TennoCon 2018: Why Warframe will never launch (and why that doesn’t matter)
Eternal beta
Wait, Warframe has never launched?! That might come as a shock to a few. Some folks, especially newer players, may not realize that Warframe is not technically a launched game — at least as far as nomenclature is concerned. After all, the game has all the earmarks of being launched (regular expansion updates, cash shop, etc.). So for all intents and purposes, it is launched, it is just happens to missing that moniker. So does that even matter?
In my interview with Ford, I asked if we somehow missed the switch to launch, and how the company views the game and why. She replied, “Oh no, it’s in beta.” Well, at least we didn’t miss anything! Would Warframe ever move out of beta? “No,” she said. “Why would we?” What does the label do? Ford noted that many folks already consider the game launched, and pointed out that it only says beta in one place on the site: the open beta agreement. “That’s the only place that we are technically still in beta. Everything else is a pseudo launch.” She continued,
“There’s literally no reason to do it other than the fact that if we say we’re launching people are going to have expectations. And we’re like, well, we like what we’re doing now, and we can continue to have our own launches for specific content types. But if we ever said Warframe was launched as a game it would be a farce for what that term means. So even if we are making a farce of beta right now, it would be a further farce of launch if we use that term.”
So there you go. Digital Extremes simply believes it is no slave to nomenclature. It ignores standard naming practices and just focuses on making a good game and delivering more and more content to its fans. Why mess with a good thing? It never had an actual launch, and it never will. There’s simply no point to. What about having a chance for fans and devs to celebrate as most launches tend to be? For Ford, there is no need for any launch party because TennoCon is their party (and a fun party it is — see this year’s in the gallery below!).
So don’t bother categorizing Warframe within the common labels. If the game must be labeled, we’ll just have to make a new one like Warframe beta or betaunch (launcheta?) just for it. After all, it is its own unique beast. Hm, suddenly, I wonder if I can use a Fortuna echo-lure on Warframe for conservation purposes. We certainly never want this game to lose its magic!
Check out the rest of our TennoCon 2018 coverage!
Check out all of the Warframe’s TennoCon 2018 videos
TennoCon 2018: Deep-diving Warframe’s Fortuna and Railjack
The Stream Team: How about that Warframe news?!
TennoCon 2018: Why Warframe will never launch (and why that doesn’t matter)
TennoCon 2018: Warframe enhances sights and sounds with new skins, ‘Frames, pet skins, music, and more
TennoCon 2018: Warframe is coming to Nintendo Switch, some cross-platform a possibility
TennoCon 2018: Warframe expands into open-world Venus plus space
No. The one thing I do not want is for new games to be in a state of eternal beta like Warframe. As good as Warframe… can be, or could be… at times… I don’t like that they have been in beta for as long as they have been. Because I do wonder what the finished product will look like and I hate the everyone gives DE a pass. I think the clock HAS to run at some point on a beta phase for any game. It isn’t right. Even if it isn’t their intent to string their player base along, it isn’t right because the next developer to take this approach will not be as noble. It’s very a bad precedent to set. It’s why I don’t touch early access games ever. Warframe’s success is entirely on the timing of their “release”. Any later and they would be dead in the during the days of Early Access. It worked for them because they were one of the first, we didn’t catch on by then.
This isn’t a single-player game, so there is no “finished” product. It continues to develop and get updates better than so many of the “I call myself launched” games. Sorry, it is only semantics, and DE has just said they will never cow to the semantics game. It isn’t ever going to have a “launch”. And sorry, but in my opinion they can darn well do what they like — they found a successful formula that does right by the fans, so who cares about precedent. Besides, if how great they are being to their fans and all their content and development is setting a precedent, then I sure hope more DO do that!
Now, if they were spewing garbage and trashing their fans, then ok. But they have what works for them so good for them. Let other companies find what works for them and let them do it.
And they never were early access I believe. Just beta.
Yeah I believe Warframe was first in beta a few years before Early Access became a popular status to adopt. Also I guess if you want to think about it in a certain way, ‘beta’ implies that the game is still ever-changing, and that’s exactly what Warframe is. They keep doing new, different things while also changing/updating existing stuff.
The game that Warframe was back when I first played it in ‘open beta’ in like… 2012 or 2013 with my two college friends (back when the starter warframes were Excalibur, Loki, and Mag, and pretty much every mission was just ‘run around and kill everything in the way’) is so massively different from how it now feels today, even though the core structure/identity of the game has remained the same.
My guess is in another 5-10 years DE will once again have added so much new stuff or made updates to existing stuff that it’ll feel even better and more varied than it currently does. And I doubt anyone’s going to be nitpicking at the ‘beta’ thing if the game itself is fun as heck.
Do you know what the launch game would look like? Exactly the same just with them announcing launched. That’s it. It’s f2p so there’s no launch price, so pointless in doing it
I think Warframe should launch, otherwise it just feels misleading. Like “wow, this is just the beta, I wonder how amazing the actual game will be.”
I understand the nature of the problem: Warframe is just so unique as a game that normal gaming terminology doesn’t always apply. But the proper solution to that is to either (a) make up your own terminology that fits your game, or (b) use the existing terminology as it best fits. Intentionally using existing nomenclature incorrectly is not the solution.
I think that is why Ford noted that it doesn’t say beta anywhere on the site, except for that agreement people have to sign, which has been the same agreement forever. They don’t say it is beta any more than they say it is launched.
This is the future of online games as a service… there really isn’t, and doesn’t need to be, a launch point. That’s old thinking, and I’m glad they verbalized it.
I agree 100% that there doesn’t have to be a definitive launch date, but that doesn’t mean it should just be in beta forever. There should be new terminology to more accurately reflect what’s actually happening.
The longer I play Warframe, the more their “Eternal Beta” status makes sense to me. They’re constantly innovating and trying new things, sometimes those things don’t work out and get abandoned (Lunaro) or removed from the game entirely (raids), sometimes they’re iterated on and developed further (from Cetus and the Plains of Eidolon to Fortuna and the Orb Vallis), sometimes it seems like they’re abandoned only to be picked up and iterated on much later (the improvements they’ve said Archwing will get with the Railjack release). And every time they release a new game mode or game system or piece of content, they rush it out as soon as it’s finished and basically let the PC build serve as a live beta environment for a week or two.
So multiple times a year us PC players get a slightly janky content release, a week or two of constant hotfixes to squash bugs and tweak balance, then the stable and more-polished build is sent to cert for the console releases. And the game is littered with experimental game modes and game systems which lie around unpolished and half-abandoned, but which (if you can overlook their flaws) add to the character and variety of the game.
I saw a great quote from Steve Sinclair in an article on another site, saying that when Warframe launched they didn’t have the money to give it more guns or more content so they decided the niche they’d go for to make it stand out was being more open and honest and flexible with communication and community connections and development. And it seems to have worked for them!
As for the cosplay, eek, the long arm of Ballas somehow manages to look even creepier in cosplay than it does in the game! I saw a few glimpses of the cosplay contest in Angry Joe’s TennoCon Vlog, looking forward to seeing the whole thing when DE posts the vid :)
But didn’t old school MMOs do the same thing? Just look at Ultima Online and SWG. They did things that pissed off large chunks of their player base well after launch, and they WERE launched and still good examples of what the genre can do, even after their blunders.
As much as I love this game and the way it’s managed, I must disagree with normalizing the “eternal beta” mindset. It’s a lazy excuse, and luckily DE doesn’t really use this excuse because the game’s quality is usually above and beyond the passable mark. However other less well-made games will be emboldened to pick up this excuse, to the detriment of players.
I think we probably need to put down the “emboldened” argument for a little while. If other games want to copy Warframe’s eternal beta, so be it. They should also copy the quality, dedication, and the complete lack of using an “it’s still in beta” excuse for every problem.
People and companies are going to do what they are going to do. If a game dev is putting out a crap product and feels like they can rely on the shield of being in beta to protect them forever, they were likely going to do that with or without Warframe. Heck, they’d probably do that with or without the problem I do see in this area. Steam Early Access.
Basically, I much prefer a quality game that keeps evolving and wants to low-key its beta status than an unfinished game that bursts into “launch” on an artificial timetable after milking that Early Access shield for all it was worth.
I’ve tried this game on multiple occasions. There is something massively wrong with the controls, gunplay and general playability of this game.
Floating and slowing time feels bad, gunplay and melee feels unpolished. Too many ambiguous and impactful ways to improve your character. Lots of unfinished systems.
The amount and variety of loot for crafting is stupid. The time it takes to craft something, also stupid.
Navigating and understanding the menus is unintuitive.
The reason they’ll never launch is because they’d have to go back and fix the myriad of junk you have to sift through as a new player.
Destiny 2 sucks as a game but the gunplay is in an entirely different (better) tier than this.
There is, however, tons to love about this game but not fixing and polishing the core systems will mean I’m not going to continue throwing money at them. I work too hard and too long to have to do research on how to understand video game systems.
I’d have to totally disagree with you. It is precisely the controls, gunplay, and general playability of this game that sets it apart from others and makes it so much more fun. They don’t need to “launch” to fit anyone’s preconceived notions. And I am glad they don’t cow to those. They need to keep doing what they are doing.
I’m happy that you’re happy.
there is nothing wrong with the controls, gunplay is just fine and its the same as almost every other game, Melee gets changed every year or two we are getting a new Melee system later this year
how is the amount and variety of loot for crafting stupid??
and the time it takes to craft isn’t that bad
the Menu’s besides the shop on your ship are just fine
you not wanting to understand video game systems besides ones you are familiar with seems to be the problem for you
If you have this many problems with the game, then it’s just not the game for you, and no amount of “polish” would fix that. Which is fine; taste is subjective and we’re all allowed to like what we want.
Next April 1 DE will announce the end of beta and wiping of all progress.
Sure would be fun to watch the reactions!
hahahaha*breaks down crying*
It will be the same with Star Citizen. People asking all the time: “When is the launch?”, making memes about it. Truth is its a game in constant development and there is no red line that separates launch from beta. They have several moons and stations now, at the end of 2019 we hopefully have fully finished and fully working Stanton system. Then they add few more (at much faster rate since they will already have all necessary tech and tons of assets). When 3-5 systems are done, Chris will probably mark it as launch to grab media attention and new players but that could as well be same beta since there will still be more systems and features to add.
So yeah, same with Warframe hard launch is irrelevant if game is perfectly playable already.
Is there any transferability of characters or progress from SC beta to launch?
…wait, it’s still a beta product? Yer seriously blowin’ my mind right now.
I personally think it would be funny to have a “We were so busy playing Warframe with you, we forgot to ‘launch’ the game.” event