When it comes to the content delivery in Warframe, it is the most consistent when it comes to quality and replayability. The Duviri Paradox was an experimental roguelike dreamworld. Whispers in the Walls took the community by surprise, while Warframe: 1999 felt like a major payoff for Digital Extremes’ creative side. No arguments can really be made about how quick Warframe is when it comes to delivering the goods. That being said, the recent update, The Old Peace, missed the mark in a few ways that I found troubling.
I think I speak for the games community when I say I had no idea where Warframe would go next after 1999. It was anyone’s call back in TennoCon 2025 last year. To our surprise, it was a return to the sentient storyline as a way of making a prequel story that also gave some progress to the current narrative in preparation for Tau. Considering Whispers in the Walls was one half, and a damn good half at that, I expected the same from The Old Peace. Despite my initial impressions and seeing the massive success it brought Digital Extremes, I could not, sadly, share that sentiment fully.
Try as I might, when it comes down to what The Old Peace is, it’s just a few game modes after an admittedly amazing quest. After that, it’s just nose to the grindstone, without the ability to freely explore at least one new area of the update at my own pace. But I will talk about that after talking about the story, which may be on par with 1999s (no, I’m not kidding).
Diving Headfirst into Lost Memories
The Old Peace included a new story quest. The story quests in Warframe have almost always been fantastic, and this new one is absolutely fantastic for a number of reasons. In this quest, you explore the long-forgotten history of the Peace Treaty between the Sentients and the Orokin. When a group of Dax Anarchists start causing problems that involve the Sentients, the treaty becomes shaky and eventually broken. Leading to Tau becoming lost forever and setting the rest of the game’s story in motion.
The quest plays out really epically. From letting you control an Excalibur Prime, to fighting a giant mech, and traversing wartorn battlefields with grineer allies? It did not miss in capturing the feeling of being in an actual war. Dare I say, Digital Extremes put the war back in Warframe. The Old Peace also explores the gray area between the Sentients, having to kill one that became unstable in front of your sentient friend, Aidis, and exploring that lost trust.
Along the way, you get to see more Sentient lore, like the wolf Amar that is now an Archon, the way the Tenno and the relationships with the Orokin and Sentients were. It was amazing to say the least, but there was also some genuinely unique gameplay concepts explored.
Of Grappling Hooks and Gifts
Digital Extremes explored some really cool new ideas. Like the grappling hook mechanic that lets you move around the wartorn battlefield of Tau really quickly while also giving you a damage boost for a little bit. Not only that, but the new Tauron Strikes allows you to summon a big freaking weapon to deal crazy amounts of damage to anything in front of you. Yes, Warframe finally has a “delete” button, so to speak. But one new gameplay mechanic was only in the story quest, but it left me very intrigued.
At certain moments near the end of the story, you can kneel down and either accept power from a Tenno that left it behind or be the one to leave it behind. The closest I can think of in comparison is Hideo Kojima’s Death Stranding building mechanics. You can essentially leave a gift for someone in need, or take something to help you. Again, this was only in the story quest, but I really want to see if this becomes a new mechanic in Tau next year.
Outside of the story quest, which again was fantastic, are two brand new game modes. One really good, and one really grindy.
The Perita Rebellion in The Old Peace
The Perita Rebellion is a new timed game mode that lets you explore 3 different memories and fight 3 different bosses. This new game mode in The Old Peace takes place over 12 minutes on a fixed timer. You are tasked with doing objectives that, once completed, give you a buff specific to your chosen focus school. It’s great fun, but it becomes repetitive, especially with how much you have to play it to get everything you need for the new Tauron Strikes.
The three bosses you can fight are either that giant sentient, a group of prime warframes, or a flying sentient from the story quest. The giant sentient becomes an archwing fight halfway through, which is an awesome twist. The prime warframes are fine, but aren’t very special mechanically unless you fight them on Steel Path, which really puts emphasis on their abilities. Such as Ember’s meteors or Ash’s assassination abilities. The flying sentient is the weakest fight of the 3 on offer.
Speaking of the Steel Path, these bosses are much harder than any normal boss when you fight them with the Steel Path on. They were originally a joke, but a hotfix made them feel overpowered, and I just could not justify the time and stress for what little more rewards you get from them each run. The same cannot be said for Descendia, a new weekly challenge tower.
Descending into Hell (Kind of)
Descendia is an interesting take on a new weekly activity in the game. Instead of a new archimedea-like experience, you will instead find yourself fighting through 21 floors of murder and mayhem. Frankly speaking, this is my second favorite part of the update. Descendia is just a blast to play through. The entire aesthetic of Descendia itself is draw dropping. Not only that, each floor is a surprise that has a unique gameplay twist.
An extermination mission with giant enemies, flying around on a kaithe from Duviri, shooting at orbs, or simply jumping through circles, and a boss fight or two sprinkled in is just a small sample of what awaits you in Descendia. There are some issues with it, like the modifiers from Marie or Lyon from the Devil’s Triad being a little too simple. Also, at least one room filled with nothing but loot should be in every run, and at least have a minute instead of 30 seconds to pillage it. Aside from that, this and the story quest are the highlights of the update. The rest is a lot of grinding and a tacked-on romance system.
The Grind with the Devil (and “Friends”)
The final part of The Old Peace is the addition of the Devil’s Triad. The 3 new protoframes that you can talk with on a daily basis to learn more about the world of Warframe. You have Lyon, the Harrow protoframe, Marie, the Wisp protoframe, and Roathe, the Uriel protoframe. Lyon talks about visions that haunt him and the pain of his past. Marie is an Entrati fanatic, and Roathe talks about the attitude and philosophy of the Orokin, to a very hypocritical degree (one I really enjoyed reading about day-to-day).
The new conversations with the three are super in-depth, and I really enjoyed learning about them. But they feel tacked on to the update itself. They had no presence in the story quest in any way, shape, or form. You only get a slight cutscene when you load into the Sanctum Anatomica, and the payoff to succeeding with your conversations is a short cutscene of Loid visiting the family above the Anatomica. They serve a purpose as vendors for both of the new game modes, but they still feel out of place.
The worst part of this update is its grind. I am not going to beat around the bush on this, as much as I love the new Tauron Strikes, to get all of these unlocked, you will need to do 50 matches of each Perita Rebellion memory. This, mathematically, results in at least 30 hours of pure grind doing the same mission over and over again. I obtained my Madurai Bow and Vazarin Staff, and I no longer have any motivation to go back in for the other three.
A Give and Take Update
For all the good things in The Old Peace comes a caveat of some type, and this has caught me completely off guard after seeing near flawless major end-of-year updates for 3 years now from Digital Extremes. The story quest is immune to this criticism; however, it’s amazing, no issues there. My only real complaint would be not having access to Perita to explore at will. I would love to take it all in without the hustle and bustle as I could with the Entrati Labs and Hollvania.
Descendia, as a game mode, is fantastic as well. But there are some changes that are needed to make it even better. The Perita Rebellion becomes very repetitive after the realisation of just how many missions you have to play to get all 5 of the new Tauron Strikes (not to mention the Focus you need to farm), and the Devil’s Triad are really great characters, but they show up out of nowhere and feel out of place.
The new offerings in the update, from Uriel to his signature bayonet Vinquibus, Gyre Prime, and the other new prime weapons, are also great. But only the ones I named have been used after leveling them. That means Sagek, Galariak, Alternox, and Kestrel are fine, but not really worth talking about.
Too Much of a Warm-Up for Tau?
As mentioned in the beginning, similar to Whispers in the Walls and Warframe: 1999. The Old Peace is basically one half of a much bigger story that would be told with the Tau expansion this year. What makes it pale in comparison is the fact that I could not be given the chance to explore at least Perita at my own pace, finding secrets akin to what I could do with the Entrati Labs and Hollvania in previous end-of-year updates. Yes, I know the context behind the Perita Rebellion is that it’s a memory, but lacking the breathing room feels disappointing, to me at least.
I may complain about the grind associated with the Tauron Strikes, but I know the way these were intended to be earned is to give players something to work towards as we progress towards Tau, presumably, the end of the year (barring any delays).
Digital Extremes is on record saying that The Old Peace has broken a lot of records for Warframe, which I am happy about. The update is great, but it’s grindy and bizarrely handled some parts. It is the only end-of-year update I have played in a long time that I feel needs that “echoes” style update that stopped after The Duviri Paradox. I can only imagine what they have in store, and I hope it brings much happier memories for The Old Peace.
