Image: Digital Extremes

Warframe has come a very long way since Digital Extremes launched it as a small co-op arena shooter - a desperate Hail Mary attempt to keep the lights on at the struggling studio. It has since grown into a colossal space opera mega-hit, and is now gearing up for a whole new story arc, taking players out of the Origin system (a far-future version of our own home space-turf) and off to the Tau system. While the full Tau expansion isn't due to launch until later this year, today is when the quest begins to prepare for the trip.

The Epoch Operation: Taubound update, out today, encompasses three chunks of new content. A story quest where the player will befriend a kaiju-sized friend (which looks extremely cool), and a month-long event sending players off to harvest 'moonflesh' to provide fuel for the coming expedition, paying out some exclusive cosmetic goodies for the most dedicated of lunatic moon-harvesters. There's also a new type of experimental 6-player game mode called The Icebind, which, if successful, might become the template for more content to come. More details on that here.

All of this is in service of getting us to the Tau system, which looks to be the most interesting place yet seen in the Warframe universe. Tau is a solar system colonized by rogue terraforming drones that have formed their own civilization. It's all a bit Cybertron now, and our first experience of it is going to be through the eyes of Brysko, an android detective who lacks a mouth, so fills his head with moody noir monologuing. There's a whole half hour of that to check out in the gameplay video below.

But if you're not an active player already, that's a LONG way in your future. Warframe is a mostly linear story, and catching up with the story will take a matter of weeks, possibly months of active play if you start now. The good news is that the game is free-to-play and quite generous, so you'll be sacrificing time more than money on the endeavor. For what it's worth, I reckon it's worth it - Warframe is a great, twitchy shooter with some impressive storytelling, and (not to spoil too much) one of the best late-game twists in video games.

Warframe is free-to-play, and available on Steam and just about every other platform worth speaking of. You'll need to be quite deep into the main story (having completed both The Old Peace and The Hex quests) to dive into the new story content, but anyone who has completed the Vor's Prize tutorial quest can take part in the time-limited event (running until November 17th), although much of the context is likely to be lost on you at that point.