year or more.
All the ''DElayed'' ''SoonTM'' and ''Content-Drought'' memes are 1010% warranted.

Game-play;
_____________________________
The game play is solid, hands down the most polished feeling FreeToPlay game out there (this review was written before destiny became F2P).
The game makes you feel like a god, you kill hundreds of enemies in a single 5 minute mission barely breaking a sweat, the game is set to easy mode, you have approx. 270 mission nodes across the game with, what? 10 primary mission types?
Let's see;
- Survival,
- Defense / mobile defense,
- Capture, 
- Assasination,
- exterminate,
- Sabotage, 
- Spy
- excavation,
- Rescue,
- and the newly added defection

Yeah, 270 nodes split between 10 mission types, the highest you will go on the star-chart (Mission progression map, sort of) is level 40,
''Endgame'' missions are 60-100 that are called Sorties and arbitrations, killing enemies is extremely easy up to level 100, this is where DE's poor game design comes in to play;

The enemy scaling.. is so ridiculously broken, that a lvl 120 enemy can kill you in one hit but has 1 million ehp (depending on faction), this is so fundementally broken, that people who manage to get to 12h in survival with enemies level 2362 (enemy level scales with time spent in endless missions like survival/defense) get banned by the developer for cheating..

THE DEVELOPERS DON'T KNOW HOW TO PLAY THEIR OWN GAME, 
they don't play test anything, they don't realize how mod synergies work, how % damage scales, nothing, the community play tests their game after the updates, we find the exploits and we get punished for it if we use them.

if we're on the topic of synergies,
You'd think that in a co-op game with around 40 different frames, 100's of weapons, companions, gear, sentinels, we could synergies our abilities together with other people, right?

Well, you're wrong, DE willfully removes ability synergies that reduce grind and increase efficiency of gameplay after people get accustomed to these methods, under the guise that it is not intended, they've done this so many times that it's not even funny.


Here's a recent example; they removed a farming tactic to gather resources and mods at an efficient rate under the impression that it was a fix after YEARS of the method being known in the game, a few weeks later, they add MICROTRANSACTIONS in to the game that are locked behind a 200$ (or 45$ if you only buy the accesories) prime access..
The developer has stated that they will add multiple ways of getting(purchasing) these boosters later down the line, but this game is getting increasingly PayToWin/Progress nevertheless

This game ignores the constructive criticism and wellbeing of their long term players to depend on the shock and awe of newcomers with wallets.

-----------------------------------

''Endgame''

Warframe doesn't have a clear endgame, something veterans and people who've completed most of WF's activities could sink their time in to.

Ask around and you will get an assortment of answers about what truly is WF's endgame, it might be Tridolons, Arbitrations, sorties or even fashionframe..

In my opinion what warframe's true endgame could be, is PVP.. something like we had in the past, large scale clan PVP battles on planets or even space (incorporate railjack) weekly/montly battles for planets and the victors occupy that planet and get bonus resources for the duration of that planet/node's time.

IMO PVP battles and large scale clan wars would breathe life in to warframes clan communities.

Edited September 29, 2019 by eXotic
New additions/corrections due to feedback

[m3stuart]

True. But you are mistaken in a few points from your post:

Gameplay

Yep, pretty much that.

Story

Also pretty much that

Enemy Scaling

 This is just wrong. Why? Because most new players won't even get to level 120 w/o a taxi or so. Onto the next thing: "Oh but the enemy oneshots me and he has 1million hp" ;Where do i even start here. First, Gara/Nezha/Trinity BASICALLY all the Warframes that can tank. Use a goddam weapon that can melt your level 120 enemy in matter of seconds W/O a riven mod. (Yes, believe it or not, there are still weapons that can do that).

THE DEVELOPERS DON'T KNOW HOW TO PLAY THEIR OWN GAME

They are only human beings. I've started playing this game after the game was out of beta 5-6 years ago. I still don't know a lot of stuff despite me being a Veteran just like you. They obviously can't know everything about their game. The first thing i imagined when you said "The Dev.. etc" is that you spam that 4x5/4x6 tridolon, and you expect others to be just like you.

Community

I don't really care about this one. If some1 is telling me how to play, i just give them a snarly reply back.

Now your POST was made with hate towards DE. Why? Your last 2 paragraphs/statements reflect that. The information is all focused in these last 2 but, sadly i also have to agree with your last 2 statements.

 

 

[-AoN-CanoLathra-]

2 minutes ago, m3stuart said:

The first thing i imagined when you said "The Dev.. etc" is that you spam that 4x5/4x6 tridolon

Not to be mean, but what is the 4th eidolon (or 5th/6th)? We normally say it 5(runs)x3(eidolons), or occasionally 3x5, but I've never seen anyone say 4x6 before.

[Veridian]

Am I getting this right?

TLDR: "good story, solid gameplay, 5k hours, do not recommend."

 

[eXotic]

2 minutes ago, m3stuart said:

True. But you are mistaken in a few points from your post:

Gameplay

Yep, pretty much that.

Story

Also pretty much that

Enemy Scaling

 This is just wrong. Why? Because most new players won't even get to level 120 w/o a taxi or so. Onto the next thing: "Oh but the enemy oneshots me and he has 1million hp" ;Where do i even start here. First, Gara/Nezha/Trinity BASICALLY all the Warframes that can tank. Use a goddam weapon that can melt your level 120 enemy in matter of seconds W/O a riven mod. (Yes, believe it or not, there are still weapons that can do that).

THE DEVELOPERS DON'T KNOW HOW TO PLAY THEIR OWN GAME

They are only human beings. I've started playing this game after the game was out of beta 5-6 years ago. I still don't know a lot of stuff despite me being a Veteran just like you. They obviously can't know everything about their game. The first thing i imagined when you said "The Dev.. etc" is that you spam that 4x5/4x6 tridolon, and you expect others to be just like you.

Community

I don't really care about this one. If some1 is telling me how to play, i just give them a snarly reply back.

Now your POST was made with hate towards DE. Why? Your last 2 paragraphs/statements reflect that. The information is all focused in these last 2 but, sadly i also have to agree with your last 2 statements.

 

 

Honstly, it's not hate towards DE but more of an exhausted concern.. i've seen plenty of showcases made by the devs, mainly their community leads (rebecca and megan), granted they're not devs, but they really don't know the basics of the game even when they're tasked with showcasing something.. i really don't do more than 3x4, i used to do raids but tridolons don't appeal to me that much 🙂

also, thank you for one of the only actual valid arguments/discussions on my post i appreciate it :)!

[eXotic]

2 minutes ago, Ver1dian said:

Am I getting this right?

TLDR: "good story, solid gameplay, 5k hours, do not recommend."

 

More like ''Good story, stretched too thinly over 100's of hours, solid gameplay with AAA quality but extremely bad game design after a certain threshold, great community with an extremely vocal toxic minority and an increasingly worrysome increase in microtransactions, can not reccomend at the moment and in its current state''

[eXotic]

Just now, (XB1)Shodian said:

Except it's not. First thing you point out is the community. Which is not even part of the game.

0/10

Would not read user's "review" again.

How is a community of a game, not part of the game when you are faced with said community the moment you log in?

[-.Tom.-]

How are communities not part of the game? 
Dont companies listen to feedback, aka what the community provides?
dont people feel more inclined to play a game with a good community? 
doesnt a toxic community drive people away?

[(XBOX)Shodian]

1 minute ago, eXotic said:

I still wanted to post a review and have a constructive discussion, as i said, a vocal minority, some of the other posts got the posters a55blasted with hate IMO

Constructive discussion yet no actual constructive comments in the OP. Just complaints.

Riiiiight

[(NSW)Linntheque]

Just now, eXotic said:

I still wanted to post a review and have a constructive discussion, as i said, a vocal minority, some of the other posts got the posters a55blasted with hate IMO

Let's be honest, you knew what you were doing purely based off what you think about the forums and it wasn't to be constructive.

That's fine, but don't pretend :).

 

[eXotic]

2 minutes ago, (NSW)Linntheque said:

Let's be honest, you knew what you were doing purely based off what you think about the forums and it wasn't to be constructive.

That's fine, but don't pretend :).

 

I know what the vocal minority would say, i can still have a discussion with the rest of the community, can i not? :P.

[(NSW)Linntheque]

Just now, eXotic said:

I know what the vocal minority would say, i can still have a discussion with the rest of the community, can i not? :P.

 

4 minutes ago, (NSW)Linntheque said:

That's fine, but don't pretend :).

 

 

[Gabbynaru]

3 minutes ago, AuroraGuardian said:

dont people feel more inclined to play a game with a good community?

Yeah, cause it's so much more important to have a good community than a good game. /s

4 minutes ago, AuroraGuardian said:

doesnt a toxic community drive people away?

Again, who gives a crap about the community if the game is good?

Seriously, the priorities of some people...

[eXotic]

1 minute ago, Gabbynaru said:

Yeah, cause it's so much more important to have a good community than a good game. /s

Again, who gives a crap about the community if the game is good?

Seriously, the priorities of some people...

A lot of people play this game still solely because they're a part of a community 🙂

[(XBOX)Shodian]

1 minute ago, eXotic said:

A lot of people play this game still solely because they're a part of a community 🙂

So then it has to have a good community then. Otherwise why would they stay?

[Amazerath]

Your review would make more sense if the problems you're pointing out were brand new. But most of them are as old as the game itself and many were far worse back then. So it's very strange to say "don't play this game because of these problems" if the problems mentioned didn't stop you from enjoying it back in 2014.

If you've grown tired of the game and are no longer having fun, that is understandable. Every veteran has to deal with this at some point. But giving the game a thumbs down out of frustration and ignoring the years of entertainment this free game gave you doesn't seem fair to me.

[eXotic]

5 minutes ago, Amazerath said:

Your review would make more sense if the problems you're pointing out were brand new. But most of them are as old as the game itself and many were far worse back then. So it's very strange to say "don't play this game because of these problems" if the problems mentioned didn't stop you from enjoying it back in 2014.

If you've grown tired of the game and are no longer having fun, that is understandable. Every veteran has to deal with this at some point. But giving the game a thumbs down out of frustration and ignoring the years of entertainment this free game gave you doesn't seem fair to me.

It's not a thumbs down to the years of enjoyment this game has brought me, it's a thumbs down to the current state of the game and where it's heading, i wrote my first review in 2015, it's been a positive one for 4 years but i feel like i just can't support this game with how it is now, i hope that cleared it up :P.

[Gullim92]

Just putting my two cents but if a free to play game can give people upwards of a thousand hours of content before it starts being repetitive then that seems pretty worth it in my opinion.

Any game will lose its shine eventually, it's only a matter of how long that takes.

As for the community, it's the same as any other game since the dawn of time. There will always be a toxic vocal minority in any community, its important to remember that they're not the MAJORITY. I regularly go to region chat and end up wasting hours just talking with people about whatever the late night topic happens to be.

[Mardomus]

First, of course the community is toxic, but not all. There are individuals who are helpful, while others complain about getting kicked or banned for writing things they shouldn't. Also, I don't respond or start conversations in groups, because I am listening to music or concentrating on what's going on. That is me and how I play, though. I don't speak/write for how for others play.

Second, I enjoy the story, however, I am a bit saddened about its lack of content to keep the lore fresh on the current story mode. The nightwave, to me, is another source of side lore content I am content with and don't mind contributing time in doing it, though I do miss alerts and wish that was added back in with the nightwave. But, the rewards are lacking and more unique stuff should be added. I do like the shoulders, op cosmetic, and the aura this season, but that's not enough to keep players engaged. 

Thirdly, the gameplay could add more fun and different types of objectives with better scaling rewards players still ask for with new mods, etc. Maybe allow players to can change how certain ability are used. Maybe I don't like how ugly it looks spinning like Inaros as Renenant. Or change primary and secondary weapon placements. More Content should be added to Plains and Fortuna. New events, maybe add back raids, something. Warframe reworks should be focused on, too. Too many frames falling behind or are not fun or enjoyable due to frame abilities and I'm sure many would like to play them. Sadly some are still lacking in todays game design. Also, many old and new frames lack creativity. For example Revenant, Baruuk ugly idle 1 ability, Atlas, Chroma, Vauban's current rework where his 4th looks the most promising out of the other stuff shown, warframe scaling ability damage, etc. Exalted weapons are still bad with their impact damage. Excalibur exalted/ augment has it right with status. The design and visual of how certain abilities are keeps me interested in that frame. 

You also forget too, some players like certain styles of the game, so you'll meet players who are content with the way things are as seen in videos or posts, while others, like me, who do want more, because content is lacking. Also, fashion frame can be good, but boy can they do better on attachments and primes.

[(PSN)Valaois]

Interesting that many of the comments in this thread is just dismissing the OP instead of actually addressing what was said. Imo, this was a fair review, OP stated mostly things he/she disliked, but also gave props when it was due.

"270 nodes split between 10 mission types, the highest you will go on the star-chart (Mission progression map, sort of) is level 40"

This is one thing I dislike about Warframe too. It's fun running around feeling like a god killing everything in your path, but actually having a challenge without having to sit in the same missions for hours would be nice. I think Warframe is a solid game but has issues, here's to hoping with Destiny 2 going f2p there will be some competition encouraging DE to seriously think things through and heed player feedback a bit more.

[S.Dust]

2 hours ago, eXotic said:

This game ignores the constructive criticism and wellbeing of their long term players to depend on the shock and awe of newcomers with wallets.

I don't really care about the rest of the post even though most of it is accurate. The only line that matters is this one I quoted because it says everything anyone will ever need to know about warframe.

[RX-3DR]

2 hours ago, eXotic said:

Well, you're wrong, DE willfully removes ability synergies that reduce grind and increase efficiency of gameplay after people get accustomed to these methods, under the guise that it is not intended, they've done this so many times that it's not even funny.

There's something very fundamentally wrong here. A game is not your job and DE is not your employer. A developer's goal is not to make you finish the game within a certain time frame so that they can avoid paying you overtime. They do not owe you efficient ways to reduce playing the game. If anything, they want people to play the game and not skip it.

[Amazerath]

32 minutes ago, eXotic said:

It's not a thumbs down to the years of enjoyment this game has brought me, it's a thumbs down to the current state of the game and where it's heading, i wrote my first review in 2015, it's been a positive one for 4 years but i feel like i just can't support this game with how it is now, i hope that cleared it up :P.

It doesn't really change anything because you're using problems that you didn't care about in the past to try to justify not liking the game in the present. That reasoning is flawed because it's a problem caused by your perception changing over the years, not by the game changing over the years.

[(PSN)sweatshawp]

8/10 accurate 

[(PSN)chubbslawson]

3 hours ago, eXotic said:

Original review posted on steam.

-----------------------------
*A VETERAN'S OF ALMOST 6 YEARS POINT OF VIEW*

When i first wrote this review, i was in love with the game, it felt refreshing and nothing like anything I've played before i couldn't recommend this game more if i could, sadly, this has changed.

At this point in time, i cannot recommend you to play this game.. here's why;

;TLDR;
-----------------------------------------
The game in it's current state is extremely bad, with a shallow surface level amazing community plagued with a toxic white knighting extremely vocal minority.
The story is stretched thinly over 100's of hours of grind with gameplay on par of a AAA title plagued with bad game design, willfully ignorant devs (to the people with the most knowladge)
and a looming increase in Microtransactions with every new update (but the updates keep getting pushed back / delayed or even totally forgotten and unreleased)

You might hear raving reviews about this game from so many people, but they're all surface level reviews..
You might hear how the community, game-play and story is amazing, but is it really?

Community;
__________________________
- Most people you meet in your missions won't speak to you, we mostly just keep to ourselves, even when somebody does communicate it's mostly just telling you how you're doing stuff wrong and how to play the game by their opinion, you will never be good enough.
- Region chat is pure cancer, filled with elitist, tyrant mods that censor almost any negative/critical opinion about them or the game,
the players are no exception to this.
- Trade chat has been ruined by the Riven market (mods that are basically steroids for your weapons, these mods can go to upwards of 20.000 platinum - warframe's in-game currency (4.300 platinum is 45 Euros with a 75% Off)).
- The forums are a dumpster fire of censorship and hate, most valid criticism can get your post removed and get you muted for hate speech but not before DE (Digital extremes, The developer) white knight fan boys come to attack you and tell you to quit the game because you're trash just spreading hate..
- The good thing about this is that these people are in the minority, sadly this minority is the most vocal part of the community.

Story;
____________________________
For what it's worth, the story is quite good, for a new player you have 3 main storyline quests that answer quite a lot about the universe, but what's the point if the story is spread so thinly throughout the game that i can take you around 100 or more hours to complete it, these 3 quests got released in the span of 4 years, with the first quest being released in 2015, DE's release plans are the worst i've seen from any developer, they show you teasers, promise you the update's are coming soon only for the update to be inevitably DElayed 3 times taking some updates to be released for upwards of 1 year or more.
All the ''DElayed'' ''SoonTM'' and ''Content-Drought'' memes are 1010% warranted.

Game-play;
_____________________________
The game play is solid, hands down the most polished feeling FreeToPlay game out there (this review was written before destiny became F2P).
The game makes you feel like a god, you kill hundreds of enemies in a single 5 minute mission barely breaking a sweat, the game is set to easy mode, you have approx. 270 mission nodes across the game with, what? 10 primary mission types?
Let's see;
- Survival,
- Defense / mobile defense,
- Capture, 
- Assasination,
- exterminate,
- Sabotage, 
- Spy
- excavation,
- Rescue,
- and the newly added defection

Yeah, 270 nodes split between 10 mission types, the highest you will go on the star-chart (Mission progression map, sort of) is level 40,
''Endgame'' missions are 60-100 that are called Sorties and arbitrations, killing enemies is extremely easy up to level 100, this is where DE's poor game design comes in to play;

The enemy scaling.. is so ridiculously broken, that a lvl 120 enemy can kill you in one hit but has 1 million ehp (depending on faction), this is so fundementally broken, that people who manage to get to 12h in survival with enemies level 2362 (enemy level scales with time spent in endless missions like survival/defense) get banned by the developer for cheating..

THE DEVELOPERS DON'T KNOW HOW TO PLAY THEIR OWN GAME, 
they don't play test anything, they don't realize how mod synergies work, how % damage scales, nothing, the community play tests their game after the updates, we find the exploits and we get punished for it if we use them.

if we're on the topic of synergies,
You'd think that in a co-op game with around 40 different frames, 100's of weapons, companions, gear, sentinels, we could synergies our abilities together with other people, right?

Well, you're wrong, DE willfully removes ability synergies that reduce grind and increase efficiency of gameplay after people get accustomed to these methods, under the guise that it is not intended, they've done this so many times that it's not even funny.


Here's a recent example; they removed a farming tactic to gather resources and mods at an efficient rate under the impression that it was a fix after YEARS of the method being known in the game, a few weeks later, they add MICROTRANSACTIONS in to the game that are locked behind a 200$ (or 45$ if you only buy the accesories) prime access..
The developer has stated that they will add multiple ways of getting(purchasing) these boosters later down the line, but this game is getting increasingly PayToWin/Progress nevertheless

This game ignores the constructive criticism and wellbeing of their long term players to depend on the shock and awe of newcomers with wallets.

I agree with you