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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 new update. The Vallis Undermind highlights the distinctive charm that has become synonymous with Warframe in more recent times.

This expansion, made available this week, brings in a new mushroom-themed warframe that performs a unique animation, along with a whole new explorable fungal area. However, it also revisits core concepts, with another quest geared at making sure this complex, vast long-running online game makes sense to new players.

The Arrival of "The Teacher"

Called “The Teacher,” this is the highly anticipated mission that educates Warframe players on how to use one of the game's most basic — yet most intricate systems: modding.

In Warframe, mods are augments that can be added to your character or your weapons to improve their stats. These can be simple (boosting power or shortening reload times) to the devastatingly complex. Dedicated players 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, seeing mods, not really understanding it,” said a lead narrative designer. “I think it was really important, upon completing the mission, for players to think, ‘Wow, modding is interesting. 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 a supporting studio, who designed the mission, which will appear early in the game.

In the quest, the player is tasked with obtaining a new segment for their spaceship, but they’re confronted by a formidable foe called Teshin, who takes away the player’s abilities and close-combat arms, and compels them to use the mod system to handily demonstrate its power.

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 proved critical.

“Our initial step involved observing new players 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 observed these weren't effective for all.

“Certain players missed fundamental guidance where it's flashing on the screen saying equip the modification,” he said.

Closing an Important Loop

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. There will be some long-time players who desire more advanced content, like optimizing for endgame challenges. 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 mission's objectives 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 rapid-fire gun, because it better demonstrates the effect frequency,” 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 trigger a special damage type.' How can you teach this mechanic effectively?”

Veterans will naturally recognize these mechanics and grasp their function, but new players have to be taught to notice these details.

“This type of design work that we've had to worry about as much just because that hasn't been our focus,” said a narrative lead. “However, this oversight meant that players weren't properly taught the modding system.”

Months of Effort

“A tremendous amount of work is required for just making a really simple mission that — honestly — you can blast through in about 15 minutes,” said the designer. “Yet it represents extensive development for many team members.”

The designer was clearly enthusiastic over contributing to a beloved title — 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.”

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 encounter until hours into the game. And others, like modding, that increase in depth depending on your level of engagement. An update earlier this year improved the introductory experience so that players could reach Warframe’s complex narrative arcs with less time on the grind up front.

With “The Teacher,” it’s clear that the developers are reinforcing their dedication to make sure Warframe’s initial hours doesn’t stay locked in 2013. New players can get their foot in the door — regardless of overlooking tutorials.