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The popular online game known as Warframe, an experience where you can feed yourself to a giant mouth and drive a motorcycle in the year 1999, has unveiled a significant update. This latest expansion exemplifies the creative flair that has become synonymous with Warframe in recent years.

The new content, made available this week, brings in a new mushroom-themed warframe that does a little dance, along with a whole new explorable fungal area. However, it also revisits core concepts, with a new mission geared at making sure this complicated, expansive 12-year-old MMO is understandable by new players.

A Quest Called "The Teacher"

Named “The Teacher,” this is the long-awaited quest that educates Warframe players on how to use one of the game's most basic — yet most intricate systems: modding.

In Warframe, modifications are enhancements that can be equipped on your warframe or arsenal to boost their performance. These can be simple (boosting power or shortening reload times) to the devastatingly complex. Content creators often craft hour-long videos about optimized loadouts that use powerful mods in combination to create devastating effects.

“I think a lot of people were maybe getting into the early game, encountering mods without grasping their purpose,” noted a key developer. “We believed it was crucial, upon completing the mission, for players to think, ‘Wow, modding is interesting. I'd like to experiment further.’”

A Collaborative Effort

“The Teacher” was created through a partnership between the core team, who handled the story elements, and a supporting studio, who designed the mission, which will appear early in the game.

In the quest, the player is tasked with obtaining a component for their ship, but they’re interrupted by a menacing, powerful warrior called Teshin, who removes the player's powers and close-combat arms, and compels them to use the mod system to effectively show its potential.

Many of the external team were longtime players, but others had never played before, according to a lead designer. It was this outside perspective that was essential.

“The first thing we did was basically sit behind them and have them experience the introduction and document extensively on everywhere they fell out,” the designer said. Early-game menu pop-ups introduced players to modding. But the team noted that they didn’t work on everyone.

“Certain players missed fundamental guidance where it's flashing on the screen saying put the mod in the slot,” he said.

Filling a Significant Gap

Warframe’s mods allow players to create stupidly powerful synergies that turn the screen into a blitz of numbers. But "The Teacher" isn’t really about that. Veteran users who desire more advanced content, like creating powerful and specific builds. But it became clear that “The Teacher” is filling a real and significant gap for newcomers — and that executing this is quite complex.

“Numerous subtle adjustments and little subtle things in the background there to just sort of show you what it can do rather than tell you,” the designer said. For example, one of the goals of “The Teacher” is to show how mods can create elemental damage types; in this case, a magnetic effect that depletes protective barriers.

“Adjustments to the armament to be a burst-fire weapon, because it shows off the proc rate more,” the designer said. “But you don’t want to say to people, 'oh yeah, actually on a base level mod, you only got a low probability to proc an elemental effect.' So how do you tutorialize that without changing it?”

Experienced players will instinctively look for that kind of weapon effect and grasp their function, but new players have to be taught to pay attention to these things.

“This type of design work that we've had to worry about as much just because that hasn't been our focus,” said a story developer. “However, this oversight meant that we never really told people how to use mods.”

Months of Effort

“A tremendous amount of work is required for just making a really simple mission that — frankly — you can complete quickly,” said the designer. “But it's months and months of work for many team members.”

The designer was visibly glowing with excitement over being able to work on a game that he loves — and to design content featuring a preferred figure.

“I'm a huge fan of Teshin,” he said. “He's my 8-year-old internal self's idea of what's cool.”

Streamlining the Beginning

In the decade-plus since launch, Warframe has been in a ongoing struggle with its own player onboarding process. There are lots of complex systems that players can ignore initially — and won't encounter until much later. And others, like modding, that scale in complexity depending on how much time you want to invest. A previous patch streamlined the early game so that players could reach Warframe’s complex narrative arcs with reduced repetitive play up front.

With “The Teacher,” it’s clear that the developers are doubling down on a commitment to make sure Warframe’s initial hours evolves beyond its origins. New players can get their foot in the door — regardless of overlooking tutorials.