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The space ninja adventure known as Warframe, a title where you can feed yourself to a giant mouth and drive a motorcycle in the year 1999, has launched a major update. The Vallis Undermind exemplifies the unique whimsy that has come to define Warframe in the past few seasons.

This expansion, made available this week, introduces a fungus-inspired character that performs a unique animation, along with a brand-new biome to discover. But it’s also going back to basics, with another quest designed to making sure this complex, vast long-running online game makes sense to new players.

Introducing "The Teacher"

Named “The Teacher,” this is the highly anticipated mission that instructs Warframe players on how to use one of the game's fundamental yet complex systems: modding.

In Warframe, mods are augments that can be equipped on your warframe or arsenal to improve their stats. They range from the straightforward (boosting power or shortening reload times) to the incredibly intricate. Dedicated players often produce extensive guides about idealized builds that use powerful mods in combination to create devastating effects.

“Many players likely started their journey, seeing mods, not really understanding it,” noted a lead narrative designer. “We believed it was crucial, at the end of the quest, for players to think, ‘Wow, modding is interesting. I'd like to experiment further.’”

A Collaborative Effort

“The Teacher” was developed in a collaboration between the core team, who handled the story elements, and an external team, who crafted the gameplay, 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 interrupted by a menacing, powerful warrior called Teshin, who removes the player's powers and close-combat arms, and compels them to use the mod system to effectively show its potential.

Several developers were longtime players, 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 document extensively on everywhere they fell out,” the designer said. Introductory tutorials introduced players to modding. But the team noted that they didn’t work on everyone.

“Certain players missed fundamental guidance where the game highlights it saying put the mod in the slot,” he said.

Closing an Important Loop

Warframe’s mods allow players to create stupidly powerful synergies that fill the display with damage values. But "The Teacher" isn’t really about that. Veteran users who desire more advanced content, like creating powerful and specific builds. But it became clear that the mission addresses a genuine oversight for newcomers — 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.

“Adjustments to the armament to be a burst-fire weapon, because it shows off the proc rate more,” the designer said. “But you don’t want to say to people, 'with a basic modification, you only got a low probability to proc an elemental effect.' So how do you tutorialize that without changing it?”

Experienced players will instinctively look for that kind of weapon effect and understand how it works, 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 story developer. “But part of it not being our focus that players weren't properly taught the modding system.”

A Labor of Love

“There’s so much that goes into just making a seemingly straightforward quest that — honestly — you can complete quickly,” said the designer. “But it's months and months of work 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 consistent battle 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 much later. And others, like modding, that scale in complexity depending on how much time you want to invest. A previous patch 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 doubling down on a commitment to make sure Warframe’s early game experience evolves beyond its origins. New players can get their foot in the door — even if they miss the menu prompts.