Warframe has been around for the better part of a decade and has its concept rooted back almost twenty years. With its free-to-play model on Steam, the game saw a resurgence of players after it was subsequently released on the Nintendo Switch, PlayStation 5, and Xbox Series S/X.
Players returning to Warframe will return to the same formula of shooting and looting. There are new Warframes and a new world to explore, but the core of Warframe remains the same. The Sisters of Parvos update for Warframe brought some decent changes to certain weapons while adding some much-needed gameplay.
Warframe Is Still Active Despite A Decline Of Concurrent Players SInce 2020
As of September 2021, Warframe reached a peak of about 82,000 players. This was a decline from the almost 160,000 players over a year earlier. The surge in 2020 was amplified by the release of Warframe on the PlayStation 5 and Xbox Series S/X. Another surge of players came in July 2021 when TennoCon streamed online due to COVID-19 restrictions at the time.
Warframe Still Ranks Highly On Steam
Steam has an extensive list of free-to-play games and Warframe almost always ranks high in the shooter category. As of 2021, it’s only sitting in second place in the third-person shooter category behind Red Dead Redemption 2. With about 60k active players on Steam daily, it’s not hard to find other players to grind with. There are plenty of Warframe communities across different social media platforms, such as Discord or Twitter.
There’s No Shortage Of Things To Do In Warframe
It’s no secret that Warframe is a grindy game. Warframe’s reputation for being grindy hasn’t changed in 2021 and won’t change anytime soon. Some enjoy the grind of Warframe. Players looking for grindy longevity will be happy to know that even players with thousands of hours in Warframe still have content to do, even after playing daily.
The first quarter of 2021 alone released major content that Warframe desperately needed. Venus, Neptune, and Pluto were added to Warframe as well as a rebalancing of Railjack abilities.
Crossplay And A New Warframe
What’s possibly the most exciting aspect of Warframe in 2021 is the prospect of crossplay and cross-save. While there’s no release date for these features, Digital Extremes has confirmed they are in the works. This means Nintendo Switch players can finally lay in bed and play together with their PC friends. This also means that PC players can save their progress, then pick up the Nintendo Switch from anywhere else and continue their progress.
A new Warframe is also reportedly in development after a tease from Tennocon called the Caliban. The Caliban Warframe will be released during Warframe’s next content update later in December.
Warframe developers understand that they have a dedicated base of players. This makes Warframe still worth playing in 2021. While the game’s population fluctuates with each update, there will always be a healthy amount of players to keep Warframe going for years to come.
