Warframe's Vibe Is Dissipating With Almost Every Update (Read Before Insta-Hate)

[VoidPunch]

I completely agree. Warframe seems to be unsure what to do.

 

Does it want to be stealthy or gun-ho?

Does it want to have hard (but rewarding) elite soldiers, or hordes of grunts charging your way?

Does it want to have difficult t acquire (due to hard boss or w/e) drops, or RNG on the RNG so you can RNG whilst RNG'ing the RNG?

 

personally I'd much rather have a more 'spec-ops' feel again, instead of some super soldiers barging in and murdering every single of the clones (with are formed on the ship, to keep up with demand). The latter gets boring a lot faster, imo.

 

 

and to the people going all 'WARFARM IS WUT IT IS NOAUW, GET OVER IT'

 

Warframe is what it is right now, true. It's also very not good at properly deciding on a course, and PROPERLY following it.

This is so true, its sad. I don't mind it having a bit of other gameplay elements but the Devs seem to be slowly losing direction of the game which is becoming more and more apparent.

[MumblesMcphatty]

Can't take any of this griping seriously when the earlier frames are referred to as "biomechanical" - bunch of dudes in wetsuits with horns is all I see. Art design for the original frames was - at best - good enough for how the company was doing at the time. Bound to have its limits over a prolonged development process like this. How many variation of wetsuit can you envisage over 2 years worth of frame releases? How do you expect them to keep up the relentless content so many are rabid for if the design parameters aren't allowed to be malleable?

 

Even though the newer frames may have wandered down some niche paths in terms of design - but they are still clearly Warframe material. I don't think having a grudge against a design team trying to keep things fresh for themselves and the players is something to complain about. Certainly if all the frames looked the same as Excalibur I would never have looked twice at this game I've sunk 1500+ hrs into so far.

 

Nor do I see how the game isn't dark anymore ... lighting & colour tweaking is a personal preference and well within your power - so use it. The game can be as moodily dark or ridiculously cartoon like as you desire. You can work with the settings DE provides or learn to use injectors like SweetFX to make a lotta games look just the way you want them. Personally, until DE add a slider for Bloom or just fix the mess it is - I don't see why anyone wouldn't use personal tweaks for this game.

 

All I really see here is people being disgruntled about other players' (often exceedingly tasteless :P) colour choices on their frames/weapons. Which isn't DE's fault anyway.

 

Oh - and in all this guff about the game losing its vibe - why no mention of the eyesore that is almost anything Prime? Yeah, yeah, gold bling-bling #swagalicious - whatever - most of it is just fugly - certainly not dark & mysterious either.

[gvidzix]

I don't understand something:

This is oldschool--every color and weapon here is available from day 1.

 

No attachments, no skins, no regalia, nothing but a few day-1-available gear pieces using classic colors ONLY.

You could use this goofy-hatted clown(who is CLEARLY wearing clothing!) with his big unwieldly gear from the get go.

 

What could you do with it? Well, you could fight guys demanding "Leave my mother out of this!" on your way to kill "Give Uncle Hek a hug!", while running down brightly lit solid-steel corridors with polished metal lockers.

 

All from the get go.

 

So this "vibe" people are complaining about? It never existed. It's nostalgia--misremembered past with an erasure of "bad" parts used as judgement against an "inferior" present.

 

There have always been brightly lit levels--the grineer galleon was surprisingly dark when it first showed up, and the derelict was (and still is) the darkest thing ever. The first tileset available was the one now known as "corpus vessel", and the first rooms available were those brightly lit, tiny hallways we're all very familiar with.

 

As far as "silly parts", if the extreme goofiness of loki doesn't get you, remember that trinity, with her glorious lobster tail and "toilet bowl" helm were there.

 

There is no dark, tortured emo past that warframe has grown away from. There's some fancy promo videos that look nothing like the game, and that goofy opening screenshot you guys have (it always looked to me like the excal was the leader of the grineer, I never undstood why that was there, and was mildly confused/upset when that was removed before I could find out why we weren't the leader of the grineer anymore).

 

If anything, the tone of the game has gotten much darker as we progress--we've been made ever more aware of the fact the empires we're battling have slaves and murder innocents. I mean, hek, we had cities and a concept of "actual civilization" outside of the military ops we're constantly stopping, and Operation: Eyes of Blight had several of those cities DESTROYED.

 

We were vaguely aware that the infestation zombies were made of people before, but we now have tilesets where we find them in the process of being converted, screaming for help as they're eaten alive by this disease. It bothered people enough that we demanded(and got) the ability to mercy kill them.

 

Think about that progress: from shiny metal corridors to a scene so gruesome and disturbing we had to demand a way to end it.

 

We've gotten quests, and all of them are horrific--brain eating robots, slave dungeons, ancient demons, science labs feeding the innocent to monsters.

 

The happy-go-lucky "running around shootin' d00ds" demeanor is jarringly removed by these sorts of things.

 

We have a radio that goes on and on about how the evil empire is actively murdering people, with little hopeful interludes about us kicking their @$$es, rescue missions where they will murder the hostages if we screw up, and "allies" that gleefully torture and vivisect prisoners before our very eyes.

 

When you actually take a look at the current state of the game, it has reached new and breathtaking levels of effed up. The bad guys are abominations, the good guys are disturbing, and our best(and only) friend in the world is some merchant whose life we've saved repeatedly, all while trying to save our comrades from being captured by fiends who want to literally rip them limb from limb, our best hope for survival being the constant harvesting of tech from a long dead empire whose only legacies are deranged psychopaths and small data clips that portray them as being as twisted and malevolent, if not more so, than the ones we're fighting now.

 

You may not think about all of this while you're playing, but @#$@# is seriously #$@#$ up, far darker than it ever was before.

 

Read this and be amazed.

 

 

Otherwise I read almost all posts in this topic, and my eyes hurt.

Either way - what I just quoted put into few words:

the OP feels nostalgic, that's it, he remembers, fells - what wasn't even there to begin with.

 

He may feel the game was more darker, because when for example I unlocked all of star chart, there where what - 3 tilesets?

And half of them were Grineer ones, which were dark ...

 

But yeah Warframe has gotten so much more flashy and blingy, still I don't mind that.

[Mr.Lube]

Why do people have a problem with Warframes being thematic? Why does that deter from your enjoyment, I can't wrap my head around this.

 

If every warframe would have a little protrusion on their heads, they would be considered a carbon-copy of Excalibur.

Every Warframe was and is based off of a certain theme, but the more recent Warframes make it too obvious. The older Warframes have subtle hints of their themes while keeping the "Tenno" art style that we all got hooked on. Now they seem to be shoving the idea in our faces by making the Warframes wear clothes and hats.

[izzatuw]

Maybe your guys' brains are being struck by the "dark" vibe of RNG when you thought getting resources was hard that or nostalgia. If you really miss this "vibe" lower your brightness, always works for me

[ValhaHazred]

It's worth noting that the game opened to everyone on Easter Weekend, so a lot of people's first impression of the game was smashing easter eggs and shooting guys with bunny ears while painted in free pastel colours.

 

Off to a really serious start wasn't it?

[nickelshark]

I will say, I do like the older frames quite a bit more then the newer ones. The old ones all have a similar feel to them as far as looks and themes. I would argue that was broken by nova rather than valkyr or Oberon. But hey variety is nice. although I really hope they release more frames similar to the older ones sometime.

Edited March 3, 2015 by nickelshark

[DrCrawford]

This is a very interesting topic. Nostalgia is something we all have, and enjoy, we love the beginings of things. And change can be uncomfortable and sometimes threatening to what we came to love.

 

But change comes to everything and Warframe has changed a lot over the years.

 

In the end all you can do is see if the game is still fun and engaging to you or not, and decide for yourself whether or not you personally want to continue playing or whether it's time to move on to another game.

 

Either way, life moves on and I hope you can have a great time in whatever game you play, even if it's not Warframe. Because honestly the opening post is about what you loved about Warframe, and maybe what Warframe is turning into isn't what you want from the game. That's ok, that's your own personal taste and you get to decide if the changes in Warframe are fun and engaging for you or not.

 

Good luck and remember that things always change, sometimes you just have to roll with the punches and sometimes you gotta just move to other pastures.

 

(a little philosophical post i know, but i feel it's relevant to the OP)

[(PSN)kiddplay13]

...and a Tenno with his Nekro avatar saying thus. I rather believe that this is just trolling than that this one Tenno just recently got mentally shafted.

My Avi means i'm trolling...WHAT? Please get off this thread with thoughtless posts.

[Amazerath]

One of the main reasons I, and other Vets love Warframe is because of it's Dark/Mysterious vibe.

 

Some questions and considerations about this quote and other parts of your post:

 

1) Can you explain what makes the Dark/Mysterious vibe interesting to you?

 

2) You selected two very interesting images to illustrate 'old Warframe' and 'current Warframe'. But the first one is a cutscene while the second one is a screenshot, is it not? So it seems to me that you are not comparing 'old Warframe' with 'current Warframe' as much as you are comparing "DE's idea of Warframe" with "Some player's idea of Warframe". With that being said, who are you really addressing here? Are you criticizing some of us for painting our Rhinos pink? Or are you criticizing DE for giving us the freedom to do that?

 

3) Regarding stealth: DE tried to make it work, but the harsh truth is that they were never able to make it happen. As Steve implied in the past, making a proper stealth system for this game would require much more then just time and effort. It would also require the entire game to change for the sake of stealth. That is a big sacrifice that not every player would be willing to make. Perhaps for that reason, DE decided instead to go towards something more action oriented and thus well-lit (so you can see your targets more easily). They haven't completely forgotten about stealth (Spy 2.0), but I don't believe they are still considering stealth to be a viable way of playing the majority of Warframe's content. This is my personal opinion based on what I heard on a number of devstreams.

 

4) Why do you expect an action video game to stimulate you into seeking knowledge? Aren't there better games and activities for that? I would understand if you were talking about lore, but that doesn't seem to be what you're talking about.

 

5) After twenty two different warframes (not counting primes) and over two years of developing the game, is it really fair to blame DE for trying to explore other themes that aren't exactly "space ninja"? How can we (the players) even agree on what "space ninja" actually means if that is DE's own creation?

[Hayzemet]

I like the fact that the OP's whine ends with a picture of a frame style available since closed beta wearing frame colors available since closed beta, labelled as "new warframe".

 

I think that fact underlines exactly what's wrong with the entire logic presented--the "newest" thing in that picture was the kunai(there were no throwns in closed beta), and I think pretty much everyone agrees that's the "most ninja" sidearm available.

 

Sorry. Pretty pink rhino has always been an option.

 

But not with that "animation set" tho...

 

And, the vibe have changed , but just because the tenno seem more powerful than before. Other than that its still the same game, and limbo.

[Shreiko]

Every Warframe was and is based off of a certain theme, but the more recent Warframes make it too obvious. The older Warframes have subtle hints of their themes while keeping the "Tenno" art style that we all got hooked on. Now they seem to be shoving the idea in our faces by making the Warframes wear clothes and hats.

upvoted by mistake. I don't agree entirely with that Idea, alot of earlier warframes visual qualities were inspired by animals. Ember is either a chicken or a phoenix (leaning towards chicken), Ash is inspired by insects, Loki the hammerhead(not sure but remember a joke from a forum challenge thread), rhino is rhino, amongst a good number of others with animal themes. Newer frames havent been drawing ideas from animals, but character archetypes we can identify with at a glance. Mirage's jester, Limbo's magician and Mesa's gunslinging cowgirl. Mirage and limbo were more subtle than Mesa whose visuals are absolutely amazing.

[Morec0]

upvoted by mistake. I don't agree entirely with that Idea, alot of earlier warframes visual qualities were inspired by animals. Ember is either a chicken or a phoenix (leaning towards chicken), Ash is inspired by insects, Loki the hammerhead(not sure but remember a joke from a forum challenge thread), rhino is rhino, amongst a good number of others with animal themes. Newer frames havent been drawing ideas from animals, but character archetypes we can identify with at a glance. Mirage's jester, Limbo's magician and Mesa's gunslinging cowgirl. Mirage and limbo were more subtle than Mesa whose visuals are absolutely amazing.

 

Well what the hell is Excalibur? Nyx? Saryn?

 

And I don't see ANY Rhino in Rhino, it's definitely possible, but it may also just be a matter of you are seeing what you think you're seeing for the same reason we see faces in certain places, it's just the brain tricking you. Same for Ash because I fail to see a lot of insect in his design - save for the names of his alt. helmets.

 

Also keep in mind that, from a lore standpoint, the Warframes had to be built by the Orokin, who themselves would have needed inspirations for designs - it stands to reason perfectly that, eventually, their gaze would have shifted from the animal kingdom to the archetype characters of human past.

Edited March 3, 2015 by Morec0

[Temp0ralfool]

I completely agree. Warframe seems to be unsure what to do.

 

Does it want to be stealthy or gun-ho?

Does it want to have hard (but rewarding) elite soldiers, or hordes of grunts charging your way?

Does it want to have difficult t acquire (due to hard boss or w/e) drops, or RNG on the RNG so you can RNG whilst RNG'ing the RNG?

 

personally I'd much rather have a more 'spec-ops' feel again, instead of some super soldiers barging in and murdering every single of the clones (with are formed on the ship, to keep up with demand). The latter gets boring a lot faster, imo.

 

 

and to the people going all 'WARFARM IS WUT IT IS NOAUW, GET OVER IT'

 

Warframe is what it is right now, true. It's also very not good at properly deciding on a course, and PROPERLY following it.

Warframe has a very simple course: if it seems like a good idea, DE will try to implement it, and players may, but won't have to engage in that content.

 

this thread is pointless because the old feel of warframe is still whats being applied, its just that player have the opportunity to make it sillier or outright disregard the serious tone(that is the real difference between the pictures in the first post for 'old' and 'new' warframe, the first is from a trailer made by DE, while the second is player generated)

 

edit: I recognize that the tone (edit 2.0: tone in this case referring to the tone of the story, not the visuals) certainly brightens up as we shift from space ninja spec ops in jumpsuits with slightly odd helmets to space ninja super soldiers in more interestingly detailed outfits, but that's player progression.

Edited March 3, 2015 by Temp0ralfool

[Rexlars]

upvoted by mistake. I don't agree entirely with that Idea, alot of earlier warframes visual qualities were inspired by animals. Ember is either a chicken or a phoenix (leaning towards chicken), Ash is inspired by insects, Loki the hammerhead(not sure but remember a joke from a forum challenge thread), rhino is rhino, amongst a good number of others with animal themes. Newer frames havent been drawing ideas from animals, but character archetypes we can identify with at a glance. Mirage's jester, Limbo's magician and Mesa's gunslinging cowgirl. Mirage and limbo were more subtle than Mesa whose visuals are absolutely amazing.

 

Limbo's design is the exact opposite of subtle. 

[immolator1001]

I agree that the atmosphere has changed. It used to feel like a civilization in decay and it's kind of lost that, but the frames are absolutely not the problem, ember is fire to hydroids water and mag had a fishbowl for a helmet. Trinity is a lobster. Please don't talk about earlier warframes being better simply because they were the first ones.

[PookieNumnums]

Variety my friend . I wasn't thrilled with the top hat idea but I like how it turned out

[Phyrosite]

I really like warframe's style. I could be a ninja, or I could be a cat who just really likes blending grineer to a mush.

[OniDax]

Era of Clowns was started by Vauban. It's too late now.

 

Vauban isn't a clown...

[OniDax]

upvoted by mistake. I don't agree entirely with that Idea, alot of earlier warframes visual qualities were inspired by animals. Ember is either a chicken or a phoenix (leaning towards chicken), Ash is inspired by insects, Loki the hammerhead(not sure but remember a joke from a forum challenge thread), rhino is rhino, amongst a good number of others with animal themes. Newer frames havent been drawing ideas from animals, but character archetypes we can identify with at a glance. Mirage's jester, Limbo's magician and Mesa's gunslinging cowgirl. Mirage and limbo were more subtle than Mesa whose visuals are absolutely amazing.

 

Mirage is a hellequin/harlequin, not a jester. Yes, there is a significant difference. Ash is the one called the "ninja" frame, and his design is based on insects and arachnids. Neither Mirage, Limbo, or Mesa are subtle. But certainly, Warframe's design has never fit the ninja theme. However, the first Warframes could believably be something that might have been designed for war. Well, not Frost, but the others, yeah. Banshee's slippers and Nova's bell-bottoms got rid of that sense. Then again, Trinity does kinda look like a schoolgirl, so...

[KrazyKubrowLady]

Soooooo, whoever expresses his opinion and that opinion is slightly different from yours, is a whiner?

 

 

Everyone can say what they want, they just have to be civil and constructive. If game is not meeting OPs demands, he can express it. If you like it, you can express it. Or we should just talk about how Warframe is great and completely ignore numerous flaws with game design?

You misread my post. I said everyone is entitled to their opinion. I also stated that opinions are not fact and expressed that mine are not either.

"Another whiner to his own opinion.You yourself determine the vvibe and to be frank: my opinion is that it still feels the same. Opinions are not fact. Same goes with my own. Same also goes with the event others agree with you."

 

I also expressed that this is an opinion to keep to himself because of the drama it causes on the forums and within the community. A vibe is the feel one gets from the game and it's their own decision what to make of said vibe and therefore an opinion.

 

For example:

Sally and Carl are founders that play warframe constantly with each other. Let's say Sally has BP's upon BP's of weapons and warframes for mastery because the VIBE she gets from higher rank players get more respect than that of a rank 8. However Carl, after having unlocked everything in rank 8, gets a vibe that rank 19 players are snooty and greedy and therefore stays at 8 and levels his weapons in his own time. 

 

Vibes are feels, correct however everyone feels differently about the game. Some hate Loki, Limbo and Vauban for the troll factor while others use them strategically and are the only frames they use simply because of a feel or a "vibe" they got from playing those warframes. Another example is one person hates kubrows, the other loves them and someone else utilizes both for the potentials simply because of the vibe they get when they either aren't on enough to care for the pups or when a sentinel steals a kill you're trying to grab for the xp on your melee. 

 

Warframe is just one big vibe and others have different feels that allows them to play differently. Want to play wf all stealthy andrarely use primary and secondary, go ahead. Want to use a 6 forma boltor, 4 forma akmagnus and a blast damage glaive on a omgwtf damage rhino, more power to you. HOWEVER, expressing your own opinion of the vibe you get stating that the vibe has changed warframe as a fact and putting your foot down as if your opinion is everyone else's and saying for a fact the vibe killed it for EVERYONE as if you're the one who speaks for everyone in the community is pretty much out of line. Also trying to get a Dev to support your opinion to show everyone else up is pretty much immature.

 

Again. Everyone is entitled to their own opinions. It's when someone with an opinion decides to speak up for an entire community as if every one of the hundreds of thousands of people (maybe millions idk) share your opinion every step of the way that ticks me off. Everyone has a voice and I will be damned if I see one unnominated person speaking for thousands who don't see it the same way.

[Shreiko]

Well what the hell is Excalibur? Nyx? Saryn?

 

And I don't see ANY Rhino in Rhino, it's definitely possible, but it may also just be a matter of you are seeing what you think you're seeing for the same reason we see faces in certain places, it's just the brain tricking you. Same for Ash because I fail to see a lot of insect in his design - save for the names of his alt. helmets.

 

Also keep in mind that, from a lore standpoint, the Warframes had to be built by the Orokin, who themselves would have needed inspirations for designs - it stands to reason perfectly that, eventually, their gaze would have shifted from the animal kingdom to the archetype characters of human past.

 

     Excalibur's design is that of Hayden Tennos, simplified and repurposed to look generic for warframe, inspiraton as drawn from there. Same goes for Nyx's design being a female excalibur that resembles one of the antagonists from the dark sectors game(dont know the thing's name but a quick search on dark sectors should bring you an image of it). Saryn's design inspiration is a venomous flower/plant. Furthermore I never once said all prior warframes were inspired by animals, I said almost all. 

     Take alook at Rhino's feet, his arms and legs which bare resemblance to an actual rhinos limbs, after which you should look at his neck and the nose stub and compare to a rhino as well. Surely then you will see the similarities.

      I am also surprised Ash doesnt look insectoid to you, his default helm has mandibles and a carapace...

     I am also aware of your point on the orokin and their sources of inspiration. I dont have a problem with the newer designs of warframes so maybe you misread part of my post.

[IEpicWolfI]

Warframe is having identity crysis because developers want to attract more players with different additions to the game, while forgetting the basics that made Warframe different and unique in the first place.

 

This.

 

Also, someone mentioned earlier, that Tenno used to be a small force, desperately trying to fight both Corpus and the Grineer, while also defending the system from the Infested. The entire theme had a dystopian post-apoc feeling to it, where the 'grind', which we resume every time we play, was towards becoming stronger fighters to change the tides of the war. 

 

Nowdays, how the game and it's world are progressing, I'm surprised any of the opposing factions still exist, since the Tenno can just about wipe anything out.

 

I do miss the old 'everything's f*cked, you're here to help or die trying' kind of feeling the game had, than 'good job, here's a potato'. 

 

In the end, we'll see how it goes, no? Digital Extremes are currently my favorite dev team in the industry, mostly due to the fact of how connected they are to the community and how much they want to improve on what's already an amazing game, by bringing us content regularly. I've faith in Warframe and DE- it would be nice to boot up the game and remember the reason why the Tenno fight (like, the betterment of the Sol system than a bag'o'potatoes ~uO ).

[Shreiko]

Mirage is a hellequin/harlequin, not a jester. Yes, there is a significant difference. Ash is the one called the "ninja" frame, and his design is based on insects and arachnids. Neither Mirage, Limbo, or Mesa are subtle. But certainly, Warframe's design has never fit the ninja theme. However, the first Warframes could believably be something that might have been designed for war. Well, not Frost, but the others, yeah. Banshee's slippers and Nova's bell-bottoms got rid of that sense. Then again, Trinity does kinda look like a schoolgirl, so...

 

In this regard I would say the idea of subtlety is subjective. Starting off with Limbo aside from general shape language of his body harkening towards a tuxedo (in my opinion, clear but subtle) his defining piece is the top hat. What builds  the magician profile around him is the animation sets.

Note:  If he were to stand up straight he just looks like hes wearing a tux and a top hat. Looks to be a gentleman. Other frames like Ash don't have to be standing a certain way for me to know he is designed based of insects and the like. I just see his carapace and mandibles and bam its in my head. Limbos being called a magician is a culmination of several little things, hence my stance on it being subtle.

 

You are also right about harlequins and mirage. Made the mistake because of the similarities between a jester and Harlequin visually.

Edited March 3, 2015 by Shreiko

[APBladeX]

I never determined the theme, DE did. All i'm saying is i enjoyed that theme as well did many others. I wouldn't make this thread if what i was saying wasn't true.

Yes. I have been saddened over this ever since U12. Ever since then Warframe has gone downhill for me. Don't get me wrong, I still love Warframe to death, but I just feel like the "old Warframe" was so much more enjoyable and badass, definitely had space ninja aspects. Today's Warframe is all about shiny half-finished content that bugs out pretty often. It's about increased RNG, RNG grinding walls to access bosses, shiny dynamic movement UI that makes it difficult to understand what we're trying to look at, new mod looks that make absolutely no sense whatsoever in terms of the different categories of mods, Legendary mods being added just for grinding more fusion cores than rare mods would require. I could go on, but I just wish Warframe could DRASTICALLY change course back to its old ways. Yes, keep the new GOOD things, like the music. Refine the syndicates, relays/Conclaves (merge them), enemies (the trend now seems to be cheap ways to annoy players), Archwing, the new mission types, and remove the research-only weapons from the Market that can currently be bought with platinum. 

I've noticed ever since U11 that Warframe was changing in a direction that wasn't necessarily appealing, shifting from the darker vibe to the current state of the game. There are so many things that need improvements and fixes, and so much unfinished content being released just to momentarily appease the playerbase.