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The space ninja adventure known as Warframe, an experience where you can feed yourself to a giant mouth and drive a motorcycle in the year 1999, has launched a major update. This latest expansion highlights the distinctive charm that has come to define Warframe in the past few seasons.

The new content, made available this week, brings in a fungus-inspired character that performs a unique animation, along with a whole new explorable fungal area. But it’s also going back to basics, with a new mission designed to making sure this complex, vast 12-year-old MMO makes sense to new players.

The Arrival of "The Teacher"

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

In Warframe, modifications are enhancements that can be added to your character or your weapons to enhance their abilities. They range from the straightforward (boosting power or shortening reload times) to the devastatingly complex. Dedicated players often produce extensive guides about optimized loadouts that use synergistic enhancements to create overwhelming power.

“Many players likely started their journey, encountering mods without grasping their purpose,” noted a lead narrative designer. “We believed it was crucial, upon completing the mission, for players to think, ‘Hey, modding is cool. I'd like to experiment further.’”

A Joint Development

“The Teacher” was created through a partnership between the core team, who handled the story elements, and an external team, who designed the mission, which will be introduced to new players.

In the quest, the player is asked to retrieve a new segment for their spaceship, but they’re confronted by a formidable foe called Teshin, who removes the player's powers and melee weapons, and forces them to engage with the mod system to handily demonstrate its power.

Several developers were already fans of the game, but some were newcomers, according to a lead designer. This fresh viewpoint that proved critical.

“The first thing we did was basically sit behind them and go right play through the tutorial and take prodigious notes on all points of confusion,” the designer said. Early-game menu pop-ups introduced players to modding. But the team observed these weren't effective for all.

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

Addressing a Real Need

Warframe’s mods allow players to create incredibly strong combinations that fill the display with damage values. But "The Teacher" focuses on different aspects. There will be some long-time players 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 early players — and that doing so isn’t as simple as it looks.

“There’s lots of little tweaks and little subtle things in the background there to just demonstrate the possibilities rather than tell you,” the designer said. For example, one of the mission's objectives is to show how mods can create elemental damage types; in this case, Magnetic damage that eats chunks out of enemy shields.

“We had to change the weapon to be a burst-fire weapon, because it shows off the proc rate more,” the designer said. “But you don’t want to explicitly tell players, 'with a basic modification, you only got a few percentage chance to trigger a special damage type.' So how do you tutorialize that without changing it?”

Veterans will naturally recognize these mechanics and understand how it works, but new players have to be taught to notice these details.

“This type of design work that we previously focused on just because our priorities lay elsewhere,” said a narrative lead. “However, this oversight meant that we never really told people how to use mods.”

Months of Effort

“There’s so much that goes into just making a really simple mission that — honestly — you can blast through in about 15 minutes,” said the designer. “But it's months and months of work for loads of people.”

The designer was clearly enthusiastic over being able to work on a game that he loves — and to craft a mission for one of his favorite characters.

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

An Evolving Onboarding Process

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 even have access to until hours into the game. And others, like modding, that increase in depth depending on your level of engagement. A previous patch streamlined the early game so that players could reach Warframe’s mind-bending plot developments 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 early game experience evolves beyond its origins. Beginners can find their way — even if they miss the menu prompts.