The Lotus Eaters is Significantly Subtle

To put it simply, The Lotus Eaters is a short quest in Warframe. It is only 3-5 minutes long, but it is just a steppingstone to the upcoming expansion, Warframe: 1999, which releases at the end of the year. With that in mind, at that length the quest did raise some eyebrows for some players. As the hype for the quest was left unchecked as the recently released Jade Shadows was also described as a short quest by Digital Extremes and this led to players being left confused to the point of the official Warframe X account having to clear the air about it.

But to me, The Lotus Eaters hit the spot. It was eerie, and just as they stated during TennoLive, it just sets the stage for Warframe: 1999, and with those expectations in mind, it did just that. For those who have not played it, you can expect a similar experience to something like Apostasy, or Chimera. I think if The Lotus Eaters was named different, maybe “Lotus Eaters Prologue” this controversy would not exist.

As someone who is extremely pleased from the experience, here is a breakdown of why this small yet subtle installment in Warframe is more significant than some people are giving it credit for.

(Major Spoils Below)

Answering The Call

The Lotus Eaters starts with the Tenno being called to the Sanctum Anatomica; the newest player hub added in Whispers in the Walls in December of last year. There’s no urgent enemy to kill, or some grandiose cutscene to greet you, instead you are simply told to go to the edge of the Sanctum where you see The Lotus standing at the edge, holding the pager that has been there since the end of Whispers in the Walls. This is not a simple confrontation though, as both the Operator and Drifter walk up to her, worried about what drew her here.

This cutscene featured the first dual dialogue cutscene from both of the player characters, and you are prompted by her to interact with the pager.

This sends you back to 1999, in Hollvania’s central mall, where you just follow Kalymos around for a short period to just find a similar pager, whether that was the one in the current timeline or a different one is left up to interpretation.

To go over this in its entirety, this is about 3-5 minutes of serious foreshadowing. The Lotus has only ever left Lua once before during The Second Dream and seeing her standing on the edge of the Anatomica left me feeling scared. She even says that things are changing, but for her, it always seemed to be static. Will something happen to her in 1999? Why did she answer the pager? It’s all just left to interpretation, but there’s so much more to unpack. This is the first time since The New War that the Operator and Drifter were ever in the same space, and giving them unique lines to reach out to The Lotus was very different compared to past quests.

As for aftereffects, The Lotus is now just standing and staring into the void in front of her, vulnerable and static again. Also, the song “Party of your Lifetime” can be heard from Daughter’s earphones in Deimos’s main hub. 1999 is starting to influence so much change and foreshadow some very eerie moments, and all of this comes from just a short quest. It is by no means a Jade Shadows cinematic quest, but Digital Extremes achieved so much in such a short amount of time in comparison.