Warframe is continually praised for its fantastical and unique sci-fi aesthetic, which makes it the perfect game for the maker community to replicate with 3D printing, which has happened today with this brilliant take on the Akbolto Prime.

User “VeryHappy” started this project after being inspired by the impressive work of Bart van der Westerlaken and his Lex Prime. He really is one of the best out there when it comes to this kind of work, and we’ve featured his throwable Kunai, Unreal Tournament 4 Enforcer and Last Jedi homing beacon in the past.

The Akbolto Prime was modelled in SolidWorks over the course of 215 hours – 200 for the gun itself, and a further 10 for the stand. The programme was a hindrance here as it slowed to a crawl as the assembly grew larger, and this certainly was with more than three thousand features.

Assets from the game were used as the base here after being extracted using Ninja Ripper. Unfortunately this mesh was very low resolution and was only used to get the right dimensions. The finer details were then added in using screenshots.

Printing took around three weeks to complete as the printer used – the Anet A8 – had to be continually monitored for its history of catching fire, and this could only be done after work hours. We’ve been told that it would take between one and a half and two weeks to complete if the printer was allowed to run continuously.

The raw plastic was sanded first with a rotary sander at 150 grit and then by hand at starting with 300, then moving on to 500 and finally 800 grit.

Painting was done mostly with Rust-Oleum colours: all of the pieces got a white primer with the black parts also receiving a black enamel. The gold was accomplished with metallic gold and the smaller blue pieces were hand painted.

Most of the pieces were painted before assembly so we have this great shot of the parts all laid out before they were put together.

The assembled model measures in at 423 mm long, 119 mm wide, 283 mm tall. Given the complexity and size here you can see why just one was made instead of the pair seen in the game.

If you’re brave enough to try to make your own version of this project – or even two – you can find the files for it available for free on both Thingiverse and MyMiniFactory. An assembly manual is also included here and make sure to read the full descriptions for more information about printing.