On Volt’s Sexy Not Sexy New Skin
So Volt finally got to join the ranks of his fellow been-there-from-the-start Warframes in the I-have-an-extra-fancy-skin department. Kinda. Unlike Mag, Ember, Nekros, Trinity, Rhino and all that, Volt didn’t get a nice Deluxe skin. No, Volt became the third member of the Proto Skin family. Except his new skin still doesn’t fit there.
The two proto skins for Excalibur and Nyx are basically assets from Digital Extremes’ game Dark Sector, redone and amplified to fit the Warframe theme. Proto Excalibur has a skin based on the protagonist Hayden Tenno, while Nyx appears as Nemesis, which I assume is one of the bad guys in Dark Sector. Volt’s new proto skin… well, it has nothing to do with Dark Sector.
Proto Volt is literally a prototype of Volt. As in, a very early version before the Orokin decided to add the butt cape, the incredibly large cod piece and before they settled on how large his nose horn is. And clearly it’s a prototype that’s gone astray, since you can see all internal bits and pieces, just underneath the ‘shell’. Parts of Proto Volt look damaged, as if he’s surged in power and broken a few things.
There’s a few little things one might notice. Electricity can be seen surging up his body, as well as spurting across the little Frankenstein’s Monster-esque bolts on his shoulder. Occasionally, a whole surge of lightning will cover his body. Also, because of Volt’s default animation sets, Proto Volt appears to stand on tiptoes, lacking the heels his normal skins on his hoof-like feet.
Funnily enough, a lot of people think the skin is ugly. I thought it was ugly when I saw the concept art, but the finished model is really nice. In its own, unique way. What’s even weirder is that people who don’t normally like the Warframe art style seem to think that the Proto Volt skin is incredibly cool. Case in point, my good buddy _aD normally goes “WHAT THE FUCK IS THAT BURN IT WITH FIRE” at most things Warframe related. Proto Volt? Apparently he’s “badass”. Even sister Skully thought that Proto Volt looked cool. I think maybe it’s because it doesn’t really look that much like Volt, aside from the lightning, a newcomer wouldn’t assume that’s Volt straight away. Then again, no one has ever SEEN Volt without his codpiece or butt cape, so it’s hard to imagine him without them.
What’s even nicer is that it fits my normal colour scheme really nicely. Minimal tweaking was required to both make him look cool and make him fit my yellow and blue colour scheme.
As for the accessories the Proto Volt bundle comes with? The syandana is pretty cool, it has an electric-like particle effect and looks like someone sealed lightning in metal. The syandana actually also looks nice on more ‘knobbly’ characters like Nidus and Chroma, and the Volt Proto skin isn’t made any less for not using the syandana, so it’s not like you’re only getting one use out of it. Unfortunately, the hammer weapon skin looks dreadful, it’s far too small (especially when used on the Jat Kittag) and looks more like a weird tennis racket or something. It should have been a badass weapon skin, like most other weapon skins, but it’s not.
Really, if you’re tight on Platinum, you can skip the bundle and just get the Volt skin. But I bought the bundle straight away because, well, it’s for Volt, and I love Volt.
The only question is, will Volt, Excalibur and Nyx eventually get deluxe skins, or are the proto skins all they’re going to get?