A while back, I posted about The First Descendant and how, despite feeling clunky, and not really having satisfying gun play, it at least seemed to have the ability to satisfy more than Warframe. I may have been wrong about that. I may have sold Warframe a little short in being offered a new, shiny thing that lost its luster pretty damn quickly.

So, let's talk about the shooter-grinder that maybe started it all.

This story goes back all the way to 2014, around a year after Warframe had originally released. I was dating a locksmith at the time. Not very integral to the story, because her being a locksmith has nothing to do with Warframe ... It was just, you know, the biggest thing I remember about her (aside from, a year later, telling me she didn't think I was dating material). But, she was staying at my place, and I remember distinctly waking up in the morning to her, on my PC, playing this weird ... ninja space game. It had almost no features, no story, and really all you did was click a mission, then shoot things, and then pick up some loot. Wash, rinse, repeat.

There were no flying ship animations, no rotating solar maps, nothing.

I got into it for about a week or so before I realized I couldn't really take playing a game that was technically in open beta, or even alpha? I don't remember. So, I dropped it. I would revisit it again and again, shooting things, leveling up, and then losing motivation. Until suddenly, one day, the star map was moving, and you could see the ship you were on flying to those missions.

Amazing.

But I kept going in and out of it like tossing out pairs of socks. At least until around 2016 when an online friend convinced me to join her, because there was some ridiculous mission we had to do called "the Second Dream."

Let's just say, it blew me away. Finally. A character creator? And, a **story? **Albeit, you're some kind of Stranger Things-esque powerful teenager who pilots these metal space ninjas, but it was something. Evangelion, maybe.

I spent a week figuring out what all was new, ran around with my new human legs, found an open world thing on Earth ...

Yeah, I left the game again ... until 2018, and the Fortuna update. Needless to say, I was blown away, again. And, after getting frustrated that I couldn't just have the cool new guns and my own hoverboard in a reasonable amount of time ... I left.

This basically is the theme behind my relationship with Digital Extremes and Warframe. I'm the rubber-band player. Getting real excited about all the honestly really cool stuff, and revolutionary storytelling, and then having my motivation riddled with bullets and swords when faced with the prospect of having to spend time collecting things and grinding reputation.

The cycle begins again.

It's 2024, and I'm back in Warframe, enticed by some wild new expansion announcement that apparently takes you back to ... 1999??? HUH?

So, I'm swallowing the grind pill, and I'm doing it. Knocking every mission out, one by one, and I'm almost to the New War.

But, here are my feelings about Warframe, all these years later.

A space ninja MMO is freaking awesome. I have like, 20 different warframes, and some of them I've never even tried. I'm account level 8, almost 9, and I'm working on upgrading my own massive capital ship (called a Railjack). The story is gripping, wild, and probably some of the best writing I've ever seen in a game, and I cannot wait to get through to more recent content.

But, despite swallowing that pill, and despite working through toward what I want, that's the one problem that remains with Warframe. The game absolutely disrespects your time as a human being.

The Second War: Hey buddy, you need a Railjack and a Necramech before you can continue the story. Frikken' scrub.

Okay, so I have the Railjack, in which you use to engage in space combat that isn't all that much unlike combat in No Man's Sky. But ... the Necramech? Oh ... Oh, you gotta grind a bunch of materials on the dead moon Deimos before you can build it?

Queue the internal screaming. This is why I've left the game 40 times since 2014. I'm not a fan of grinding. I have a full-time job, I have extracurricular things I like to do with my time. Spending hours upon hours collecting materials, so I can build a mech, so I can engage in yet another form of combat, so I can continue the masterfully crafted storyline ... it seems to me like needless barriers to get to what you actually want.

The GAME.

But, sure, I mean, yeah. They need hooks to keep you playing, because if you blast through the storyline, and you don't have to do anything else, you lose your player base. I just wish grinding didn't feel like I suddenly had a second job. But ... I'M GONNA DO IT. I'm not quitting this time.

For real.

If you wanna help me out, my account name is CMDR_N0va.

My overall feelings on Warframe are that it's probably one of the best games ever made, that kind of annoys the absolute hell out of me ... at times.