Warframe's annual Tennocon conference was this weekend, and despite being about only one game it still somehow managed to pack in enough announcements and reveals to rival an E3 press conference. Not only are there new quests, warframes, and open world zones to frolic around in, but Warframe is also getting an entirely revamped new player experience as well as ship-to-ship combat that looks extremely fun.

The Tennolive mainstage presentation is worth watching (it's embedded above), but if you can't spare the time here's a quick rundown of all the major updates that are coming to Warframe over the next year.

Warframe's ship-to-ship combat looks incredible

Who could've imagined that spaceship combat would be the next frontier for Warframe? When it was first revealed last year, the Empyrean update surprised everyone but didn't offer much in the way of concrete information. During Tennocon 2019, Digital Extremes played Empyrean live on stage for 30 minutes—giving an intimate look at just how this update is going to work and fit into Warframe's already complex ecosystem of looting and shooting.

If there's one thing you should watch from Tennocon, it's this demo. There were so many cool details packed into it. Using your clan dojo (think guild housing), you can build spaceships known as Railjacks that are, like everything in Warframe, modular and customizable. Using the Railjack, you can explore regions of space around the solar system and harvest materials that will, in turn, power up the Railjack's various abilities.

The Railjack can house up to four players and a handful of recruitable NPCs who must man various battlestations to pilot and defend it from enemy threats in space. Players can also exit the Railjack to explore nearby ruins or invade enemy ships to sabotage them from the inside or even steal them. During Railjack missions, special 'SquadLink' objectives let you call on your friends who might be somewhere else in the solar system to complete secondary objectives which will, in turn, affect your mission.

Oh, and there's also a Shadow of Mordor-like Nemesis system where players are hunted by a Kuva Lich that grows stronger and mutates each time you kill it. It's a lot to take in, so read my preview to get more information.

Warframe's tutorial is getting revamped with a new prologue video

One cool surprise out of Tennocon is that it's getting a revamped tutorial that better reflects how dramatically Warframe has changed since it launched six years ago. The director of 10 Cloverfield Lane (and the upcoming Uncharted movie), Dan Trachtenberg, joined forces with Digital Extremes to make a badass new intro video. The special effects are gorgeous, but the video also serves to introduce players to the three starting warframes so they can better decide which one suits their playstyle.

As for the reworked tutorial itself, we don't know much other than it is likely coming at the end of the year. Digital Extremes implied a new series of quests will help guide players through Warframe's complex web of shooting, crafting, and modding—but even veterans will be able to go back and check them out too.

The Duviri Paradox is a surreal open world zone with horses

Warframe now has two open world zones that are both a lot of fun, but its upcoming third zone looks completely different than anything in the game so far. Details are scarce at the moment, but the trailer (embedded above) holds tons of clues—all of which imply that The Duviri Paradox is going to be one weird-ass place to visit.

For one, it looks as if The Duviri Paradox won't allow you to use your warframes and will instead force you to play as your operator but all grown up and without their special powers. The new zone will also have a new faction for players to fight (or befriend?) and implies that, despite lacking your powerful warframes or operator abilities, you'll be able to tame a weird robot-horse and ride it around. All of this is just guesswork, though. Hopefully Digital Extremes shows more soon.

The New War is coming this Christmas

One of my favorite parts about Warframe is its "cinematic quests" that feature long cutscenes, fun boss fights, and hard-won insights into Warframe's esoteric lore and backstory. And The New War quest promises to be its most climactic chapter yet.

I won't go into details at the risk of spoiling some of Warframe's coolest plot twists, but The New War, together with Empyrean, feels like a critical turning point. A mass invasion by the ancient Sentient robot race tied with the ability to finally explore space in the Railjack has tantalizing implications for the future of Warframe. It's also expected that The New War will bring to a close one of Warframe's best and most-intimate character arcs—but we're going to have to wait until The New War releases this Christmas to know for sure.

A closer look at two new warframes

New warframes are always on the horizon, but I'm particularly excited for this next pair, Gauss and Grendel. During a livestreamed art panel at Tennocon, we were given a sneak peek at each frames' idle animations, which hinted at what their play styles would be. Both also made a quick appearance during the Empyrean live demo as members of the SquadLink team that helped the Tenno in space by destroying a shield generator located nearby on Earth.

Gauss is, quite simply, The Flash from DC comics. As Digital Extremes already revealed, one of its abilities is to run super fast, which will be helpful when traversing Warframe's growing list of open world zones.

Grendel looks like a sumo wrestler crossed with a troll, but that's all we know. Digital Extremes wasn't ready to talk about either frame's abilities, and there's no confirmed release date yet.

That covers all the major announcements from Tennocon 2019. There was loads of smaller reveals, like the start of Nightwave Season 2 (which is now available) and also a contest that will send one lucky winner to outer space—yes, you read that right.

When Warframe's developers first revealed the Empyrean update during its annual Tennocon convention last year, it felt like Warframe was evolving. No longer were Warframe players stuck running across procedurally generated hallways or open-world zones like Fortuna—now they’d be free to customize and pilot spaceships in co-op battles inspired by indie roguelike FTL, where each member of your squad can man different stations on the ship or infiltrate the enemy ship and sabotage it from the inside. It was ambitious—seeming almost too ambitious—but at Tennocon 2019, which just wrapped up, Digital Extremes unveiled an extended live demo of the new update. And, uh, it's even more ambitious now.

Apparently piloting your own spaceship with your friends isn't good enough for Digital Extremes. You can now infiltrate an enemy ship, kill its captain, and then steal it for yourself (though you won't be able to keep it for good). That's just one of the new features Digital Extremes showed as it played through Empyrean in front of a live audience at Tennocon.

The video above shows the entire demo and is worth watching because, as a Warframe fan, it's exciting to see how ambitious and transformative Empyrean is. There's too much to cover in just one article alone.

Unlike Warframe's previous updates like The Plains of Eidolon or Fortuna, which game director Steve Sinclair describes as "islands", Empyrean isn't just another new area of Warframe with progression and rewards isolated from everything else. Instead, Empyrean is meant to be the glue that binds all of Warframe together as one cohesive world.

Using your Railjack spaceship, you can visit different locations in space, many of which are located in orbit around the same planets where players take on normal missions. This core concept of Empyrean hasn't changed much since last year: You're still piloting a spaceship with your squad, working together to fight enemy fleets. Like FTL, the Railjack only has so much energy that can be diverted to different systems like shields, weaponry, or engines. And each member of the team will need to work together to divert this resource as needed.

During combat, players can also exit the ship via their Archwing flyer and fly around space independently. This also lets players explore wrecked space stations and ships whose interiors resemble traditional Warframe levels.

What I love is how much flexibility every player has at a given moment. During one scene, a Digital Extremes developer infiltrated a derelict space station and was ambushed by Infested. Instead of watching helplessly, the pilot of the Railjack was able to divert energy to a powerful cannon with a targeting radar that displayed the station map along with friendly and enemy locations. Using this cannon, they could provide artillery support to their allies as they made their escape.

My favorite feature is the Squad Link, which lets you send a distress signal to nearby players in your alliance to have them assist you on your mission from where they are. In the demo, Digital Extremes developers are squaring off against a Kuva Lich, a mutated monster that, similar to Shadow of Mordor's Nemesis System, changes and adapts after each time you fight them. This particular Kuva Lich has secured an impenetrable capital ship, and just as the squad is about to engage it directly the Kuva Lich activates a shield relay located on Earth that protects it.

Sinclair says this is Warframe's Battle of Endor moment, harkening back to Return of the Jedi when the rebel alliance must attack the Death Star while a smaller force simultaneously tries to deactivate its shield generator on a nearby planet.

With the Kuva Lich safe behind its shields, the players are able to send out a Squad Link beacon that other players in their alliance can respond to if they're not busy. In this case, one player is fishing in the Plains of Eidolon on Earth and happens to be right next to the shield generator. After accepting the Squad Link invite, they're given a mission to blow up the nearby generator so that their friends in orbit above Earth can kill the Kuva Lich. To be clear, all of this is happening in real time.

Fortunately for people like me who have no friends, these Squad Link objectives are optional. If no one responds to your request or if they fail, there will be other, more difficult methods to deactivate the shields of the Kuva Lich capital ship. Sinclair equates this to fighting with "one hand tied behind your back."

That covers most of the glamorous bits. The good news is that a Railjack is in reach for most players willing to spend the time and resources to build one—but it will require a Clan dojo (think guild house if you're new) with a Drydock expansion. Each player can have their own Railjack, but only the host-player's Railjack will be used in missions (so you'll have to choose which player gets to play captain). Even if you're new, though, you can always be part of the crew on another player's Railjack.

There's still no confirmed release date for Empyrean, but given that Fortuna released in November last year and was also revealed around the same time, it's a safe bet that Railjack will arrive either late 2019 or early 2020.

For more coverage direct from Tennocon 2019, you can read about Warframe's new intro video by the director of 10 Cloverfield Lane. We'll have more Warframe news soon.

For the past two years, Warframe has been adding open-world zones that are a big departure from its usual claustrophobic corridor run-n-gun combat. Today, during Digital Extremes' annual Tennocon convention, the developers revealed the new zone coming to Warframe at a later date—and it looks like nothing I've ever seen in Warframe.

Called the Duviri Paradox, this surreal landscape introduces a new enemy faction and ages your Operators (if you don't know what that word means it's something I won't spoil) forward to adulthood.

More than that, we don't know. But watch the trailer above to get a better idea for how bizarre the Duviri Paradox promises to be.

We have loads more info coming out of Tennocon 2019, so stay tuned.