Warframe Is it Worth your time?

If you're answer to my question was in any way a "Yes", a "Yea", or a "Maybe", then you need to be playing this game my friend! Imagine that you have the freedom to run across walls, clear mindbogglingly-impossible gaps, or clear a room full of enemies in the blink of an eye. Well that is only the beginning friend, here in this magnificent opus crafted for us by Digital Extremes.

The kicker here, in case you did not know already, is that this is a five-year-old game. I kid you not friend, that is basically an old lady in video game years. Yet, I am here to tell you that this lady has aged better than Napa Valley wine over the years. Through constant support by the developers throughout. In the form of constant updates and a never-ending stream of new content. Even at the time of this review, they have new Warframes and weapons for release. They put in so much time and effort, poured so much love into this thing and it shows in every frame design, every weapon released, every prime frame introduced, every new story chapter added. I myself have only made it to the planet Neptune so far in pursuit of my Chroma parts. Yes, I'm definitely team Chroma! No, I have yet to gather them all but I have not given up my journey. Yet barely a few days ago the plains of eidolon update went live, giving players a whole new kind of experience. No more cramped hallways or stuffy bases, they literally gave us an entire world as an open world map basically. Did I forget to mention this is a Free-to-Play game? I will never wince or cringe when I hear that combination of words ever again. Never before has free really meant free. Yet somehow at no time during my time playing was I spammed with ads, or was forced into my wallet to continue. Every loading screen, every mission I waited but it never came. I scrolled through the market, down past all the amazing gear up for grabs for platinum, (in-game currency that can only be bought with real money), and thought to myself, "Look at all this cool s**t, I'm never getting any of this without spending some serious dough.", lo and behold I did not know how wrong I could be. Everything and I mean everything can be obtained in-game without ever spending a dime. There are blueprints for every weapon, Warframe, ship, armor, etc. and all you have to do is farm the required materials to build it in your ships foundry. Collect blueprints from regular missions, boss fights, story missions and artifacts. You still can't find that thing you had your eye on? head over to your clan's dojo and you can research a vast majority of the coolest stuff in the game. After research just buy the blueprints and pop over to your ships foundry and voila free gear. This game is beautiful, impressively so, a lot of fun to play and because I don't want to spoil any story surprises for anyone, full of wonder. There will be more than one moment in your Warframe journey where you just sit there staring at the screen amazed beyond belief at what they accomplished. My first time landing at a helipad on Neptune, or seeing the lost Moon for the first time are memories that have been ingrained into me. This developer had done on a free model what most major developers cant do with million dollar budgets. It is truly a sight to behold.

Well not really, obviously it's Warframe. But just the sheer amount of options at your fingertips really make you feel so empowered, so superhuman that this feeling is only matched by few titles; paid, free, or otherwise. The new update, the Plains of Eidolon, takes the freedom of mobility concept to a whole new level with an open world. I don't think I've seen this level of customization ever before in a game and that's saying something because I am a big RPG fan. It is hard to even find a comparison for that aspect of this game. This carries over into everything, your Warframe, your weapons, your ship, your pets, and companions, and I mean everything you own becomes exactly that, YOURS. Randomize your color patterns or go in-depth and paint each part individually. Get that alternate helmet to help you stand out from the crowd, a new weapon skin, a coveted Warframe skin, this list could be endless. How about loadouts? Want a Grenade Launcher?, Flak Cannon?, Energy Rifle? heck, there are even old school bows and shuriken weapons. Plus a variety of different Swords, Scythes, Daggers, Pistols, Shotguns, Gauntlets, Hammers, Staffs, Spears, and Polearms, I think you get the drift of the almost inexhaustive weapon selection offered. Then you go a step further with the Mod system. Here you decide how you want to manipulate your damage output. Do you want to do Heat damage, or Cold, or Lightning, or maybe even Poison? In Warframe you can do it all, you can pick and choose at your leisure, even combine them if you wanted to and you are encouraged, even rewarded for trying.

We have all heard the old superhero movie adage, "With great power, comes great responsibility." Never have I felt more powerful in a game, and not in a ridiculous Saints Row kind of way, but in a more slightly subdued meaningful way. You walk into a mission and the first thing that pops into your head is usually how can I make this awesome. Thankfully the developers made that easy for us. The variety in Warframe designs is not purely cosmetic, every frame plays differently. Not just a few animations, every Warframe is unique to itself. I'm talking completely different powers, passive abilities, and stats. From what I have seen there are no two frames with the same powers or abilities. For example, Excalibur is a melee oriented Warframe, its attack powers are pretty balanced with its defensive ones. You can be a team player or you can solo missions, either way, you will decimate the enemy. On the other hand, you have Nyx that works a lot better in teams with her psychic attacks or Limbo that drags your enemies into the rift between dimensions and can be a great AOE or crowd control character. Then you have my personal favorite, the Chroma Warframe. This dragon inspired frame is every bit the destructive monster it was modeled after. Chroma has a seriously OP ability, he changes elements based on the color of his energy. Basically, it means you can have either a fire, ice, lightning or poison dragon doing your bidding. One of his best moves is a perfect attack for a legendary beast, depending on your energy color Chroma will breath out a blast of that element. At present, there are 33 non-prime Warframes and numerous Prime ones, with new ones added every so often. So there is definitely going to be one that fits your style or aesthetic. Each is able to be augmented to fulfill any combat role, be it defensive or offensive, or any combination of the two. This tailors the experience making it so much more personal, as you never feel stuck with your choices.

Throughout this review, I've been singing the praises of the game, but it wouldn't be fair if I didn't give you the bad along with the good. First and foremost would be the always dreaded grind. Warframe is definitely what you would call a looter game. That is when you replay missions over and over farming materials to build new gear. Granted the gear is usually worth the effort and always stylish to look at. Be prepared to run down that same hallway, battling in the same metallic Corpus rooms, shooting at the same skinny legged Grineer goons a lot more than you might want to early during the game so keep that in mind. It does get more varied in locations and enemies later on, with the boss battles being exceptionally unique. My personal favorites were the Junction missions between planets where I squared off against other Warframes guarding it. Story missions were next in line, with lovingly crafted cutscenes that draw you deep into the lore of this world. The plot takes a lot of surprising twists and only does more to hook you into loosing, even more, hours of your life to protecting the galaxy. Is Warframe the perfect game? definitely not has a long way to go, it is not for everyone. But this game is so much more than the sum of any one of its parts, it transcends its genre and free-to-play mold and became something amazing that millions of players have come to love. Is Warframe worth your time? Unless you live under a rock or don't have access to the internet this reviewer says this is one you need to try at least once. Who knows it may just be the beginning of your new love affair with the world of gaming.

This has been Marcus C. Collins thank you for joining us here on HubPages, I hope you enjoyed the article and will be joining us again. See you next time Gamers!