Soulframe still isn’t out yet, but its Preludes were finally publicly opened on November 6, giving me my first chance to try it out. I was expecting “Warframe but fantasy,” and to be fair, a lot of Soulframe is like that, but so much of Digital Extremes’ new action-role-playing game feels very different. I’m floored–I’ve tried to get into Warframe several times and just kept bouncing off of it for one reason or another, but here I am really enjoying Soulframe and trying to figure out which live-service game I’m going to have to retire from to put Soulframe into my regular rotation. And it’s really all because of the game’s music.
Admittedly, music is one of the best parts about Warframe too. While I’ve never been able to really get into it, the reason I kept trying Warframe is because I’d keep hearing these absolute awesome sea shanties and vocal-led orchestral scores and thinking, “I want to play a game that sounds like that.” But I never knew how to get to any of those moments to hear them play out in game.
I tried getting into Warframe way too late, when the game had already transformed into something that largely catered to the players who were already in the ecosystem. The game just felt way too big of a beast to tackle as a newbie. Which is fine! That happens to every live-service game eventually.
Soulframe is new so it doesn’t have that problem yet. And even if it did, it feels like it incorporates its music way more regularly and meaningfully than Warframe seems to. Almost every aspect of Soulframe (so far) is shaped around its music, including its poetry, birdsong, choral folktales, and orchestral scores. Character creation is writing a poem about how beautiful your mother was, several characters communicate solely in sing-song rhyme, and the first storyline revolves around learning the song that will not only play during the climatic boss battle but will also be played by your character in order to finally cleanse the evil you’re fighting.
In Soulframe, music is just implemented everywhere. It feels like a story that’s meant to be listened to, like a folktale, and you just happen to be playing through it instead. The vibe is not dissimilar to games like South of Midnight or Kena: Bridge of Spirits.
I haven’t experienced anything in terms of the gameplay that has wowed me thus far, but it’s a solid baseline. It often feels like playing Dragon Age: Inquisition, so if you’re like me and mourning the idea we’ll never get another one of those, then Soulframe is surprisingly healing.
At the start, you pick whether you want to strike enemies with a sword, be sneaky with daggers and a bow, or pepper foes with arcane pellets launched from your magical staff. Each of these roles has special abilities that work on a cooldown, and all classes can normally attack, defend, dodge, or jump. The semi-open world is broken up into several explorable sections populated with enemies that have a number above their head denoting whether you can take on a particular group or not, and as you complete side quests and main missions, you’ll level up and be able to unlock new skills and equip better armor and weapons.
There’s more to the gameplay, like combining certain abilities to take advantage of a staggered enemy or pulling out an enemy’s soul to pull off a smite, but it’s altogether a very simple loop–the kind you’d normally jump into with a podcast playing in the background so that you can unwind after a stressful day. And I suppose you could still do that here, but you’re missing out by muting this game given how so much of the enjoyment comes from how characters talk and how the dynamism of the music causes moments of exploration and combat to flow together, again, like it’s all one tale being conveyed.
Plus, how else would you fully appreciate the pattern-focused rhythm minigames in which you have to play songs to charm animals, relive the memories of a place or person, travel between dimensions, and cleanse the corruption that’s hurting a poor magical stag? Get outta here with your silly ocarina or tsuchibue. Soulframe’s magical fipple flute is the superior gaming wind instrument!
Soulframe is already shaping up to have a pretty interesting story too. An enchanted melody (I’m telling you, music is everywhere in this game) known as the Spellsong has caused people to forget the importance of nature and the fey and the rites of true magick. But because you are born from an ancient fey lineage, you’re able to resist the effects of the brainwashing. Blessed with the powerful song of the courageous Mora, spiritual Iridis, or graceful Saphene, you venture into a land in which humanity has put animals into cages, enslaved beasts with magical armor, and corrupted powerful spirits.
You’re basically a champion of nature, which isn’t exactly a novel concept for a fantasy game, but I love how it’s portrayed here. You fight humans to free captured animals and fey, destroy the armor of wardogs not to kill them but to free them, and challenge bosses to use the healing power of music to restore their memories of how the world is supposed to be: humanity and nature living side by side. Yeah, it’s cheesy, but it feeds into that folktale vibe the rest of the game has going on.
There are certainly plenty of pretty games to look at this year, but Soulframe’s Preludes might possess the most arresting sound of any game in 2026. I currently can’t stop listening to it, even when I’m not playing the game. So if you’re at all like me and have struggled to get into Warframe despite wanting to understand the hype, love a good folktale, or just have never cared about Grand Theft Auto and need something to play in November while everyone else is busy with GTA 6, consider downloading Soulframe. The Preludes are free-to-play, and while what’s there is certainly not a full game, what’s available feels like the bedrock for something that’s going to be excellent.
