TennoCon 2024: Soulframe Spills New Details About The MMO, Shows A Live Demo, And Teases Future Tests

It's been about 2 years since we first got word that Digital Extremes was working on something new. While the name picked, Soulframe, conjured images of their F2P game Warframe, this MMO project was something very different from their flagship title. Showcasing a very medieval art style, an intertwining with nature, and things that were a bit more "magical" than they were "future technological", Soulframe looked like a very welcome deviation from the company's bread and butter.

Since then, it's been a bit sparce on the info front. Sure, we got to solve a few puzzles on the game's initial website, the team dropped a few screen shots here and there, and we'd get snippets of information in a few videos over the past 24 months, but getting in game was reserved for a very limited few as testing moved forward. Even the game's showing at last year's TennoCon was a bit on the sparce side, really just touring a cavern dungeon and showing a few puzzles.

Today's TennoCon presentation showed off new info, revealed a bit of a demo of what the game entails, and teased future testing. It was the most we've seen from Soulframe and it makes me even more excited to get my hands on the game.

As Community Manager Sarah Asselin, Creative Director Geoff Crookes, and CEO Steve Sinclair took the stage for the Soulframe keynote presentation, they reiterated more than once that everything we were about to see was still in development. I'll be honest, though, as the demo walked through Soulframe's opening Prologue, if this is still a "work-in-progress", I cannot wait to see the finished product.

Our mini-adventure starts with quite the visual treat as we get to tour environments from the air through a bird's travels. In a very cool castle we see a mom and a new baby. Then we get to actually pick a few traits for our character. We've kind of seen this before in previous Soulframe snippet, the character creator being implemented kind of mid-story. I liked it the first time we saw it and I still like it. It's a subtle thing and, as we find out that the baby is us, it's kind of touching we "create" ourselves while in our mother's arms.

We aren't there for long, sadly.

Soulframe will be bringing large scale open zones to explore. It may not end up truly "open world", but the size of zones seems to provide plenty to explore. Compared to zones in Warframe (like the Plains of Eidolon) the starting island in Soulframe is twice the size.

Our demo concludes with a few impressive items. First, a boss fight with a new boss named Nimrod. Despite the silly name, the way this cat wields lightning certainly seemed to give our tour some challenges and even a few deaths. (FYI, you fly back to your body as the bird you've been seeing in videos.) Expect to see more of Nimrod, this isn't just a one-off encounter. Second, we get a tease of a fight with a big boar, Bromius, who is apparently a new "Omen Beast." We'll learn more about those soon, too. Finally, we get to meet a "friend" through us saving a rat. Yep! Kind of neat. The rat ends up being Ancestor Verminia, who helps us with both customization and point creation.

“The community we’ve formed around Soulframe has been really inspiring for the team and they are the backbone of everything we do,” said Sarah Asselin, Soulframe Community Manager. “ We’re welcoming more new players than ever and we can’t wait to share our progress through regular Devstreams with the team as we continue to peel back Soulframe’s layers of intrigue.”

So when can you play? Probably this fall, according to the presentation. More players will continue to be added to Prelude testing between now and then, but in the fall more public testing should open. That said, if Warframe's history is anything to go by, I don't personally expect to see very defined "testing" phases. Digital Extremes likes to hold things in "beta" forever and just keep developing. Just as with Warframe, though, Soulframe testing will be F2P with founder pack options.

I can't wait. Are you excited for this one? If you're interested, make sure to sign up on the official site.

(FYI - The team isn't dropping any videos until the completion of the Warframe stuff later tonight. I'll circle back and add any videos they post below.)