Threads
- Soulframe’s development is progressing well, with player feedback from Pre-Alpha “Preludes” significantly influencing its direction.
- Digital Extremes isn’t aiming for Soulframe to replicate Warframe’s success but hopes it will resonate with its own unique player base.
- Drawing from Warframe’s model, Soulframe intends to be free-to-play, with all core gameplay accessible without payment.
We recently got the chance to speak with Sarah Asselin, Senior Community Manager at Digital Extremes, about the current state of Soulframe—the studio’s ambitious new fantasy RPG. In this interview, Sarah shared insight into how development is progressing, how player feedback shapes the game through ongoing Pre-Alpha “Preludes,” and what kind of long-term vision the team has for Soulframe.
She also talked about what sets Soulframe apart in a crowded genre and how the team is working to balance accessibility with depth.
We also touched on some lighter moments, like the fan-favorite “bonk” sound from throwing weapons and how a developer’s dog helped bring the game’s wolf pups to life. From art direction and potion crafting to how Digital Extremes handles the balance between Soulframe and Warframe, Sarah’s answers gave a clear look at the studio’s community-driven approach and focus on building a fresh, fair, and player-first game.
Sarah Asselin: Development on Soulframe is going smoothly! Our community of players in our closed Pre-Alpha playtests, which we call Preludes, has been essential to the development process. Their feedback is shaping the game up for the better. We just debuted some new features coming to the game for those testers in our 9th Preludes build, which is expanding out the world map, adding two new factions and social hubs, along with a new Caster weapon type.
These Preludes updates are the best kind of milestones since we get immediate feedback in a Pre-Alpha state from players saying, “Oh yeah, more of this stuff please” or “I think you missed the mark on this feature.” It all makes Soulframe a better game in the long run before we “officially launch.”
Sarah Asselin: We have hopes and dreams, as any developer does for any game they create, but we aren’t trying to make Warframe again. We believe Soulframe will find its own audience, but there is never a way to predict a game’s lifespan either. Our main focus right now is looking at the present and what’s in front of us, which is making a game that welcomes players looking for an experience they haven’t found before and satisfying their current desires from a co-op fantasy action RPG experience. What comes after that can only be dictated by our players.
Sarah Asselin: We have a development structure that we think works, and that’s building out a game alongside the community that forms around it. People joked in the past about Warframe being in “Beta” for years and years, but that was just the team listening intently to our players and trying things that did and didn’t work, adding and removing ideas. It’s a scary and vulnerable approach to making a game that just happens to work really well for Digital Extremes. So Soulframe is taking that same approach. Our Pre-Alpha closed tests will eventually open to the public, and then as we keep building out the game, it will slowly enter the “Alpha” and eventually “Beta” builds as we try more things and get more feedback from that ever-growing pool of players. Please come join us and give your thoughts!
Sarah Asselin: We aren’t looking to stand out to a wide audience. We are focused on making something that people have been looking to play. We trust our players and believe that building this game alongside them creates a bond that is hard to find in live service games. Making players happy and surprising them is more interesting to us than beating the competition.
Sarah Asselin: Warframe is sort of a model you can look towards when it comes to our methodology around free-to-play. Digital Extremes believes that all of the “fun” should always be accessible with no paywalls. Practically all content in Warframe can be obtained through gameplay for free. We want the same for Soulframe but haven’t made it that far in development yet. The team is still so focused on making a good game first and foremost. When we’re ready to share more on its free-to-play model, we will, but that player-first mindset is very important to us, and Warframe is a testament to that.
Sarah Asselin: We do have dedicated development teams for Warframe and Soulframe and a few specialist members that cross over between projects. Doing things in an untraditional way is just the Digital Extremes way sometimes!
Sarah Asselin: I am consistently blown away by our sound team! In Preludes 8, with the Shewolf Snared Fable (Orengall’s quest), one of the members of our sound team used their very talented voice actor, their dog Misha, to help record the wolf pups’ howls.
Sarah Asselin: The team has been inspired by a wide variety of high fantasy works, some of which we’ve mentioned on past Devstreams, like Team ICO’s games or Studio Ghibli films like Princess Mononoke and Nausicaä of the Valley of the Wind. You can see some of those things plainly on the surface, like the giant wolf mount, Orengall, but some of them are hidden deeper in narrative dialogue and environmental design that we can’t wait for people to see for themselves.
Sarah Asselin: Verminia, our Ancestor tied to Elixirs, will be key to this! There’s much more to come with her in mind, so stay tuned.
Sarah Asselin: We strongly feel that Soulframe should be a very accessible experience for new players, both for the game and the multiple genres we are playing around in. That being said, the team also doesn’t want to entirely hold the player’s hand either by telling them everything to do at every step. Warframe is a game where you can find your own fun in many different ways, and we want Soulframe to be similar in that regard. There is just a balance to be found, and the team is finding that alongside our Preludes players right now.
Talking to Sarah Asselin gave us a clear view of how Soulframe is shaping up—not just as a game but as a project built with the community at its core. It’s not trying to copy Warframe or chase trends. Instead, the team is focused on creating something new and meaningful, with systems and ideas that evolve through real player feedback. That’s a bold move in today’s gaming space, but one that fits Digital Extremes’ style.
There’s still a long way to go, but seeing how much care is being put into every part of the game, from sound design to gameplay balance, is exciting. Soulframe is shaped by people who care about games and the players who love them. Thanks again to Sarah Asselin for taking the time to share these insights.
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