The 5 biggest reveals from Warframe's TennoCon 2020

Warframe TennoCon 2020, Digital Extremes' annual livestream where it reveals all the biggest updates coming over the next year, is over. And even though the event was entirely virtual due to the coronavirus, it still packed some big announcements. The Heart of Deimos, a new open world expansion, was revealed alongside three new warframes coming throughout the year.

There's a lot of ground to cover, so here's a recap of all the biggest announcements with links to our coverage so you can find out more.

The Heart of Deimos launches on August 25 

Warframe's getting its third open world zone on August 25, called The Heart of Deimos. This expansion will include an entire new moon to explore, complete with several new missions and a new open world called Cambion Drift. Like Warframe's other open world zones, Cambion Drift will be home to a new series of quests where players try to save the titular Heart of Deimos from the Infested that have claimed almost all of Deimos. Players will also learn about the Entrati family that watches over the Heart and the Void—the mysterious dimension from which warframes draw their power.

For more on the Heart of Deimos, check out our breakdown of the expansion and its weird new features, like being able to feed unwanted warframes to a giant fleshmouth monster. 

Xaku, the next warframe, is also coming on August 25 

What makes Xaku special, however, is that they were designed largely by the community. Back in March, Digital Extremes tasked its community with creating its next warframe. First the community proposed themes that the warframe would be based on, then Digital Extremes hired fan artists to bring it to life, and finally the community suggested ideas for its abilities. It's pretty cool, and you can find out more about Xaku's creation in our full interview. 

Three new warframes are coming in 2020 

Aside from Xaku, Digital Extremes also revealed two other warframes that will be arriving later this year. The first is The Alchemist, a mad-scientist warrior, and then Wraithe, a terrifying monster that looks like something out of Neon Genesis Evangelion. While we don't know what their abilities will be yet, you can check out their artwork here. 

The new-player experience is getting overhauled with Heart of Deimos too 

Last year Digital Extremes showcased a new cinematic intro for Warframe directed by Dan Trachtenberg, who you might recognize from 10 Cloverfield Lane. That cinematic is being paired with an entirely new intro that does a better job of representing where Warframe is today as opposed to when the intro was first made years ago.

Details are scarce, but it looks like the tutorial levels have been overhauled significantly. The overall structure will be the same, but Digital Extremes hinted that the starting weapons might be changed.

Hydroid is getting a badass Prime variant 

Warframe's roster of Prime warframes is getting bigger with the much-rumored Hydroid Prime coming on August 25—and anyone who watched TennoLive (the main event of TennoCon) with their Twitch account linked to their Warframe account is getting it for free. For the uninitiated, Prime warframes are simply more powerful versions of their standard variants that also come with a much cooler outfit. Primes take a lot of work to get or can be bought using Platinum, Warframe's premium currency. 

Steven Messner

With over 7 years of experience with in-depth feature reporting, Steven's mission is to chronicle the fascinating ways that games intersect our lives. Whether it's colossal in-game wars in an MMO, or long-haul truckers who turn to games to protect them from the loneliness of the open road, Steven tries to unearth PC gaming's greatest untold stories. His love of PC gaming started extremely early. Without money to spend, he spent an entire day watching the progress bar on a 25mb download of the Heroes of Might and Magic 2 demo that he then played for at least a hundred hours. It was a good demo.

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