Despite becoming a Tencent subsidiary, Warframe developer Digital Extremes promises that it fully intends to remain "creatively independent." Six years ago, the Hong Kong-based game company Leyou purchased a majority stake in Digital Extremes. In the several years since then, the studio has retained its creative independence. And though the developer just entered another season of change, it plans to continue operating as usual.
Chinese holdings company Tencent recently acquired Leyou. Consequently, Tencent now counts as Digital Extremes' parent company. As many have noticed, Tencent's expansion over the last few years has yet to subside. The holdings company owns a substantial portion of many a gaming outfit, including Epic Games, Grinding Gear Games (Path of Exile), and Riot. Earlier in the year, it purchased Funcom, then soon thereafter announced its own United States-based development studio. Simply put, Tencent is throwing a lot of cash around.
Fortunately, Tencent's influence as far as the crew at Digital Extremes is concerned should not affect the studio's usual operations or its persistent work on the popular free-to-play title, Warframe. Xbox Series X|S and "innovating" with The New War arc. The post reads in part:
"One of our core pillars is transparency and so we’d like to let you know what that means: We will remain creatively independent, we expect no changes to Warframe or how our studio operates, and we will remain as dedicated ever to you, the community, who has been with us every step of the way since we launched Warframe."
Given concerns about Tencent's unceasing growth, and the influence that China in general has on western entertainment, it's good to learn that Digital Extremes intends to retain creative control of its products. Evidently, Warframe will not be going anywhere anytime soon. Thus, it seems fans can rest assured the action title's future won't succumb to outside influences.
Though a full next-gen update is in the works for Xbox Series X|S, PlayStation 5 s can take advantage of the next-gen enhancements right now. Warframe's PS5 upgrade hit a few weeks ago, adding in for 4K resolution and 60fps. Digital Extremes has yet to confirm when the same update will makes its way to Microsoft's new hardware, but Tencent's acquisition of the studio hopefully shouldn't affect the changes that players feel on the consumer side of the new arrangement.
Warframe is available on Nintendo Switch, PC, PlayStation 4, PlayStation 5, Xbox One, and Xbox Series X|S platforms.
Source: Digital Extremes
