Warframe: 1999 Demo Impressions

Last week, Digital Extremes did a first for their marque title, Warframe. That is launching a demo for their upcoming big expansion this year, Warframe: 1999. Going hand in hand with the stunning trailer to show off more of the cinematic moments from the expansions showing at TennoCon 2024. This demo is short, concise and lets the player get a feel for the setting, drive around on the Atomicycle, and demo a new pistol along the way. Here is a short breakdown of that experience!

Classic, Dark Warframe

The demo for Warframe: 1999 is a simple Extermination mission, where you simply run around and kill things before leaving. But loading into the mission was honestly very cool. They give you the Atomicycle, or in universe Motorcycle, off the bat, allowing you to zip down the streets of Hollvania and tells you how to jump off it to have it crash into anything in front of it. This causes a pretty sizable fiery explosion that not only lights enemies on fire, but that ignition deals a lot of damage. The dismantle looks cool, and there is a very satisfying payoff I just could not resist doing.

You play as Arthur, the Exalibur Proto frame, fighting against the Scaldra, a new enemy faction. There is a good amount of variety with the enemies, tanky foes that shoot projectiles, quick ninja-like enemies with dual swords, and even an aerial turret give a good mix to mow down. The new Vesper-77 sidearm packed quite the punch with the AX-52 providing a nice spray and pray approach. But the streets of Hollvania were the real stars of the show.

From high rooftops that can offer a nice advantage to sneak up and shoot enemies from a distance. To walking along ziplines to give more maneuverability around the map. It feels like classic Warframe in a way. A lot of recent areas never took advantage of these fundamentals, and I am very happy they are used in Warframe: 1999. Hollvania also feels like an abandoned city under siege, cars with unique interiors, dead streetlights, and even reruns of the music for On-lyne, create a unique and dark ambience. One that I am very eager to dive back into, especially for the back and forths between Arthur and the Scaldra leader, Rusalka.

Closing Remarks on the Warframe: 1999 Demo

Overall, I really enjoyed this small taste of what’s to come this winter with Warframe: 1999. I think the only problems I had was visibility for the aerial turrets in one of my playthroughs. It was hiding behind a bunch of ziplines, and I could not see it very well. There are no technical issues I noticed, but controlling the Atomicycle takes some practice. As it took me until a recent replay of the demo to drift around the zone.

The Warframe: 1999 demo is available for free in the game after you complete the tutorial quests. Which is a win-win for Digital Extremes, as you get to have fun testing out an upcoming expansion, and you even get a free sword skin as a reward.

Below we have prepared a playthrough of the demo from the PlayStation 5, if you would like to see what you’re missing!