Warframe's next big update, Whispers In The Walls, will debut in December, and aside from a fresh cinematic quest, new enemy faction, fresh weapon type, the game's 55th Warframe and the long-awaited arrival of cross-save (deep breath), it'll also shake up the existing game's progression in a big way.

Revealed as part of the game's latest dev stream 175, Community Director Megan Everett and Creative Director Rebecca Ford explained that the team has decoupled the Mastery Rank system from its Cinematic Quests, the latest of which is the titular Whispers In The Walls questline.

It's now easier to catch up with Warframe

For the new story content, players will need to have completed both The New War and Heart of Deimos quests.

As part of dev stream 174 in late October, the team had discussed a "story skip" mechanic that would get players into the new content more quickly, but as of dev stream 175, the idea has been reworked.

Players would previously need to wait 24 real-world hours after earning each Mastery Rank, meaning The War Within quest from 2016, which had a Mastery requirement of five, would require players to wait five days before being able to play it.

With the uncoupling of Mastery Rank from the game's cinematic quests, new or returning players can, in theory, work their way through to Whispers In The Wall without needing to take the time to wait.

After ten years, Warframe can feel daunting, but Digital Extremes is also rolling out a fresh option to purchase a sort of power pack that includes some Warframes, weapons, and mods to help get started. In doing so, players can get to grips with the game much more quickly.

I played a fair amount of Warframe all the way back in 2013, and have dabbled since, but with its story quests often feeling just over the next horizon, I'm excited to find time to dig through its mainline quests and learn more about its various characters and factions.

Will you be jumping into Warframe for the first time, or returning again? And will you be picking up the new bundle?