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Ahead of TennoCon 2024, I had a chance to sit down with Soulframe's Community Manager, Sarah Asselin. Digital Extremes is trying something new with their medieval fantasy title that is still very much in development, but we’re quite excited to get hands-on with it and learn more. While discussing this upcoming MMO-lite, we talked about how the feelings and emotions around the game are more hopeful and bright compared to Warframe, as well as the potential for things like a stamina management system.
Fans will no doubt learn more about the upcoming free-to-play MMO, Soulframe, from Sarah Asselin herself during TennoCon 2024. In addition to talking about the aesthetic and story, we also talked about the challenges of building both games simultaneously, fashion, and so much more. I am still very new to Soulframe, but I’m very excited for its future.
Sarah Asselin on the development and future of Soulframe
Q. Correct me if I’m wrong, but Warframe’s original pitch was probably something like ‘agent sneaks into an enemy ship to steal data and sabotage its engine.’ What about Soulframe, what would you say was the boardroom pitch for that?
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Sarah Asselin: Yeah, it's funny hearing that, because Warframe has come a long way since those days, and become something so much more wacky and weird than that. But yeah, in my boardroom, I will give you my pitch.
So, I think Soulframe is slower-paced than our sister (Warframe)... but we've been calling it Warframe in a lot of ways. It's a fantasy, but not a grim fantasy. A 'hopeful fantasy' is what we're trying to go for.
And it has a lot of themes of redemption, and turning to nature. I don't know if you've had a chance to play yet, but a lot of people have said as soon as they wake up, they feel that. So that's what we're going for, and turning to nature to heal, not only ourselves, but the world around us.
And Steve (CEO of Digital Extremes) has said this a lot of times, it's a response to sort of an anxious culture and cynicism that is maybe seen in the world today. But we're hoping this has a more hopeful tone, and... I'm just going to keep going for this. I've been practicing this one, so I know.
In Soulframe, we are Envoys, and the Ode — which we have called the Gods from the Sky — are the enemies that you see very quickly in the game. They've cast a Spell-song on the people of Alca, and that has taken away a lot of their culture, history, and memories.
So we must seek to remind them of that with help from our ancestors. One of which, a new one, you will see at TennoCon. Yes, that's my pitch.
Q. I have to say, Soulframe has some stuff that’s not quite like anything I’ve ever seen. Specifically the poetry in narration. From early promos, I thought, ‘now that’s a sophisticated way to present the world.’ Then in the character creation, I see it’s a diegetic part of the world. How did you come to such an idea?
Sarah Asselin: Yeah, so a lot of the early concepts that Keith Thompson, who will also be at TennoCon, came up with had so much poetic lore-based aspects just sort of infused in these concept designs. So, from the get-go, when the creative minds came up with 'Okay, this is what the Ode enemies will look like, this is what the Ancestors will look like' ...that was all such a part of the initial foundational ideas.
Some of that we've taken and ran with. Some of that we've kind of changed as we went on. But it's always been super important that the poetic aspect is part of the world building. And we have a narrative designer who's been working on these early scripts in Sydney Hills. And I think she's just a genius with her words. And she's very hardcore into the lore-building right now, creating those foundations, taking stuff from Keith's initial ideas. But having that touch, like every part of what we do, like the enemies, the Pacts that we use, like everything is connecting.
And I think it's just been such an immersive part of the entire experience from concept to developing to design. That's why it feels that way, because it's always been on our mind to keep that true. And it's been really cool seeing the people who have started to play it connect all the dots, even without having to tell them. I saw someone post a timeline of the lore so far, and it was pretty accurate to what we have on our side of things. And so it's really cool seeing it come to life slowly.
Q. Let's talk about the setting. I know the team went to Kains Woods to get foley and probably also a visual inspiration for the art direction. It’s a bit of Middle-English pastoral mixed with some high-fantasy stuff, and then the corruption. Very Elden Ring, in a sense - only less depressing. What were your inspirations for world design?
Sarah Asselin: There were a bunch, and I'm not going to speak on it because it's such a Geoff question that he answered. (Note: Geoff Crookes is the Creative Director of Soulframe).
Like, you can see it in our world, there's touches of Ghibli and such. I do think that it's not something we have tried to create to compare to some of these really exceptional high-fantasy games that we've seen before.
And when you say a more hopeful kind of game, I think it is in that direction. Even just running around in the parts that aren't even highly developed yet, you can feel it's a hopeful fantasy.
I will be interested to see how, as we work on the corruption of Glades, that connects to the hopeful aspect and what will come of that. As we spoke, Warframe is so different from its initial ideas. And it is just so wacky and funny how there's been so many different things that have been added over time to Warframe that we never... I mean, I wasn't here at the start of Warframe, but they never would have imagined that.
And it just makes so much sense now. So I imagine it has room to grow in terms of the world and the direction, but I think it will feel like its own unique space. And it does to me already, as someone that has played a lot of those games. And I just like to run around in it. I've heard a lot of people say the same thing: “I don't know what's going on yet. I can see you're working on a lot of stuff, but it's fun to run around in. The environment is beautiful.”
Q. Lets talk a bit about combat. One of the development vlogs calls it ‘animation-driven’ (Citation: Soulframe Journal 3). Can you elaborate a bit on that?
Sarah Asselin: Yeah, I mean, I definitely think there is a lot of animation-driven aspects to the game. And we have a great animation team that puts it all together. Geoff could speak on it more, but I feel it when I play. And I see what goes into it.
And I see as they get the mocap and they put it together and they try new animations and try it again to make it feel more original and fun. It adds so much to the gameplay design. But yeah, I definitely would say very animation-driven. It's a Slack Channel that is very active all day. So there's always lots going into that.
Jason Parker: On that note, will there be stamina management?
Sarah Asselin: There's definitely lots of talks about that. I don't think a firm decision has been made, but it's on our mind for sure.
Q. In Warframe, a major appeal is looking cool while you’re on the job. The Envoy has the cool sword-hurling move. Tell us a bit more about some other *cool* stuff we’ll get to do in Soulframe - or wear, in the way of Medieval High Fashion? Unless that’s not the kind of game it is?
Sarah Asselin: Potentially, like 100% fashion is going to be a big part of everything with Soulframe. And I think something that's cool, the designs are in the works for this sort of stuff. But something that we are going to see at TennoCon is Verminia. And she is going to be our Rat Witch Fashionista. So she is going to be where you start to customize all of your looks with colors, and eventually textures and materials and all of that.
And she's going to determine if we look good or not and stuff like that. So it's 100% going to be a big thing, I think, if I have anything to say about it for Soulframe. We all love Fashionframe and it's close to many of our players' hearts. So I definitely think it will be massive.
We have so much room to grow there and play around with all of the different - I suppose we could say - factions of characters, and different enemy types, and the history of the different ancestors. That's only going to grow and it's going to be so cool to see where the fashion aspect plays in.
Q. I’ve seen so far that instead of ‘conquering’ bosses, you remove the corruption and add them to your roster. These will unlock alternate types of Pacts as far as I know. Are there also bosses that you don’t befriend?
Sarah Asselin: Like I said, I think redemption and the ability to restore the good nature of the characters we meet is so central to these design dreams right now. So I will say: never say never.
Again, we don't know what will happen, but I do think... I'm glad you picked up on that. That's a concept that we're hoping to continue with the ability to redeem. There's no strict bad guys necessarily that you go and demolish at this point.
Q. I really like how the Pacts are essentially character classes/archetypes. However, Warframe has “Primes,” which often deviate from the original design. Will there be Primed Pacts, so to speak?
Sarah Asselin: I don't think we really have much to share yet. Right now, we're so focused on making sure the core functions of these things are good to go and the core base of each Pact and getting new Pacts in. So that's probably our focus right now. We're still at that stage where functionally everything has to be good on its own. We're not at the Prime Stage, you could say.
Q. In light of recent revelations (Warframe 1999’s announcements), will there be romance in Soulframe?
Sarah Asselin: I hope so. And I mean, he's maybe going to get mad at me, but Geoff Crookes has said “absolutely” in the past publicly. So if Geoff is paying attention, that is my dream and wish. And I hope so. I hope we get some of that. I think it would be so fun with the more role-playing aspect, of course.
Q. From what I know, Cam Rogers is officially associated with the writing team on Warframe - though I don’t know to what extent. Is there also a lead writer for Soulframe, or is the writing side of development a team effort too?
Sarah Asselin: There's definitely a group effort. Sidney is our Narrative Designer right now. I know Steve is, of course, a part of the writing aspect. He is also a writer, as well as all his other roles.
But yeah, so it will be a growing team, I imagine. We're still a very small team on Soulframe, especially compared to Warframe. I feel sort of like we're a mini little bubble within this really big bubble. So yeah, there's Sidney, Steve. We all kind of play around.
We have channels where we talk about everything and how that connects to the design and Rosa, who's our Art Director, how it reflects some of their concepts, some of Keith's original concepts. So I'd say a group effort, Sidney, Steve, and room to grow, perhaps, in the future.
Q. Will the game come to consoles on release?
Sarah Asselin: Yeah, so like we were talking about yesterday, we're hoping to get this Preludes test version of our game in a place where people can play it publicly soon. And right now, that is PC only. But when we have the actual... Well, I don't even think you can ever say Warframe is a full game as it continues to grow so much.
But when we have it more in a place where it's not Soulframe Preludes, it's Soulframe, the obvious aspiration is that it's for console players. That would definitely be our goal and hope. But right now, PC only.
Q. Splitting the development team was quite the unexpected move back when Steve said he was leaving Warframe. You’re pulling it off so far from what we can see. But what do you think about Warframe players migrating to Soulframe? How do you approach growing both games parallelly?
Sarah Asselin: Yeah, we talked about this in some stuff yesterday, so I feel pretty confident answering it. We have said it's like a Venn Diagram in our minds of people that are hardcore Warframe, people that maybe would really hardcore be in the Soulframe genre. And of course, the people in between that just love Digital Extremes and the maybe story building of what we do and that kind of aspect of stuff.
But our hope is there will be a large variety of people that love to play both games, some people that just love Soulframe for what it is, and some people that, of course, are more into the fast-paced science, sci-fi, everything that Warframe is. And yeah, I think there will be room for all groups.
Q. How will Clans work in Soulframe? Will there be group-focused content, and then festivities afterwards?
Sarah Asselin: It’s too early to say, unfortunately. We have dreams and goals, of course, for everything. And there's aspects of Warframe that we know our community loves. And so, of course, we're always thinking about that and if it makes sense for Soulframe. But in these early days, we're still at — like I said earlier — that foundational aspect, and then we'll keep adding to it.
Q. How’s the crafting-gathering system here? I know there’s Elixirs, so is there a comprehensive Alchemy system?
Sarah Asselin: Yeah, there's actually a crafting blacksmith in the game right now, which is funnily not that obvious to players at first. It's Tufailkane. She is this really cool blacksmith with an imposter-syndrome complex based on her lore that you learn a little bit about in the game.
And like all of the Ancestors, she is someone that you discover. And she actually is in a spot in the first quest we have right now that if you're listening really carefully, you can hear her hammer. But you'd be surprised how many players just miss it, and they're like, “is there crafting in this game? How do I build more weapons?”
So it's just funny because these are such... The beginning of what you saw yesterday, that Warsongs Prologue clip, that's going to be the opening of the game. So the entire opening is something that is still in the works. And that will have a bit more of like tutorialization and things as you play through that. And when that comes out, these things might make a bit more sense.
But yeah, crafting with her is definitely going to be a big thing. We have Fenn Jotar, the fire sword guy from last time I saw, who has Motes, which are weapon upgrades. And it's really from all these Ancestors that you're going to have a lot of that stuff. And hopefully the Night Fold eventually grows with them and feels like this cool little village. I love it. Like I love going in there. I think it's so cool.
Q. You said you’re doing more of a role-playing game this time, and there’s ‘Arcanic’ Souls. Can you be a pure mage/caster class?
Sarah Asselin: Maybe. We are actually working right now on thinking about design more so in a multiplayer sense, and being able to build things that make sense together. So hopefully there will be Pacts that are focused on support and Pacts that are focused on... You see that a bit with the Virtue system, which... I don't know. We didn't talk about it too much yesterday.
I can't really remember what we said, but the virtues of courage, spirit, and grace are kind of how you can start feeling more of that role playing, like putting the bonds into those aspects is going to kind of build your character.
TennoCon 2024 took place on July 19 and 20. At the event, there were announcements regarding both Warframe and Soulframe, alongside panels, a cosplay contest, and much more.
