Recent reviews by TennoSkoom

Major Order complete! Sony has backed off and reverted their decision to make PSN account linking mandatory.

Helldivers 2 is an awesome game with loads of fun to be had. Drop in with up to three friends to complete missions and destroy the enemies of managed democracy! The gun play feels really good and the stratagems are very fun to use. The premium currency isn't grossly overpriced and it can be earned by playing the game! The war bonds that release will never expire, so no FOMO is present there. The community surrounding the game is pretty amazing and generally welcoming of new cadets. The different difficulties aren't artificial and actually add new challenges (until diff 8 & 9 anyways). There are some negatives present here though, like all the bugs plaguing some of the game's systems. One example is the DoT bug where if you aren't the network host, you can't deal any DoT. So taking DoT stratagems is a gamble unless you are solo. Another annoying bug is some of the scopes are misaligned, like on the AM sniper rifle. So shooting something dead center of the reticle will miss. These were recently fixed.

Overall I recommend this game to anyone who enjoys co-op PvE experiences, and anyone who enjoyed the movie Starship Troopers.

So after playing Warframe for 1,040 hours (Steam says about 658 hours, but it's incorrect.), I finally decided to write a review on the game. In this review, I'll be stating how "Free to Play" the game actually is and what the gameplay is like, what the game offers in terms of content, and a pros/cons list at the end of the review to sum things up.

So first off, how Free to Play is this game anyways? As a lot of us know, most Free to Play games have you paying for microtransactions to get most content in the game, with no way of using the in-game resources or currency to get them instead. Warframe does not do this, only cosmetic items, color pallets, interior decorations for your Liset, etc. Things like Weapons, Warframes, and Companions can all be earned by playing the game and getting enough resources/credits. Although Warframe and Weapons slots can't be obtained without platinum (Warframe slots are 20 platinum each and weapon slots are 2 for 12 platinum), you can trade items in the trade channel to people in exchange for platinum. Another thing I should mention is Foundry build rushing. If you are building a weapon or Warframe in the foundry, you will notice a "Rush build" option. This isn't spendy though, usually only costing 25-50 platinum to do so. Trust me, if you have what people want, you can obtain a hefty amount of platinum without paying a dime and have plenty to spend on rushing builds or buying slots.

Now if you actually start liking the game and want to spend money to get things quicker, this is where you could have a tough time. Market prices from Digital Extremes are, you could say, "Extreme". With Weapons usually costing about $5-$12 depending on the weapons and Warframes costing $5-$20 depending on the Warframe. To put this into a better perspective, it costs $5 for the most basic package of platinum, which is 75 platinum, all the way to $200 worth of platinum, which is 4300 platinum. There is a cheaper way to get platinum though. The game has a login reward system and sometimes you can get a coupon for 25%, 50%, and 75% off your next platinum purchase. This would be an ideal time to buy some. They started doing Prime Access, which allows you to access the lastest prime Warframe and weapons instantly.....for $150 of course. The cheapest package you can get in Prime Access give you just the prime accessories, a 90 day Affinity Booster, and a 90 day Credit Booster....for $50!! I feel Prime Access just isnt all that affordable, but maybe that's just me. My rating on Warframe's Free to Play factor is a 9/10.

Alright, next thing to talk about is the actual gameplay. Is it fun? Is it rewarding? Well, Warframe can be very fun to play at times, other times it can be annoying and tedious to play. It's a 3rd person view Co-Op/PvP shooter with unique elements that will be talked about later. In the beginning, you will have a choice among 3 Warframes ( Excalibur, Mag, or Volt), you will have a choice between 2 primary weapons ( MK1-Braton or MK1-Paris), you will have a choice between 2 secondary weapons (Lato or MK1-Kunai), and you will have a choice between 2 melee weapons (Skana or MK1-Bo). Either of the Warframe are fun to play, in my opinion. The MK1-Braton is garbage, both secondaries are good for beginners, and both melee weapons are good for beginners as well. Getting used to some of the controls might be a pain at first (Such as wall-running and sliding), but eventualy you'll get the hang of it and be flipping around like a space ninja in no time! Basically what I'm saying here is that the beginning of the game is hard to get past, in the sense that you feel underpowered and weak compared to your foes. If stick with it long enough to get better equipment, then it becomes much more fun to play. Weapons are fun and all, but I think the Warframes are what spice the game up the most. Each Warframe has a set of 4 powers that you unlock as you rank them up. The powers are some of the most fun this game has to offer. Example scenario: You are a rank 10 Excalibur surrounded by 25 Grineer troopers and there are just too many to shoot and kill before you die yourself. What do you do at this point? Activate Radial Javelin, which is your most powerful power as Excalibur, and watch as all 25 of them are pinned to the walls around you. Eventually, you'll be able to do the same thing, but with 50 guys surrounding you. Warframe powers, yes please. Now what about rewarding gameplay? This game can reward you at times, however, it can be very grindy. The first thing you'll probably farm for in this game are resources. Resources aren't that painful to try to get, although Orokin Cells, Neurodes, Neural Sensors, and Argon Crystals are the ones you will be grinding out on the most. In terms of farming, the only real things that could be tedious to obtain are Warframe parts and Archwing parts. Speaking of Archwing, if you have played the game awhile now and feel the need for something new to do, try getting the Odonata Archwing and fly through deep space in Archwing missions. It's a breath of fresh air if you feel like ground combat is getting boring. Gameplay can get pretty intense at times, if you finally have the loadout to survive 30 minutes on Warframe's survival gamemode or 30+ waves on Warframe's defense mode. All in all, the gameplay is fun, the farming/grinding isn't always fun, but once you get that weapon built or Warframe built, the fun begins yet again. Overall, Warframe's gameplay gets an 8/10 from me.

Now to talk about what Warframe has to offer in terms of content. Well, it has a lot of content to offer compared to when I started back in June 2013. There are 22 Warframes available to play as, not counting the Prime Warframes (Only difference is they have an extra polarity and look way cooler). There are 100+ weapons in the game as well, not to mention the primes of course. There are 14 planets to visit, each with increasing number of missions available. Tons of mods to choose from, including melee stances, which enhance your melee weapons by allowing you to perform combos. Just, plenty of content for a newcomer to explore. Usually every two months, Digitial Extremes puts out a massive update, usually going up a whole number ( As in Update 14.5 goes to Update 15). These massive updates add hours upon hours of new things to do. Warframe's amount of content gets a 10/10 from me.

Pros:
-The game is fun to play once you get the hang of things.
-Easy to learn thanks to a tutorial
-PvE and PvP
-You can earn content in the game without paying
-Friendly community
-There is a wealth of content
-At least 7 gamemodes to play
-Endgame is cool, more to come!
-No Pay to Win business models
-Rewarding exploration (Especially in Void missions)
-Warframe powers are fun as hell
-Boss fights are awesome for a F2P
-Alerts, Invasions, and Infestations as daily missions are great and rewarding
-Most weapons past the beginner ones are fun to use
-Pet dogs

Cons:
-Market pricing is a bit steep
-Prime access is ridiculous
-There is some farming/grinding
-Some bugs still in the game a frustrating
-Napalms are jerks
-Beginning of the game loadouts can be tough to get past (Because of how underpowered they feel)
-Higher mastery rank Tenno entering your game could ruin the experience for you
-Some people in trade overprice everything ever

Let me know if there's anything I could add, as this is my first review :).

Thanks for reading, Tenno.

Edit 1: All cosmetics except for TennoGen stuff can be aquired without paying for platinum. Just use trade chat to get platinum!
Edit 2: Digital Extremes has moved to a less predictable update pattern that usually results in the updates being packed with new content and now cinematic quests!
Edit 3: Prime parts are less tedious to obtain thanks to the Void Relic system added recently!