Warframe 1999 is a boyband-infused X-Men alike with a somersaulting motorbike

What do you do when you've done pretty much everything to expand on your successful free-to-play action RPG? That's the conundrum facing Digital Extremes and Warframe.

Whispers in the Walls from 2023 was a sort of sidestep into a little cosmic horror, while the game has added entire open-world regions, ship-to-ship combat, and even fishing in the years since it debuted. The solution, through some good-old timeline-bending narrative seeds sown last year, is to go back to 1999.

Back to where it began

While Digital Extremes says you'll need to be up to date on Warframe's campaign to be able to jump into Warframe 1999, the team was coy on the potential to make it easier to get to grips with.

And that's a good thing - I'm a lapsed Warfare player, and I'm absolutely desperate to play 1999. This dark, grungy, Y2K adventure feels like Warframe through the lens of early superhero movies, starring a team of Tenno progenitors led by Arthur, played by Ben Starr of Final Fantasy 16.

His gravelly tone feels perfect for this world and plays off nicely with each of his superpowered companions. They bicker, fight, and occasionally show true contempt for one another, and when paired with the skintight clothing, I couldn't get the X-Men analogy out of my head.

Adding to that is a new social system via a classic instant messenger system, too, and the voice cast (as previously revealed) includes alumni from Baldur's Gate 3, Super Mario Bros. Wonder, and Cyberpunk 2077.

1999 will feature plenty of era-appropriate elements, too: Infomercials for movie rental services, subtle hints at gaming's past (including a surprise appearance from Gordon Freeman, albeit as a cardboard cutout) and, perhaps best of all, an in-game boyband with original music. On-Lyne's first single hits streaming services tomorrow (July 20), and it's a true earworm.

Speaking of music, the soundtrack goes hard in what we were shown ahead of TennoCon. The Digital Extremes team confirmed that original music had been written for the expansion, and it runs the gamut from saccharine boyband pop to dirty, chuggy post-hardcore and grunge.

Slicin' and bikin'

Aside from the audio and visual shift, players will get to use Arthur in gameplay. He looks a lot like classic 'frame Excalibur (who'd have thunk, given the name?) and controls as you'd expect a Warframe character to do, with slow-motion diving and the classic 'bullet jump'.

In our demo, we see him and his cohorts tackle a huge tank-like behemoth, which is certainly one of the larger bosses I've seen in Warframe, chipping away at vents to take it down.

Outside of combat, 1999 offers an open-world area, too, with a new Atomicycle vehicle to boot. Not only is this slick ride impressively agile and able to be used as an explosive, even sporting a somersault option, but it's able to be taken from the 1999 areas and into other explorable regions like the Plains of Eidolon. In fact, the same applies to weapons, too.

A new Warframe is coming, and CYTE-09 is a new sniper character class, and he's available with a new Gemini skin, too. Gemini skins will also let players switch to 1999 versions of their Warframe collection in some instances, too, letting you dress Excalibur as Arthur, for example.

Final Thoughts

Warframe 1999's stunning Tennocon showing has me wondering just how much there will be here for players and how long it'll last because it feels like a hugely ambitious revamp of Warframe's entire aesthetic.

Last year's update had me tempted to return to Warframe, but 1999 has me playing it regularly again already. The potent mix of grungy vibes and its cast of characters has me ready to travel back in time.

Warframe 1999 launches later this year, but you'll be able to jump into a new prologue quest next month called The Lotus Eaters.