A Redundant Rant Concerning U15 And The Deconstruction Of Yet Another Coop Game I Used To Like In General.

[Gebuesch]

The problem is atm people only run the missions for the rewards and dont care for anything else. of course there should be rewards but it should add to the game and not take away from it

 

> Key sentence!

that's the reason why i'm prefer to play with new players.

they don't see missions just as a necessary evil, in order to get the reward.

[Macdermott]

I wish there was a way to know whether the devs read these posts, and what there thoughts were. Maybe...one of them responding to the thread!  It's how you hold gaming communities together.  The gaming community for Warframe will make or break it, so I hope they do pop in here and say 'allo

[MichaelSD]

I agree with OP, but i am more pessimistic. I see a loss of focus in development, which is not to my liking.

 

When I began playing Warframe it was a coop-shooter and the development was focused on this fact. Around the introduction of Damage 2.0 and the extractors began a tendencies to use the coop-shooter as a vehicle to subsystems. Now, damage 2.0 was a great idea, but checking my loadout before missions in not appropriate for a shooter with space ninjas, which is not a tactical military shooter. So, why not change the 3 loadouts during the game? It can take 10 seconds or whatever, but would help much to make the more smooth. The same with extractors. Even today, the claim button is buggy and needs 5-10 seconds to switch to deploy. I understand that they do not wish to make automatic deployment, because we would not log in, but claim & redeploy button would ease the problem. Now this are very small things. Now none of there are big things, but with each update we got a couple of them. Kubrows another subsystem. Now Archwing another subsystem. Now, several sub-systems does not improve the game. They are created for the sake of having something more.

 

Also the bigger the game gets, the more glaring this problems are. With 10 guns people play around with 20 they maybe, but with more than 50 they simply grind most up an that is it. So the novelty factor will wear off. Now, I am not against new items, just saying the more we the less it will matter.

 

Many items are not useful, be it frames, or weapons. For ages the community asked for changes, but nothing happened.

 

Also, from the very beginning we asked we asked game lore. The first frames at least had short stories, but even that was scraped. Hiring a story writer is not a big deal, but that is not direction the game is going.

 

Also the more the game advanced player input became less important. Hot Topics vote section is wonderful example for this. Despite the votes being ambiguous at best,  but rather negative, DE just went ahead and implemented things (one example the current Excalibur changes). Now, not caring about the community may backlash, but asking for opinions and ignoring will backlash.

 

So for me with U15, the time has come to change my view on Warframe. I am a Grandmaster and bought a couple of Prime Access feature, but no more. Some may like the where the game is going, my blessing to them and I am happy that people like that. I will keep an eye on the updates and probably do the events (if they do not involve too much Archwing stuff), but that is it. I sincerely hope, I am wrong...

[koolen]

I agree with your post, I don't pla WF a lot since U14, I'm waiting for some balance between weapons, mods, and tiering system ( because yes, actually everyone seems to agree that the better weapons (most dps, even if for me dps is not the main thing to choose a weapon) can be used at rank 2

[low1991]

-

Only those player with higher standing in the community or players whom demand stuff for themselves at expense of other are to be BLAMED!

[TheDoctah]

This is just a rant, not a list of suggestions. It is not meant to be read by anyone who doesn't like reading for the sake of reading itself.

 

I'm frustrated. Angry as well, very angry. For no reason, basically, except that Warframe is turning to S#&$ and I used to spend a lot of time and effort on getting accomodated to it, holding hopes that one day I might experience the coop fun I had when playing its early form with a friend.

 

Don't expect content from this post, I just want to vent. Because I'm a sad, stupid and frustrated person.

 

----

 

When Warframe "appeared" on my radar, I didn't know what to think of it. The trailer was wishy-washy and it didn't look appealing to me. It was advertised as free to play coop, so we decided to give it a try, lacking coop games till this day and the four-player shoot'em-up sounded really cool.

 

It was hard getting into the convoluted concepts and the clunky UI. It was very buggy at the time and the early game wasn't facilitated by means other games would implement such as a tutorial or anything remotely resembling one.

 

But we had genuine fun after a while of figuring out how it works since I teamed up with a friend, we skyped and went shoulder by shoulder from room to room, shooting up enemies and keeping each other's backs clear. It was an early version so hopes were high that it might develop further and all those annoying bugs and quirks would get eliminated over time.

 

Months and years later, none of the coop stuff is left. The game has been replaced with a load of fanservice junk that obviously the majority of players including some of my friends highly desire such as flying in space and petting doges. Between U13 and U14, I started to lose a lot of interest in playing the game. Most of my time was spent grinding for stuff I would eventually discard anyway and there was no "late" game, the gunplay was weak, the frequent bugs and matchmaking issues, migration problems, inconsistencies, graphics trouble and generally unfriendly staff made me look for alternatives a lot.

 

I've started playing other F2P and P2P games more, logging in daily for a reward that was less and less desirable, playing a couple of missions. Then I started omitting the missions and just getting the daily reward. Then I stopped caring about the daily reward. Lately, before U15, I've tried to come back, go slow, find a bit of gameplay that interests me. I've bought some T1E keys and started going solo with guns that were cool in theory such as the Buzlok, despite all its flaws which I am certain are never going to get eradicated, making it yet another rank-and-sell. But it was reminiscent of The Fifth Element as the bad guy sells a similar gun to some mercenaries there, giving a breathtaking preview of the gun, making viewers think: I wanna have that.

Just because I don't like ranting about something without ever providing constructive feedback:

 

Buzlok is:

- A short- to mid-range spam gun. Projectiles make hitting enemies harder, lack of zoom for dumbfire.

- Its homing beacon is used for attracting bullets to one target to enable a different type of high-accuracy attack.

 

Current problems:

- Beacon costs 10 rounds per shot, at least one beacon per enemy, meaning it is a waste of ammo and is therefore never used except for joking around or on enemies that sponge bullets.

- Therefore: Either Buzlok is too strong, so the beacon is pointless as it costs more than dumbfire. Or Buzlok is too weak which just creates huge ammo consumption for little effect. It just takes a lot of time to kill a single enemy and is therefore hard to use in Warframe.

- Beacon is offset from target location. Rounds home into the beacon, often missing the target and striking into the beacon antenna protruding from the enemy's head instead of the head itself. So no damage.

- There is no forced dumbfire. Once a beacon has been placed, shots cannot be fire normally without the beacon getting reset by firing it at an enemy and killing that enemy or waiting for a very long time.

- Beacon counts as attack, spoiling stealth. I think it was noted somewhere that this shouldn't be the case.

- Shots have a fast turning speed, giving the player only a bit of control over the path a round takes.

 

> Make beacon free or 1-round cost.

> Make sure beacon is not noticed by enemies.

> Beacon offset = 0 so shots hit where the beacon hits.

> Give rounds more inertia in their initial firing direction to give players more control over the path of the projectile. Meaning slightly less turning speed to emphasize player control and roughly aiming into the enemy direction for best accuracy. Even better: Increase turning speed with distance travelled.

> Reset beacon on right-click (zoom) if beacon has been spawned 1 second or longer ago. This allows players to enable dumbfire again and shoot straight to where the crosshair is pointing.

 

The approach of playing a couple of missions with interesting gear worked, I kinda did enjoy it. I started playing with other players again and that was okay, had some nice chats, friendly gameplay, everyone was working together. It was alright.

 

Then U15 was coming, everyone was hyping it, I didn't expect a thing, I even expected changes to have negative impact.

 

But this negative? This is ridiculous. I did an alert with my all-time favourite frame Excalibur, teaming up with a bunch of proper kids to go for Ceres Defense and what I found was just garbage.

 

- Enemies were stuck in spawns in every wave, ran in circles, got stuck in weird places.

- Abilities seemed totally bugged. Blind didn't blind. Javelin did blind. Jump made invisible. I later learned that this was intentional.

- The artifact got stuck in place when the cart moved and we just had a session of laughing at the bugs.

 

Blah blah blah. After finishing the mission, I decided to do the rest of the daily S#&$ I'd normally do such as emptying my extractors only to find that the new Archwing missions counted for completion, therefore blocking extractor placement.

 

I'm not exactly angry, I figure, just in complete disbelief. The design choices on the frame skills lately have been poor overall with Oberon's buff being the pinnacle of lazy coding. Instead of designing proper skill sets on par with the original ones and contributing to proper gameplay, you people just add effects you have already coded. Oberon ult too weak? Give it knockdown. Still too weak? Give it blind. In fact, add blind everywhere. Add slash to this. Add invisible to that. And now to see how Excalibur has been "redesigned" that way in U15, that's just shameful. That's something we did when modding games back when I was a kid. Making a minigun that shoots rockets at ten times the speed, ultracool. Changing props, numbers, going into configs and changing index numbers so there would be quirky effects. Lol, a grenade launcher that shoots chickens. Rofl. Such random. But we were kids and didn't actually know how to program anything. We just changed externalized values for experimentating, not for professionally balancing skillsets of characters in our commercialized game.

 

Numbers seem arbitrary. Nobody considers balance because it is not a selling point. More mod builds means more complexity means more confused kids. Therefore, let's reduce choices and make things easy and also very dull. Add 90% damage or a fraction of 30%? Hm, tough choice. Maybe write a guide about how to figure out which number is higher using a calculator or asking a 9-year old who is good at maths. I'm getting cynical. Especially if I see how the community is being looked down upon in livestreams if they point out how silly the current modding system is. That's just @(*()$ rude. It's not "bullS#&$" if someone suggests dissolving the mod tiers for more mod combinations. Nobody ever uses raw status mods because they are inferior and not only in a subjective way. They are not even pareto-optimal. There is no "skill" involved in picking the higher number. I can go for 15% status or 60% status, which do I take? There is no choice, there are no downsides to picking Serration on almost every gun. Hornet Strike triples the damage of my pistol. Don't you have a way of statistically finding out which mods are used the most and which are used the least? If literally nobody ever uses a certain mod, then maybe it's time to look into why that's the case. And it's certainly not because players are stupid.

 

The doge crap is just moneygrabbing. Kubrows are an addition I don't mind but the lousy detailing of the entire concept just makes them low-quality. Instead of letting me somehow form a shallow bond with my "pet", I get to spam arbitrary interactions to restore damage on an otherwise dysfunctional companion. Broken pathfinding, very bad hit rate and absolutely unintuitive targeting AI make Kubrows look like handicapped roid tamagotchis in battle. After a long time, the most crucial design flaws got patched such as immediate bleedout, lack of minimap and HUD notification and the inability to free a slot but without knowing more about what's going on behind the scenes, it appears like there are forces at work I don't understand. Like someone wants to make a "Sell Kubrow" feature but his 3-year old daughter is screaming and shouting, wanting the Kubrow to stay forever, so he's reluctant.

 

This is consistent throughout the development process as witnessed from the outside. As if half the team is against positive change based on some unrelated notions. And this is reflected within the community.

• If a gun is three times as powerful as another, it is considered a good gun because it is powerful. Therefore it is popular because good guns get used more. Therefore, it should never be nerfed because it is used a lot.

• The other gun is weaker than that gun so it is a bad gun. Bad guns are not being used by anyone and a player using one is a bad player. Buffing that gun to the level of all other guns is met with resistance as it would diminish the extreme advantage of the community's favourite guns which are of course the overpowered ones.

This is a vicious cycle that is based on poor thought and I expect this to be similar within the staff. Instead of striving for game balance which allows higher versatility, some alibi arguments are thrown as to why that would be bad. For example, the Brakk should be absolutely overpowered because it takes time to farm it. Or the Aklato should be weaker than the Lato because otherwise the terrorists would win.

 

There have been positive tweaks I've noticed. But they're often either just very reluctant or over-the-top. Attica has gone from one of the worst guns in the game to one of the most powerful pounders. Mk1-Braton and Lato have received a long-needed buff but they're still too weak and Aklato is now officially the #1 most pointless gun in the game, still retaining the old gun values. You're notorious for overbuffing stuff or nerfing it to scrap but as long as there IS something going on, it's highly welcome.

 

Looking at the Excalibur changes without having seen the other frames it gets apparent that there are lazy attempts at balancing stuff back and forth but not via means of redesign, thought, complete re-organisation and well-made adjustments, but by just putting S#&$ in place and seeing if that works. The dog is sick? Feed it vitamins. Still sick? Feed it more vitamins. Oh, it's dead. Try feeding it salad or some S#&$.

 

I'm getting increasingly cynical about this as it has bothered me for a long time. The most frustrating part of it all is the zombie-like repeating of phrases such as: "If you don't like it, don't play it."

The problem is that I like it. The core game. The idea behind it all. I like being a space ninja turtle mercenary robot something. Shooting up people on space stations, doing backflips off of walls for no reason other than swag. It just takes increasing effort to actually find a proper game these days as there is a mainstream ideology running the market, led by Activision and the likes, which dictates that games need to appeal to the broadest audience possible. So even if a game is good at one point, it will get worked down to please the market, turning me into a nomad, scavenging games for parts of their content and moving on to the next source of entertainment once the game has been deconstructed entirely.

 

And you have got such a good game at your disposal. You could do anything with it. You could make it shine. But you seem ambivalent about this. On the one hand, the landscapes are beautiful. Some designs are outstanding. Some atmospherical elements are very well made. You have those sceneries in some sectors that made me stop and stare when I first experienced the new tiles. I was marvelling at some Corpus carrier drone transporting random boxes in the background, looking around, thinking about what this place that I now use as a fighting ground used to be. Some areas have a brillant use of colour and depth. There are enemy and frame design choices that I wouldn't have done better even if given the means.

And then you emphasize speedplay and rushing through those maps without paying attention to the paintings you've drawn, grinding for silly loot.

 

A prominent example of good design is Excalibur as the generic protagonist / cover hero. I have grown so much to that frame while most players are simply unable to use it effectively, having to do with it being a really bad starter choice for average players. It has taken me a lot of playtime to figure out why I do love Excal and why I don't like Ash despite me initially assuming I'd be a total Ash fanboy.

 

The reason is that Excalibur is the archetypical ninja whereas Ash is a teleporter. There is almost nothing really "ninja" about this game. Stealth is horrible due to most game design choices being focused on reducing stealth and adding horde mode. Parkour... well. Nothing to add. Takedowns are flawed. Zerg mind AI. Blah blah. It's all been said before. But Excalibur embodies a lot of what a game ninja would be like. The Slash Dash is a standard attack motion from ninja movies and anime and it gives him great mobility. Kung Fu movies of the fantasy kind often feature monks jumping from branch to branch with inhuman jump height based on the rumors of ninjas being able to fly due to their extreme agility and climbing speed - and Super Jump is an attempt at capturing that. Ninjas are said to use blinding powder to render their foes incapable of striking back - this is Radial Blind. And it shows in the playstyle. Excalibur cannot tank. He is very squishy and doesn't have mass extinction nuke skills (except now Javelin has become one for low-level exodus). Instead, players have to play carefully, cowardly, attacking from vantage points, separating crowds with dashes and finishing off the stragglers.

 

And similar features are found in some other frames. Some enemy designs are great. There is a huge foundation for a proper game featuring space ninjas. It is within reach, it is so close, that might be why it has attracted so many players in the first place. But it is ultimately disappointing to reach a dead end, knowing the entire thing was a hoax. Warframe keeps moving on, featuring all-new sides of gameplay such as space combat now which will inevitably attract thousands of players looking for space combat and a fresh version of Gundam and it will be fun and they will get suckered in up to a certain point at which the game just does not hold anything new to discover and it gets apparent that everything that is there is just facade and not satisfying per se.

 

Some of the best games I've ever played have been buggy as F*** and the bugs never got fixed. And that's a damn shame.

 

Ehh... yeah, just sad and frustrated. There are obvious fixes at hand but the game doesn't get fixed because fixes don't contribute to profit. I still imagine there might be a bunch of developers within the crew who actually have a vision of the game and would love to see it become better than that but who ultimately cannot. At least that's what I like to think. That someone cares. There are a bunch of players who do but who are unable to articulate their concerns or get to the root of what bothers them but also a good lot of 'em who can and I've seen constructive criticism all around the board.

 

And some suggestions even make it through to the actual game, so that means there is something happening. But it gets smothered by the huge glaring issues that never even get a mention.

 

We made that suggestion to add random loot containers and then, poof, they were part of the Gate Crasher event. Nice.

We made the suggestion to nerf Nova and then Nova actually got a very good nerf on her ultimate which is really something that needs to be commended. That was a proper redesign and you did very well on that. I was impressed.

We made the suggestion to nerf Trinity and the change was crap, making her a heal / mana spam monster. To buff Oberon and it's just putting emphasis on ult spam. To buff Excalibur and now he's invisible during jumps which is just absolutely aesthetically appalling. Looks like the animation is missing.

 

I just don't know whether you people don't know what you're doing wrong, you do not want to know or you do and just don't care. And that's what frustrates me.

Like turning the Kickbot into a spambot that is ineffective at actually filtering spam. Seems like someone is trying somehow to do something but is ultimately going the wrong way.

 

Or interface. Ah, whatever.

 

I just needed to vent and I did. I feel better now.

 

Peace be with all. I should just donate my plat and trade goods to noob charity and give up for good. Team Fortress 2 is a lot of fun.

 

P.S.: Censoring words can destroy language, written and oral.

I can use low-key words without employing caps and it will make my text look readable. I will appear calm.

I can use #!x@() words without @#;$³§!ing caps and it will !#\% my &$§ look %§$!able. I will appear loud.

You get my vote! I tried to play update 15 for one hour but I couldn't bring myself to do it. It's the same bland grind to get the archwing, and the archwing stage is buggy af. The devs imo aren't great devs. They're nice, but they don't seem all that great at their job, or they just don't care cause it's getting some money. I just don't see things changing with this dev team unless they got new people that actually care enough to make a difference than the usual crap update we get now. (some people like these updates, no disrespect to you, I just think they could be much better.) I hatched a kubrow, got it to mature, and put it back in the stasis. I think I'm going to take a very, very long break from this game. It's the same bad grind, with the same usual flood of bugs every single update. This update feels like a simple bling update. I really don't understand why they needed to bring archwing, the core setup they had was good, just needs a lot of love and attention, which it clearly hasn't been getting. The new warframe is locked behind a buggy mini game which DE couldn't pay me to play with it's current bug infested gameplay. What's really, really sad about archwing is that it took them a year apparently and this is the best they could do with it's release. I saw when steve first brought it up at that convention a ways back and stood up out of his chair like he's showing some big great thing. I was just shaking my head at the screen thinking to myself "just sit back down, please."  Every update I can almost guarntee you for probably the next 5-10 updates is gonna be bug infested. That "it's beta!" is so played out and tired, these devs have can help test their own game too, since they claim they love their product so much and can help reduce the flood of bugs that came with each and every patch. I'm sorry, I'm bitter. I've been here since the start of this game and it's been taking a really. really bad turn imo in the last 5 or 6 updates. I don't mean to sound like a &#!, but if they asked if we could have a new dev team, I would be among the people who say yes. Nice people, but I just don't feel like this game is going in the right direction anymore. Anyway, I'm outroz, laid down my rant, haha. Hoping for a better game eventually!

[MichaelSD]

You get my vote! I tried to play update 15 for one hour but I couldn't bring myself to do it. It's the same bland grind to get the archwing, and the archwing stage is buggy af. The devs imo aren't great devs. They're nice, but they don't seem all that great at their job, or they just don't care cause it's getting some money. I just don't see things changing with this dev team unless they got new people that actually care enough to make a difference than the usual crap update we get now. (some people like these updates, no disrespect to you, I just think they could be much better.) I hatched a kubrow, got it to mature, and put it back in the stasis. I think I'm going to take a very, very long break from this game. It's the same bad grind, with the same usual flood of bugs every single update. This update feels like a simple bling update. I really don't understand why they needed to bring archwing, the core setup they had was good, just needs a lot of love and attention, which it clearly hasn't been getting. The new warframe is locked behind a buggy mini game which DE couldn't pay me to play with it's current bug infested gameplay. What's really, really sad about archwing is that it took them a year apparently and this is the best they could do with it's release. I saw when steve first brought it up at that convention a ways back and stood up out of his chair like he's showing some big great thing. I was just shaking my head at the screen thinking to myself "just sit back down, please."  Every update I can almost guarntee you for probably the next 5-10 updates is gonna be bug infested. That "it's beta!" is so played out and tired, these devs have can help test their own game too, since they claim they love their product so much and can help reduce the flood of bugs that came with each and every patch. I'm sorry, I'm bitter. I've been here since the start of this game and it's been taking a really. really bad turn imo in the last 5 or 6 updates. I don't mean to sound like a @$$, but if they asked if we could have a new dev team, I would be among the people who say yes. Nice people, but I just don't feel like this game is going in the right direction anymore. Anyway, I'm outroz, laid down my rant, haha. Hoping for a better game eventually!

 

Sadly, I agree.

[Garuger]

You get my vote! I tried to play update 15 for one hour but I couldn't bring myself to do it. It's the same bland grind to get the archwing, and the archwing stage is buggy af. The devs imo aren't great devs. They're nice, but they don't seem all that great at their job, or they just don't care cause it's getting some money. I just don't see things changing with this dev team unless they got new people that actually care enough to make a difference than the usual crap update we get now. (some people like these updates, no disrespect to you, I just think they could be much better.) I hatched a kubrow, got it to mature, and put it back in the stasis. I think I'm going to take a very, very long break from this game. It's the same bad grind, with the same usual flood of bugs every single update. This update feels like a simple bling update. I really don't understand why they needed to bring archwing, the core setup they had was good, just needs a lot of love and attention, which it clearly hasn't been getting. The new warframe is locked behind a buggy mini game which DE couldn't pay me to play with it's current bug infested gameplay. What's really, really sad about archwing is that it took them a year apparently and this is the best they could do with it's release. I saw when steve first brought it up at that convention a ways back and stood up out of his chair like he's showing some big great thing. I was just shaking my head at the screen thinking to myself "just sit back down, please."  Every update I can almost guarntee you for probably the next 5-10 updates is gonna be bug infested. That "it's beta!" is so played out and tired, these devs have can help test their own game too, since they claim they love their product so much and can help reduce the flood of bugs that came with each and every patch. I'm sorry, I'm bitter. I've been here since the start of this game and it's been taking a really. really bad turn imo in the last 5 or 6 updates. I don't mean to sound like a @$$, but if they asked if we could have a new dev team, I would be among the people who say yes. Nice people, but I just don't feel like this game is going in the right direction anymore. Anyway, I'm outroz, laid down my rant, haha. Hoping for a better game eventually!

This sums up everything perfectly i dont think that anyone else will be able to sum it up as good as this . Well said well said indeed

[Marnus]

I agree, and thanks for doing it in a well worded respectful post.

 

I personaly have that love/hate thing going on with warframe much like yourself.  I want to just leave the game but have those points that I really do enjoy playing it as well.

 

Warframe has so much potential but I feel DE cant see the potentially beautiful trees for the forest.

 

For me I can see that the art and sound teams actually are improving (even if I dont always agree with their chioces) and trying to achieve more within the game. 

Unfortunatly I cant see the the same thing for the programming and UI teams (no offence meant to those teams mind you).  Few things feel like they are more inventive or improve over what we have from that side to the development, they feel more like rehashes of what already exists, or just simplified conversions of what is there.  Kind of like they are playing it safe rather than trying new ways to improve and develop further.

 

 

Same here. OP's post is an eloquent, surprisingly thoughtful perspective that I wish I could have come up with before I left. While I don't completely agree with some of the specific examples used, the general feeling - the overwhelming disappointment with perceived progress and frustration at the opacity of DE's response - is definitely something I - and others, apparently - have in common. I admire you for your dedication to the game which led you to write possibly the single most informative piece of feedback from a point of view growing more and more widespread by the day.

 

Sorry to hear you feel this way, and while I don't offer any answers, I'd like to add my voice to the concerns raised in this thread.

Thoses two gentlemen perfectly formulated what I think of the first message and what is actually happening to warframe. Can't say it better.

EDIT: And more I read comments, more I found other people who seems to think the same way.

And DE having been nearly sold-out isn't really making me optimistic for the future. I can even says it's a proof that a change won't happen.

 

The bold things is just what I found the most sad in all of this :(

My personnal, biggest pain is that one of the rare IRL friends playing the game can't lay with me. The netcode seems to bug as usual, and the only person I really NEED to play with in order to show him the game can't reach me, nor can I.

Edited October 30, 2014 by Marnus

[(PSN)Strifedecer]

This is honestly the best feedback post I've seen in the entire forum.

Seriously. I'm not kidding. DE should definitely get a load of this.

[Garuger]

This is honestly the best feedback post I've seen in the entire forum.

Seriously. I'm not kidding. DE should definitely get a load of this.

They dont want to thought why  change something that is able to milk players? It is like demanding Yugo to become Ferrari they just cant

Edited October 30, 2014 by Garuger

[Neocyberman]

I've had issues with the games development and issues with gameplay and the related systems that keep getting added but I have not yet been able to describe it. Until now.

 

I am reminded of a quote from macbeth that I am beginning to see as being more and more applicable as the games development and updates go on.

 

"I have walked so far into this river of blood that even if I stopped now, it would be as hard to go back to being good as it is to keep killing people. I have some schemes in my head that I’m planning to put into action. I have to do these things before I have a chance to think about them."

 

The blood and killing being the constant moving from mechanic to mechanic, not expanding them or creating a sense of depth if it does not require putting in place the foundation for another system. They just keep doing this and doing this patch after patch but it seems like they cant turn back and work on existing systems. Why? Because they cant keep people interested because all the systems they have implemented to compliment core gameplay are not fleshed out... because they keep introducing and hyping up these new unexpanded upon systems.

 

So they just keep wading through that river of blood. They keep releasing systems that, while it is acceptable that the first pass is not realized, do not receive the attention they need to make them anything more than satisfactory. Which only results in shallow features that are clunky.

 

Stamina mechanics need work, damage and damage scaling need work (which might actually help solve the weapon power creep issues), enemies not providing challenge not linked to their damage output and armor scaling needs work, enemy variety needs work, melee combos are unwieldy to the point of not being worth using because you cant cancel your moves and as such NEED WORK.

 

Then there comes the hardest to discuss portion of all of this because these sort of complaints get swept away: I dont think that our complaints, critiques and issues are at all addressed or read by anyone but Rebecca and the community mods. Someone else brought this up before me. Aside from threads hand picked by community mods and a handful of questions taken from the question thread not much that goes on here or in weapon feedback or in the other feedback forums gets mention in the dev streams. A communication gap exists.

 

And... I have to be honest it makes me feel like not much of the game is played by the developers outside of the basic quality tested needed to get them out. I'm not talking about bug testing though that could use some work. I'm talking about generally playing the game from the beginning levels up. The dev team talk a lot about their vision for the game and the roles frames fall into but every time they talk about it I can feel the disconnect.

 

AND YET I still play. Because there is enough right with warframe to keep me playing. Why, because I haven't gotten all the stuff yet. I haven't unlocked all the levels yet, I haven't completed my perfect build yet. But I feel terrible at times that I continue to play. Each time I walk into a grineer enemy that is arbitrarily more powerful or I run a high level mission and receive credit rewards that scale in any way to the missions difficulty or level I find myself gazing into the abyss that is the shear unpolished nature of increasingly ageing mechanics. And what gazes back insists that these things will get better with time and they have not in an appreciable way.

[vaugahn]

Stamina mechanics need work, damage and damage scaling need work (which might actually help solve the weapon power creep issues), enemies not providing challenge not linked to their damage output and armor scaling needs work, enemy variety needs work, melee combos are unwieldy to the point of not being worth using because you cant cancel your moves and as such NEED WORK.

 

According to Steve on the most recent AMA, stamina mechanics are under review.

[hijinks_the_turtle]

There are many good arguments here.  I do hope DE takes note of this.  It's very true, nothing in Warframe is in a finished state.  Most of it is in a half baked state.  It really stinks.  The next update should try to fix these.

[Temmron]

When I began playing Warframe it was a coop-shooter and the development was focused on this fact. Around the introduction of Damage 2.0 and the extractors began a tendencies to use the coop-shooter as a vehicle to subsystems. Now, damage 2.0 was a great idea, but checking my loadout before missions in not appropriate for a shooter with space ninjas, which is not a tactical military shooter. So, why not change the 3 loadouts during the game? It can take 10 seconds or whatever, but would help much to make the more smooth. The same with extractors. Even today, the claim button is buggy and needs 5-10 seconds to switch to deploy. I understand that they do not wish to make automatic deployment, because we would not log in, but claim & redeploy button would ease the problem. Now this are very small things. Now none of there are big things, but with each update we got a couple of them. Kubrows another subsystem. Now Archwing another subsystem. Now, several sub-systems does not improve the game. They are created for the sake of having something more.

 

Also the bigger the game gets, the more glaring this problems are. With 10 guns people play around with 20 they maybe, but with more than 50 they simply grind most up an that is it. So the novelty factor will wear off. Now, I am not against new items, just saying the more we the less it will matter.

 

Also, from the very beginning we asked we asked game lore. The first frames at least had short stories, but even that was scraped. Hiring a story writer is not a big deal, but that is not direction the game is going.

 

Also the more the game advanced player input became less important. Hot Topics vote section is wonderful example for this. Despite the votes being ambiguous at best,  but rather negative, DE just went ahead and implemented things (one example the current Excalibur changes). Now, not caring about the community may backlash, but asking for opinions and ignoring will backlash.

I have to agree with all those points

The implementation of shiny sub-systems doesnt fix anything

It doesnt even add anything

Its just another gimmick to keep veteran players playing

In U14 i hatched my kubrow and directly put it in stasis after 1 run with it because I HATED the uphold cost that I needed to pay

AT least you didnt have to use the kubrow so i was ok with it, but U15 really did it WRONG i mean really WRONG

As I already said in my previous comment the REQUIREMENT to be able to get limbo (and not waste money on it) is to have an archwing and to have completed the archwing mission. Furthermore the time/paywall you were confronted with was awfull

So either you spent money on it or you had to wait 4 days until you could use your limbo

I dont even want to speak of the syndicates

I saw syndicates as a possibility to get in some lore but apparently its just another grind feature

 

The things all players need most importantly is not new sub-systems, new weapons, new warframes, new archwings, new mods or basically anything that requires you to either pay or wait or grind

 

What we need is to make GAMEPLAY ,the most important part, of a game more enjoyable and worthwhile

new mission mechanics that need TEAMWORK (thats what coop is about) or REQUIRE stealth

New enemies that are enjoyable (not horde mode)

New Bosses that are enjoyable (I still like to fight lephantis because hes fun, even though he could be harder)

New tilesets

and most importantly bugfixes

 

Those things I mentioned are the most important part of any game

1 hit button slaying is boring and repetitive

(Thats what we do right now in every mission. I dont care how my enemy looks like or what weapon he is wearing since I kill him so fast that it doesnt matter)

Imagine enemies with invincibility mechanics and weak spots that you need to bring down with teamwork and that certain warframe skills dont affect them

Imagine tile sets where you can parkour like crazy or have to duck under certain objects or squeeze through pipes not to get detected and shoot enemies that are in hidden places. (This is mainly the reason why the orokin derelict tile set is my favorite)

Imagine missions where you need to split up or do a certain tactic to achieve something, or where every member of the group needs to fullfill a specific role since the enemies are so hard and you die without a proper trinity/oberon

(I know it is a healer/tank/dps rpg example, but 1st this game has many rpg elements, and 2nd I just mean for it to be an example)

 

But instead of this we get broken archwing missions or paywalls or more GRIND

The problem is end-game doesnt exist

And all mission types at the moment require you to do the same thing. Simply in other form

Excavation is basically mobile defense

Gate crash/sabotage is basically assassination with caches

Archwing is basically flappy zephyr in 3d with enemies

 

There is no lore whatsoever that would smoothen up gameplay even a bit

Nothing makes me care for any enemies/characters in any way. I just see them as targets to get the mission complete and get to the next grindy mission

 

As already said PLEASE allow veteran players to review some of your design choices before you release them, or give us a thread were we can post the most important ideas for you that NEED a look at.

FOCUS your vision on CORE gameplay aspects and not on new shiny things without any QUALITY

Add lore that points us towards interesting enemies, gives us background story, lets us identify with certain characters, introduces new tiles and explains what they are used for, gives background story on the development of certain Warframes and how they came to be able to use their skills or by who they were invented and what their specific roles were. Or lore that links syndicate specific events, that can happen, together and makes us able to experience the ideas and thoughts behind the system and syndicates and gives us a reason to rather side with one faction instead of another because the story progression of a specific syndicate isnt going in the right way. Basically you can narrate the story of each syndicate and syndicates progression while you rank up in position (just an example of how syndicates could be used) and the more players side with a specific faction the more influence it gains and you can see changes that happen during main play say F.E some grineer will surrender if you join steel meridian and steel meridian has a high tenno playerbase, and they then will actually help you and give you information that progresses you through the steel meridian story (Otherwise you can kill them to gain reputation with the red veil) (Note that this is an example of how things can be, I dont say they should be this way or need to be this way but rather intend for DE to add at least something interesting that is not another sub-system or grind and it isnt my main point but rather something lore-specific). My main point is still that their focus should be on enemies,bugs,bosses,tiles and mission mechanics

Edited October 30, 2014 by Seyenas

[Neocyberman]

According to Steve on the most recent AMA, stamina mechanics are under review.

All comes down to specifics and then testing. I've become much more cautious about system revamps in recent patches.

 

Did they state what they or they thought the players found unweildy about the system?

Edited October 30, 2014 by Neocyberman

[MichaelSD]

I have to agree with all those points

The implementation of shiny sub-systems doesnt fix anything

It doesnt even add anything

Its just another gimmick to keep veteran players playing

In U14 i hatched my kubrow and directly put it in stasis after 1 run with it because I HATED the uphold cost that I needed to pay

AT least you didnt have to use the kubrow so i was ok with it, but U15 really did it WRONG i mean really WRONG

As I already said in my previous comment the REQUIREMENT to be able to get limbo (and not waste money on it) is to have an archwing and to have completed the archwing mission. Furthermore the time/paywall you were confronted with was awfull

So either you spent money on it or you had to wait 4 days until you could use your limbo

I dont even want to speak of the syndicates

I saw syndicates as a possibility to get in some lore but apparently its just another grind feature

 

The things all players need most importantly is not new sub-systems, new weapons, new warframes, new archwings, new mods or basically anything that requires you to either pay or wait or grind

 

What we need is to make GAMEPLAY ,the most important part, of a game more enjoyable and worthwhile

new mission mechanics that need TEAMWORK (thats what coop is about) or REQUIRE stealth

New enemies that are enjoyable (not horde mode)

New Bosses that are enjoyable (I still like to fight lephantis because hes fun, even though he could be harder)

New tilesets

and most importantly bugfixes

 

Those things I mentioned are the most important part of any game

1 hit button slaying is boring and repetitive

(Thats what we do right now in every mission. I dont care how my enemy looks like or what weapon he is wearing since I kill him so fast that it doesnt matter)

Imagine enemies with invincibility mechanics and weak spots that you need to bring down with teamwork and that certain warframe skills dont affect them

Imagine tile sets where you can parkour like crazy or have to duck under certain objects or squeeze through pipes not to get detected and shoot enemies that are in hidden places. (This is mainly the reason why the orokin derelict tile set is my favorite)

Imagine missions where you need to split up or do a certain tactic to achieve something, or where every member of the group needs to fullfill a specific role since the enemies are so hard and you die without a proper trinity/oberon

(I know it is a healer/tank/dps rpg example, but 1st this game has many rpg elements, and 2nd I just mean for it to be an example)

 

But instead of this we get broken archwing missions or paywalls or more GRIND

The problem is end-game doesnt exist

And all mission types at the moment require you to do the same thing. Simply in other form

Excavation is basically mobile defense

Gate crash/sabotage is basically assassination with caches

Archwing is basically flappy zephyr in 3d with enemies

 

There is no lore whatsoever that would smoothen up gameplay even a bit

Nothing makes me care for any enemies/characters in any way. I just see them as targets to get the mission complete and get to the next grindy mission

 

As already said PLEASE allow veteran players to review some of your design choices before you release them, or give us a thread were we can post the most important ideas for you that NEED a look at.

FOCUS your vision on CORE gameplay aspects and not on new shiny things without any QUALITY

Add lore that points us towards interesting enemies, gives us background story, lets us identify with certain characters, introduces new tiles and explains what they are used for, gives background story on the development of certain Warframes and how they came to be able to use their skills or by who they were invented and what their specific roles were. Or lore that links syndicate specific events, that can happen, together and makes us able to experience the ideas and thoughts behind the system and syndicates and gives us a reason to rather side with one faction instead of another because the story progression of a specific syndicate isnt going in the right way. Basically you can narrate the story of each syndicate and syndicates progression while you rank up in position (just an example of how syndicates could be used) and the more players side with a specific faction the more influence it gains and you can see changes that happen during main play say F.E some grineer will surrender if you join steel meridian and steel meridian has a high tenno playerbase, and they then will actually help you and give you information that progresses you through the steel meridian story (Otherwise you can kill them to gain reputation with the red veil) (Note that this is an example of how things can be, I dont say they should be this way or need to be this way but rather intend for DE to add at least something interesting that is not another sub-system or grind and it isnt my main point but rather something lore-specific). My main point is still that their focus should be on enemies,bugs,bosses,tiles and mission mechanics

 

I absolutely agree. Few things were done right U15. To be honest I am really getting tired of new sub-systems, and all aimed to make my life miserable. Extractor, has no "claim and redeploy", loadouts can not choose during mission (this is not a tactical shooter), Foundry can not make same item twice, Kubrow is a virtual tamagochi, and Archwing a 3rd rate shooter. Each alone is bothersome, all together mighty annoying.

 

Events were unique in the past become beta test for the next tileset.

 

We at least had lore for the frames, this was omitted to. And so no...

[CBAROG]

Then there comes the hardest to discuss portion of all of this because these sort of complaints get swept away: I dont think that our complaints, critiques and issues are at all addressed or read by anyone but Rebecca and the community mods. Someone else brought this up before me. Aside from threads hand picked by community mods and a handful of questions taken from the question thread not much that goes on here or in weapon feedback or in the other feedback forums gets mention in the dev streams. A communication gap exists.

Well, you are wrong. They do read, they know the issues. They just don't do anything or do according to their "vision" of the game, not ours. The worst example is the stance system. Players asked for better melee, better mechanics for the swordplay. Here you go. After months of making and scrapping ideas they make more mods to grind. And they leave it as it is to make another half-baked feature.

[MichaelSD]

Well, you are wrong. They do read, they know the issues. They just don't do anything or do according to their "vision" of the game, not ours. The worst example is the stance system. Players asked for better melee, better mechanics for the swordplay. Here you go. After months of making and scrapping ideas they make more mods to grind. And they leave it as it is to make another half-baked feature.

 

+1, there is nothing to ad...

[Temmron]

Well, you are wrong. They do read, they know the issues. They just don't do anything or do according to their "vision" of the game, not ours. The worst example is the stance system. Players asked for better melee, better mechanics for the swordplay. Here you go. After months of making and scrapping ideas they make more mods to grind. And they leave it as it is to make another half-baked feature.

Well I mostly agree that the melee system is half-baked, however the devs already said that they will be taking looks at it.

The problem I have with DEs developerteam is that they dont do this with every new feature or are too concentrated on another rather unimportant subsystem

The HUBs will be coming soon too and again they wont add anything to the gameplay but just work as a place to meet friends. If at least they would introduce somehing like a trading house or other important things like syndicate guild buildings where you have to sign up for a syndicates instead of some console on your liset and it has additional benefits.

[Sylaenius]

Well I mostly agree that the melee system is half-baked, however the devs already said that they will be taking looks at it.

The problem I have with DEs developerteam is that they dont do this with every new feature or are too concentrated on another rather unimportant subsystem

The HUBs will be coming soon too and again they wont add anything to the gameplay but just work as a place to meet friends. If at least they would introduce somehing like a trading house or other important things like syndicate guild buildings where you have to sign up for a syndicates instead of some console on your liset and it has additional benefits.

 

 

Something like player hubs shouldn't ever have gone beyond the conceptual stage until core systems get the attention they need.

 

If DE would just update gameplay assets to a respectable level they wouldn't ever have to touch them again except in cases of content reworks, massive gameplay additions or the like.

 

Instead we have enemy types that blend together in an unrecognizable mass of "Pffffhahaha", a melee combo system with all the finesse and grace of a sledge hammer, a difficulty system that relies solely on stat scaling for enemies and maxing DPS for players with a tentative usefulness regarding utility stats, a parkour system with more stick than a tree, physics that make Halo custom lobbies look like a Cambridge Seminar on Gravity and it's effects on mass and inertia, a 3 month development cycle focusing on cover-up content and more fan service crap than I've seen come from half the Japanese anime market; Top hats, need I go on?

 

Honestly, I would welcome Hubs, Sigils, Kubrows, Sentinels, cross-warframe idle animations, and even flavour-of-the-update weapon releases, if only the foundation of the game weren't still from CBT 2.

 

I don't understand why these issues are continually sidestepped. There is no focus on any of this from staff, ever.

 

DE devs say "We're aware of it, it's getting worked on." or "I don't think that's the case, it's fine." and that's it, discussion over, back to General feedback to seethe about S#&$ not getting done.

 

I mean, what the hell.

[CBAROG]

Something like player hubs shouldn't ever have gone beyond the conceptual stage until core systems get the attention they need.

 

If DE would just update gameplay assets to a respectable level they wouldn't ever have to touch them again except in cases of content reworks, massive gameplay additions or the like.

 

Instead we have enemy types that blend together in an unrecognizable mass of "Pffffhahaha", a melee combo system with all the finesse and grace of a sledge hammer, a difficulty system that relies solely on stat scaling for enemies and maxing DPS for players with a tentative usefulness regarding utility stats, a parkour system with more stick than a tree, physics that make Halo custom lobbies look like a Cambridge Seminar on Gravity and it's effects on mass and inertia, a 3 month development cycle focusing on cover-up content and more fan service crap than I've seen come from half the Japanese anime market; Top hats, need I go on?

 

Honestly, I would welcome Hubs, Sigils, Kubrows, Sentinels, cross-warframe idle animations, and even flavour-of-the-update weapon releases, if only the foundation of the game weren't still from CBT 2.

 

I don't understand why these issues are continually sidestepped. There is no focus on any of this from staff, ever.

 

DE devs say "We're aware of it, it's getting worked on." or "I don't think that's the case, it's fine." and that's it, discussion over, back to General feedback to seethe about S#&$ not getting done.

 

I mean, what the hell.

My opinion is, DE don't know what to do with those issues. And they don't want to admit it because it would show their incompetence. (Not at all. If you admit you don't know something it means you want to learn. Then someone will show the way)

I mean, what was the last update that really changed the gameplay? Damage 2.0? Mostly it changed how we mod our weapons. The gameplay is still the same. While the artists and animators do a hell of a good job, other parts of the team are still lagging behind. So they try to overcomplicate the gameplay to hide it. 

Eximus system is the prime example. DE proudly present them as difficulty, not realizing that you can't make the fights interesting and challenging with the foundation they have. The only way for now is to change numbers. Damage, health, armor and enemies quantity. 

DE don't know how to make it better, so they work with what they have. And with such a big playerbase they try to please everybody. It's our fault too. We demand too much without realizing that it's impossible.

[ThePresident777]

This is all very theoretical.  I wish someone would name a game that embodies these theories so we can understand what's being talked about.

Edited November 1, 2014 by ThePresident777

[Exodess]

Well, I think we can all agree on this: there is enormous potential in Warframe, and I think we're less frustrated about it not being how we want it to be realized than we are aggravated that the potential is being spread thin through feature creep: Quests that should tell stories with a strong conveyed narrative are instead basic mission types with a few lines of dialogue, our battles to defend the solar system from oppression are faceless cookie-cutter missions to which failure poses no risk, our freedom of equipment diversity is continually sidelined by more advanced and appealing weapons for the sake of profit and hype, et al.

 

I believe we simply want to see DE enhance the overall immersion by adding depth to existing content and features while keeping a continued effort at maintaining balance within character systems as opposed to treating it as an afterthought. The fact that these are rarely built on in favor of new features is at the core of the problem it would seem.

 

In DE's defense, they are improving at this in one regard at least: bosses. This was the biggest push two years ago due to how absolutely generic the bosses were. For whatever complaints may be levied at the bosses now, they are infinitely better than what was there at Update 6. However, it's not simply the battles that need re-envisioning, but the experiences leading to those bosses as you cut a path from one mission to the next. Players don't feel invested because the bosses don't feel like actual characters as they don't have the ability to pose a true threat the player. The fastest way to get an observer to care about what's happening in your work is to show your protagonists getting hurt (and in the case of games, I'm referring to the NPC allies and virtual property or locations tied to the player's in-game experiences, not the players themselves).

 

I understand that part of a developer's joy is found in experimenting with new things, but that doesn't mean old things can't be revised with a unique twist and still be fun to work with. I'm going out on a limb with my faith that DE does listen, and I hope they realize that Warframe can be so much better with the tools we already have.

Edited November 2, 2014 by Exodess

[Zuijin]

Well, I think we can all agree on this: there is enormous potential in Warframe, and I think we're less frustrated about it not being how we want it to be realized than we are aggravated that the potential is being spread thin through feature creep: Quests that should tell stories with a strong conveyed narrative are instead basic mission types with a few lines of dialogue, our battles to defend the solar system from oppression are faceless cookie-cutter missions to which failure poses no risk, our freedom of equipment diversity is continually sidelined by more advanced and appealing weapons for the sake of profit and hype, et al.

 

I believe we simply want to see DE enhance the overall immersion by adding depth to existing content and features while keeping a continued effort at maintaining balance within character systems as opposed to treating it as an afterthought. The fact that these are rarely built on in favor of new features is at the core of the problem it would seem.

 

In DE's defense, they are improving at this in one regard at least: bosses. This was the biggest push two years ago due to how absolutely generic the bosses were. For whatever complaints may be levied at the bosses now, they are infinitely better than what was there at Update 6. However, it's not simply the battles that need re-envisioning, but the experiences leading to those bosses as you cut a path from one mission to the next. Players don't feel invested because the bosses don't feel like actual characters as they don't have the ability to pose a true threat the player. The fastest way to get an observer to care about what's happening in your work is to show your protagonists getting hurt (and in the case of games, I'm referring to the NPC allies and virtual property or locations tied to the player's in-game experiences, not the players themselves).

 

I understand that part of a developer's joy is found in experimenting with new things, but that doesn't mean old things can't be revised with a unique twist and still be fun to work with. I'm going out on a limb with my faith that DE does listen, and I hope they realize that Warframe can be so much better with the tools we already have.

 

I'm afraid more immersion would not be enough. 

What I think we need asap is simply a more clean code: matchmaking, stric nat, poor performances, lag spikes with no reason, framerate drop while hosting but not while guesting... and so on.

Warframe is a great game, but archwings, doge, limbo are not the answers we need to its current problems. I can live without cosmetics or fan service for 3 months, or even 6, to allow, finally, a polishing of the core code of warframe. I will not live 3 more months with terrible matchmaking but cosmetics in spades.

Lore, a more variety of mobs, better missions and better graphics can wait after all of the above, imo.

Edited November 2, 2014 by Zuijin