Soulframe Opens Its Preludes Alpha To Everyone This Week

In their latest Devstream, the Digital Extremes team showcased what's next for the Soulframe project, including an open alpha, mounts, and more.

After almost three years of an invite-only alpha called Preludes, Soulframe is taking a big step this week, opening its doors to every player on November 6. Available for Windows PC, the second free-to-play baby by the Digital Extremes team follows in the footsteps of its Warframe sister by offering everything for free, with the exception of some cosmetic items.

While the Open Preludes Alpha will continue to be on its Windows launcher, the team has shared that the game will eventually arrive on Steam and later on consoles. Warframe is currently available on every platform, including mobile, so it is easy to believe that Soulframe will release on more systems in the future.

"Soulframe has been a community-driven game from day one, shaped by the tight-knit group of players that joined us for Preludes, and now, we're ready to grow that community even further," said Geoff Crookes, Creative Director. "It feels a little scary to finally open the gates like this, but the introduction of mounts and world progression systems we revealed today is the right time so we can gather essential feedback on these features and everything we've worked on so far. The more players we have right now, the more helpful it is for our team to inform the direction Soulframe takes. Thank you to everyone who has helped get us this far."

Over the course of the playtest, the Soulframe team has made many additions from its initial stages, adding more quests, which the team refers to as fables, new locations, and side activities such as fishing, crafting, liberating animals, and more. However, a highly requested feature is making its way with the November 6 "Verse of the Veilands" update: Mounts.

Unlike Warframe, which offers mainly a linear mission-based design, Soulframe takes an open-world route. Players can also train a wolf pup as a companion, which will now transform into a mount to traverse that open world. Details on the Verse of the Veilands update include:

• After completing The Tormented Stag Fable, trek across Alca’s overworld and witness the latest corruption of the invading Ode forces in a new environmental world progression system, Veilands.
• After completing a wolf pup’s training and purifying two Veilands regions, mix ingredients to brew a Bairnday Biscuit and feed it to the furry friend so it may grow into a fully fledged Omen Wolf mount. Look forward to future updates as this feature continues to develop.
• Take the trapping power of invading forces and use it against them with a new character, Pact, Ode Shrike, and wield deployable spike traps, enemy-lifting balloon darts, damage-linking bola chains, and an evasive throwing bomb.
• Settle into the season with the return of Bita’s Eve. Seek out peculiar patches of Wintersquash and the new headless horserider Veltruska mini-boss to earn limited-time rewards and a special fish, Sunken Terror.

What makes Soulframe so enticing to play in an Alpha state is that Digital Extremes has promised that the game will not receive any progression wipes. Some things will change; that’s for sure. But the team has been quick to compensate for any big changes. So, you can play without worrying about a wipe on new versions or the full release of the game. To join the Soulframe adventure and give any support to the game's development with its Founder pack, you can find more here.