7.0 Graphic Update - Elezen feedback

I'm mostly happy with the update, however the new shape of the female Elezen lips is very distracting and I think should be fixed.

https://i.imgur.com/BYHAdoi.png

It completely ruins the final scene in the benchmark when her mouth looks absolutely horrifying...

https://i.imgur.com/qvAagPC.png

There are a few subjective issues I have with the upgrades such as the appearance of the eyes, lips, and eyebrows. The eyes look more lifeless now, lips are fuller and curve into a very subtle smile, and eyebrows are double thickness when enabling the "longer eyebrows" facial feature.

Update: I have raised a bug report regarding the mouth shape as I strongly believe this was an unintentional error.
https://forum.square-enix.com/ffxiv/...33#post6440033

https://i.imgur.com/UoNuk0q.png

All female duskwight faces (1 to 4, from left to right) show this visual bug when the face tattoos are made dark, it is easiest to see here when fully black. None of the four male face tattoos have this issue.

https://i.imgur.com/RszOfJn.png
https://i.imgur.com/JAjY9gj.png

Female fuskwight faces 1, 3, and 4 (from left to right) show artifacting on the face tattoos. It is most obvious here, with a white tattoo on dark skin. Face 1 is especially egregious. In faces 3 and 4, it may look like I am circling nothing but there is in fact a white smudge that disappears when the tattoo is removed.

Edit: another white smudge on face 1:
https://i.imgur.com/7xhjgBd.png

Contributing!
Here is my before and after.
https://i.imgur.com/n0egSmH.png
I think she still looks cute but not as cute as before. Face 2 is my favorite because I feel like it has a more "cute" factor than "elegant" that face 1, 3 and 4 have.

I have a problem with the eyebrows:
https://i.imgur.com/HwTmSn2.png
(new | old)
Why are they SO filled in? It's really unnatural looking, I liked the thinner look from before.

As well as the lips:
https://i.imgur.com/IqQdBUD.png
(old | new) (I did it out of order, oops)
What's cute to me in the old version was the heart shaped look, with the cupids bow being a V, and with the new update, it's more of a weird U shaped cupids bow. I know its not 1:1, but why the complete change? ;_;

Let's not forget the obvious:
https://i.imgur.com/uvfsrBk.png
I hope they fix this too.

Did a comparison with my face 1 Elezen and the difference is shocking. Left is current graphics, right is benchmark.

My one net positive would be that it looks like they changed one of the noses to be more downward, which I like. But everything else makes them more soft in facial features--the thinned eyebrows being the biggest change and complaint from me. Lips too as well; they seem thinner.

Trying to keep in mind that the benchmark isn't 100 percent accurate, but this is surely not the same character I've been playing for the past couple of years now.

https://cdn.discordapp.com/attachmen...01c01e44e4b6d&https://cdn.discordapp.com/attachmen...1060b5b0baab4&

I'm in love with my glow up, obviously the mouth issue is something that does need to be fixed but will be mad if they take the translucent ears. It is incredibly realistic and one of my favorite parts of this update. My only "gripe" is i will need to change skintone just slightly, but other than that this is perfect.

https://i.imgur.com/HKCxG0I.png
https://i.imgur.com/y595kDT.png

Quote:

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Originally Posted by Roarmiaka

I'm in love with my glow up, obviously the mouth issue is something that does need to be fixed but will be mad if they take the translucent ears. It is incredibly realistic and one of my favorite parts of this update. My only "gripe" is i will need to change skintone just slightly, but other than that this is perfect.

https://i.imgur.com/HKCxG0I.png
https://i.imgur.com/y595kDT.png

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She is cute! You absolutely won the Elezen graphics update for sure.
I second the see-through ears. They are super amazing.

The gamma is completely broken with the Windows snipping tool. But i am also happy how she looks. :)

https://i.ibb.co/nr3C4pS/Lari-Old-New.png


Cheers

They turned my boy into a Wildwood and I hate it here. Not only they added the dark circles, they also made the eyes bigger which changes the look completely. The guy went from the soft boy to a sickly grumpy man and it looks even worse if you zoom out. Also makeup looks so weird now too? Light is barely noticeable and Dark is too much, highlighting the dark circles. If I wanted those I'd play a Wildwood o(-< It doesn't necessarily look bad on its own but it's not my character anymore. I may be able to live with it in the end but it still hurts a lot.
https://i.imgur.com/4NFAZhd.jpeg https://i.imgur.com/2nl0p79.jpeg

I have nothing good to say about what they did to Elezens. What happened to conserving characters' identity? They've changed EVERYTHING. :mad:

https://i.postimg.cc/kXfFQ6S3/DTbench-Comparison.png

- Eyebrows are now blonde
- Eyes are darkened with shadow and have no luster
- Skin tone is now green-gray and it can't be fixed since this is already as close to purple-gray as it can get
- Mouth is a different shape
- Lips have lost their shine
- The ears glow in peach tones when that's not my skin tone

Lip changes:

https://i.postimg.cc/6qgXYqXh/DTbench-Mouth.png

Left is old, right is benchmark

https://i.imgur.com/rBEESUP.png https://i.imgur.com/baeyoAs.png

The graphics look a lot sharper and clearer, but I'm really missing the defined cheekbones, and his lips seem to have a very different shape now? It's weird : ( not mega chuffed with these new graphics

I created a comparison sheet of each of my three main elezen (all duskwight)

They all suffered from a warmer + lighter shift in their skintones, as well as how the lighting appears to have completely rid the faces of any definition. My purple-toned characters are now warm and zombie-like.

The lip shape changing is particularly egregious. Even if the model didn't change, there's something about how the lip textures are placed that changed the shape entirely.

https://jmp.sh/0Nxsjoaz+

In the interest of fairness, I did tinker with the gamma correction. To be honest, it did nothing to address my concerns [Only that 7.0 gamma set at 0 gives a skintone more similar to 6.58's gamma set to 50]

Here's my little color theory chart [apologies if the text is too small ; if you'd like to see it at full size, here it is! ]

https://jmp.sh/KKN2p16v+

Kinda feeling like a downgrade here. Yeah, it's a benchmark, work in progress, and obviously character creator lighting is always wonky as hell, but I'm not really feeling it. Here is a comparison album, top two images are my current character in the Black Shroud and Thanalan, and then the second two are the new Dawntrail update in Black Shroud and Thanalan. All screenshots are taken head on rather than from the side since I didn't want to have slightly different camera angles by accident. My thoughts:

• Skin tone is slightly off, but can be tweaked I guess. I dunno, in some angles my character looked real yellow now which is awkward to look at, might need to change that a bit.
• Hair colour doesn't look as vibrant, seems kinda dull and flat. Definitely more detailed though which is really nice, and even if it isn't as vibrant it's still got better contrast between the main colour and the highlights. Also, so help me God, they better fix this before launch.
• Eyebrows have been changed, bugs me a bit. The old ones were more tapered at the top end, new ones are definitely thicker. I wish I still had the thinner eyebrows.
• Eye shape itself seems changed, and the Thanalan comparison in particular has them looking a lot bigger. Granted I might have just taken the old version screenshot while mid blink or something so whatever, I'll ignore that for now I guess. Pupil seems different as well, but could just be the reflection, I dunno.
• The shadows on the nose make it seem like she has a big ol' cat schnoz. Like, I made a Frothgar for fun, that's the kinda vibes the nose is giving me when viewed head on. It looks great when I actually rotate my character though.
• Lips are definitely not as glossy, and the line seems a bit harder? The old one has a bit of a softer blend from the lipstick to the normal skin tone, while the new one has a pretty hard cutoff. Also the expression has definitely changed and I do not like that. Old one has more of a neutral resting face but the Dawntrail one is smiling. Why change that? I dunno, this is the thing that probably bugs me the most.

So yeah, feeling like a downgrade. Stuff like skin tone and hair colour I can tweak, but it bugs me that they went and messed with the eyebrows and the mouth. It doesn't feel quite like my character anymore. I'm sure I can get used to it, but those are the big things that really need fixing.

And the hair around the ear, holy shit.

Chiming in to say my duskwight looks horribly washed out even with the gamma set to 50 (which is remarkable because I literally fantasia'd to deepen his skintone recently so he wouldn't be so washed out in bright lighting). Whatever they did to the lighting engine, I do not like it. I also really am missing his facial angles as they all seem to have been sanded off. Very disappointing and not sure what I'm going to do going forward. This sucks.

Face 2 Female Elezen got assassinated... Girl that's not a graphics update that's an entire different face. Even disregarding palette shifts or gamma funk—the right picture has Gamma = 100 just because I was testing something, so this isn't a "she's washed out" complaint—she's not even the same character anymore. Her whole head is shaped differently.

Yes, the textures are good, the lights are good, the ears are very good, the eyes are good. And if I wanted to make a character who had the facial characteristics of the picture on the right, that'd be great. But if I wanted to do that, I would've done it to begin with.

https://i.imgur.com/xTGMqUP.png

This thread is full of people posting pictures of two identical Elezen and saying they're completely different. It's baffling to me. Ultimately this is why they're going to give people a free Fantasia: if you've formed a particular attachment with your current face of course it's going to want some tweaking, but at the end of the day this is just the way of things with any graphics update.

I am one of the (sadly) few people who are actually really happy with the change.
Like yes he looks different but not so different that I dislike anything too much.

https://cdn.discordapp.com/attachmen...1506085e8ca6e&

In my case, lighting changes a lot of how my chara looks and I noticed that in the CC the lighting now changes if you wait long enough (at least the Limsa one does? Like if there is an actual small weather or day cycle going on) In the screen I took the light looks pretty yellow in comparison hence why his skin looks more green-ish, a screen I took 5 minutes later looks significantly different.

So the Pros for me are:

• The upgrade on the ears are the best thing, ngl

• Eyebrows showing up better

• General texture upgrade looks great

• The area around the eyes having more definition with little wrinkles and such

Neutral:

• The nose. It lost a bit of character, especially in the front view, but I don't hate it too much

• In a similar vein, lips loosing some definition though the lip color option can somewhat counteract that and is also heavily lighting dependant imo

• The new eye texture sure makes things look off at first, but that's something I can personally get used to

Con:

• The loss of the cheekbones, even if it not the most extreme case with my character but even I notice it when looking at him

• The plastic-y skin glow, especially on dark skin. Also depending on the light but it's noticable in the face and even worse on the body

• After looking at it for a while, I am not that much of a fan of the dynamic catchlights. It looks more realistic yes, but unless the light hit's juuuust right, which is rarely the case, the eyes just look lifeless. I think more static catchlights like before would be better for this type of game or maybe a combined solution? Just something to make the eyes more expressive in lowe rlight situations.

• The missing shine on the lip colors. I think before it was TOO much but now it just seems completely gone. Maybe making the shine toggleable would be a solution here bc some ppl like the shine and some want matte lips

• While not a concern for my character due to his very dark grey skin, but the shadows beneath the eyes on Duskwights should be reverted how it was before. While I like the details added like wrinkles and more dimension, the shadow is unecessary.

More of general things that caught my eye:

• Light colors like white on dark lips still looking like clown make up and not like lipstick

• The textures on a lot of long hairsytles (Like Emmanelains and Artoirels hair) just look like they haven't been updated much yet? Probably subject to change but I thought I'd point it out.

• Less to do with the character model but while the lighting on dark skin is improved, in some situations it still looks way too dark. For me especially in the opening close up there are some pretty harsh shadows

All in all I am pretty happy with the change on MY character. I know what to tweak to make him look more to my liking (adding lip color, making the eyes a shade lighter) and I can live with the rest.

But I also think that critique is fair and know that not everyone feels like this, so I hope there is still time to tweak some things and that stuff like the animations on F!Elezen mouths are more of a bug/glitch/unpolished job more than anything else.

There's this dirty texture that wasn't there before on the female elezen starter clothes, and it's super noticeable on white:
https://cdn.discordapp.com/attachmen...04f1a86f65cf6&

And her left thumb is mysteriously blackened for some reason, this issue doesn't appear on the other racial starting gear:
https://cdn.discordapp.com/attachmen...ed5e75477cd79&

This sadly doesn't address the sculpting changes they made, or the changes that are not impacted by lighting. For example, face 3 women have a strange shadow on both sides of the nose that does not go away in any lighting, and is present even in 'shade'. It makes the nose look perfectly straight without any contour. The eyes are also shaped somewhat differently, and the head in general clearly has been as well because my hair now clips on my forehead and neck. Here are all four elezen faces to show the nose shadowing on 3. It's the only face, in the same lighting, that has this contouring that makes the nose look DRASTICALLY different from the in-game nose now. It's making her not even recognizable as the character I know.

https://i.imgur.com/AOn052i.png

Could be worse, but the sculpt changes to the nose and lips are really off. There's a prominent difference in the bridge (no bump in the new one), and the lip shape has been nerfed into the ground. IMHO the nose shape really should be left alone entirely, noses are a very important part of the profile and facial recognition, any tweak there is going to make a character read as "off." The lip thing just makes me mad :( there's only one thicker lip option on this face and it's also small now.



https://pbs.twimg.com/media/GLJgknOX...pg&name=medium
https://pbs.twimg.com/media/GLJglW3W...pg&name=medium

Quote:

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Originally Posted by linesthatinterlace

This thread is full of people posting pictures of two identical Elezen and saying they're completely different. It's baffling to me. Ultimately this is why they're going to give people a free Fantasia: if you've formed a particular attachment with your current face of course it's going to want some tweaking, but at the end of the day this is just the way of things with any graphics update.

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Nobody asked you??? Sometimes the kindest thing is to keep your thoughts to yourself. This thread is for feedback and we're giving our feedback.

Quote:

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Originally Posted by cakesphere

Nobody asked you??? Sometimes the kindest thing is to keep your thoughts to yourself. This thread is for feedback and we're giving our feedback.

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I gave my feedback too! They ruined what was to me my iconic haircut! I just dunno how much it's going to mean to the game's designers- I feel very sad for people who had formed a very close attachment to a character look that will not be returning, but many of this small details stuff was I think inevitable. The larger issues, like the general somewhat "plasticky" tone to skin and so forth, might well be something they can tweak, though. I do think that the look of the F!Elezen mouths is more like just their artistic choice.

Quote:

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Originally Posted by Reinha

I have nothing good to say about what they did to Elezens. What happened to conserving characters' identity? They've changed EVERYTHING. :mad:

https://i.postimg.cc/kXfFQ6S3/DTbench-Comparison.png

- Eyebrows are now blonde
- Eyes are darkened with shadow and have no luster
- Skin tone is now green-gray and it can't be fixed since this is already as close to purple-gray as it can get
- Mouth is a different shape
- Lips have lost their shine
- The ears glow in peach tones when that's not my skin tone

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the ear glow is subsurface scattering or subsurface light transport; while I think it needs to be tweaked and toned down some based on where the thicker ear cartilage is and more in line with skin tones, that's how light looks through thinner parts of the skin. The devs went for a more realistic approach- it's like when you hold a flashlight under your hand and you can see somewhat through your skin and it's red- well, she's paler so it's not as red. But I do think it needs to be tweaked some because it looks abit too glowy, even in subtle lighting.

Quote:

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Originally Posted by linesthatinterlace

This thread is full of people posting pictures of two identical Elezen and saying they're completely different. It's baffling to me. Ultimately this is why they're going to give people a free Fantasia: if you've formed a particular attachment with your current face of course it's going to want some tweaking, but at the end of the day this is just the way of things with any graphics update.

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Just because you personally cannot see the difference does not mean that people who have spent years with their character do not see a massive difference. For me at least, I specifically chose an eyebrow that was straight, but now it's tapered/thicker. Am I not allowed to express my displeasure with them changing something that is, to me, a very important feature of my character?

And now there is no amount of tweaking that I can do to fix this, because there are no longer straight eyebrow options.

None of us asked either to have a graphical update, I personally did not even expect for one to happen. So to have something forced on me like this is rather upsetting, and I'd prefer we let the devs know that a fair number of us are unhappy instead of not saying anything and then they do not know that there are things that we wish to be fixed.

Quote:

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Originally Posted by linesthatinterlace

This thread is full of people posting pictures of two identical Elezen and saying they're completely different. It's baffling to me. Ultimately this is why they're going to give people a free Fantasia: if you've formed a particular attachment with your current face of course it's going to want some tweaking, but at the end of the day this is just the way of things with any graphics update.

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I agree on like 90% of peoples characters for all races. Reinha here posted what was in my opinion the clearest change in appearance but even then its an easy fix for SE.

They said changes wouldnt be drastic and they really arent for the majority but people somehow came to expect carbon copies. Its a miracle most are as close as they are considering the scope of changes like shading and increased poly counts.

Quote:

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Originally Posted by Liamont

Just because you personally cannot see the difference does not mean that people who have spent years with their character do not see a massive difference. For me at least, I specifically chose an eyebrow that was straight, but now it's tapered/thicker. Am I not allowed to express my displeasure with them changing something that is, to me, a very important feature of my character?

And now there is no amount of tweaking that I can do to fix this, because there are no longer straight eyebrow options.

None of us asked either to have a graphical update, I personally did not even expect for one to happen. So to have something forced on me like this is rather upsetting, and I'd prefer we let the devs know that a fair number of us are unhappy instead of not saying anything and then they do not know that there are things that we wish to be fixed.

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What I'm saying is exactly the same as what you are: of course you're going to notice the difference of a face you spend hours and hours and hours staring at. It would be very strange if you got exactly the same look, honestly: I had to rework my character a little until she looked right again, and I'll definitely be taking the chance of the free Fantasias to make the change.

Look, I'm not saying you shouldn't be unhappy. I'm just saying that - while they should fix the obvious glitches - your standard for "my character looks the same" is going to be much higher than that of anyone else for your character. The graphical update is happening; none of us have any choice about it; feedback isn't going to address the myriad small issues (things like eyebrow tweaks!) that people have. If you look at any HD remake or remaster of a game, this kind of thing happens - it isn't surprising it has here. I just think we should make emotional peace with the change.

throwing my guy in, for the most part i'm happy but yeah like what's been said before i really don't like how strong the dark under eye is on face 2 duskwight, just makes it the same as wildwood faces

current | benchmark
https://64.media.tumblr.com/5094b203...0707a779db.png

it's a bit jarring going from nothing to something so heavy
https://64.media.tumblr.com/73378743...34e4dda995.png

Quote:

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Originally Posted by linesthatinterlace

Look, I'm not saying you shouldn't be unhappy. I'm just saying that - while they should fix the obvious glitches - your standard for "my character looks the same" is going to be much higher than that of anyone else for your character. The graphical update is happening; none of us have any choice about it; feedback isn't going to address the myriad small issues (things like eyebrow tweaks!) that people have. If you look at any HD remake or remaster of a game, this kind of thing happens - it isn't surprising it has here. I just think we should make emotional peace with the change.

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What? Feedback absolutely should address the myriad of small issues. While I do also think some complaints are exaggerated and caused by lighting differences, a ton of them are actual, physical changes that were made for no reason. Eyebrows, in fact, being a great example and one of the easier ones to fix--it's a texture! They still have the old ones to reference from!

FFXIV is a MMORPG with one of the most player-character focused narratives a MMO has been capable of, while also being produced by a multi-million dollar company. Of course people are going to care and have some higher expectations. Comparing it to HD remasters of single-player titles is a nothing statement...which also tend to be reasonably disliked anyway, when objectively worse-looking AI upscales like FFX have been pushed out of the door by the same company.

I can never grasp the resistance to player feedback in the place that's meant to host player feedback. Most people aren't actually being malicious or attacking the devs in this case; people wouldn't be worried about the developers being given enough time otherwise. They're just emotional, and--regardless of how silly it may appear to some--not for a lack of reason.

Left image: benchmark graphics, right image: current graphics

https://i.ibb.co/sKgVCkw/fomst.png

I feel like the whole general feel of my character has changed. One of the charm points of elezen has always been how sharp their faces are, but now it feels like all the sharpness and angles have been sanded away, which makes him look very baby-faced. The expression is also different as the little downward curve of the lip has been changed.

May as well add mine here too.

EW
https://i.gyazo.com/f35975a52516179f...6b4cde06ed.jpg

DT
https://i.gyazo.com/1175d7a4c0bdaa7b...a9340e6550.jpg

Like I said, I don't hate it. As far as the dark circles... I don't know. I tried to play around and see if there was a particular setting they could have added to the game to give them (doesn't look like it, and yes, I even tried to replicate it with Reshade, can get close but not quite). I can only assume they did so on the models themselves for some reason I can't fathom. It's not like it gives them more depth, just makes them more sunken in. Its not like we don't have the option in Face Paint though.

Benchmark isn't much better in some areas.
https://i.gyazo.com/93fc4a29b4c6ea09...5a9ebca51b.jpg

I have no idea wtf this shadowing is here:
https://i.gyazo.com/958c213bd25f3648...d44b71ece4.jpg

But in bright light head on lighting... eyeshadow isn't too bad. Nor are the eyes.

https://i.gyazo.com/023eaff579552ec2...fde956dedf.jpg

Still think interior lighting is going to be the downfall though. Especially when the light is overhead, cause you get the WORST shots with this skin tone.

Quote:

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Originally Posted by linesthatinterlace

What I'm saying is exactly the same as what you are: of course you're going to notice the difference of a face you spend hours and hours and hours staring at. It would be very strange if you got exactly the same look, honestly: I had to rework my character a little until she looked right again, and I'll definitely be taking the chance of the free Fantasias to make the change.

Look, I'm not saying you shouldn't be unhappy. I'm just saying that - while they should fix the obvious glitches - your standard for "my character looks the same" is going to be much higher than that of anyone else for your character. The graphical update is happening; none of us have any choice about it; feedback isn't going to address the myriad small issues (things like eyebrow tweaks!) that people have. If you look at any HD remake or remaster of a game, this kind of thing happens - it isn't surprising it has here. I just think we should make emotional peace with the change.

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I disagree, I will fight for them to address what you call the "small issues" until it's obvious that they are not going to change it at all. Then, and only then, will I make my peace with it (or quit the game, I've got 13k hours at this point, it's not a bad thing for me to move on).

I politely refuse to sit down and say nothing if there's still a chance that things can be changed.

Quote:

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Originally Posted by Doopliss

What? Feedback absolutely should address the myriad of small issues. While I do also think some complaints are exaggerated and caused by lighting differences, a ton of them are actual, physical changes that were made for no reason. Eyebrows, in fact, being a great example and one of the easier ones to fix--it's a texture! They still have the old ones to reference from!

FFXIV is a MMORPG with one of the most player-character focused narratives a MMO has been capable of, while also being produced by a multi-million dollar company. Of course people are going to care and have some higher expectations. Comparing it to HD remasters of single-player titles is a nothing statement...which also tend to be reasonably disliked anyway, when objectively worse-looking AI upscales like FFX have been pushed out of the door by the same company.

I can never grasp the resistance to player feedback in the place that's meant to host player feedback. Most people aren't actually being malicious or attacking the devs in this case; people wouldn't be worried about the developers being given enough time otherwise. They're just emotional, and--regardless of how silly it may appear to some--not for a lack of reason.

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Exactly this.

Quote:

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Originally Posted by linesthatinterlace

What I'm saying is exactly the same as what you are: of course you're going to notice the difference of a face you spend hours and hours and hours staring at. It would be very strange if you got exactly the same look, honestly: I had to rework my character a little until she looked right again, and I'll definitely be taking the chance of the free Fantasias to make the change.

Look, I'm not saying you shouldn't be unhappy. I'm just saying that - while they should fix the obvious glitches - your standard for "my character looks the same" is going to be much higher than that of anyone else for your character. The graphical update is happening; none of us have any choice about it; feedback isn't going to address the myriad small issues (things like eyebrow tweaks!) that people have. If you look at any HD remake or remaster of a game, this kind of thing happens - it isn't surprising it has here. I just think we should make emotional peace with the change.

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I think it is important for us to make a stink about changes that were very clearly the result of developer preference and not graphic updates.
Faces looking softer is a nasty result of us Elezen being five polygons and then getting more. I think these are the graphic updates that won't get addressed. Sometimes, I don't see the difference people are pointing out.

BUT! Eyebrow shapes changing, addition of extra textures (dark circles), harsh lip outlines, female Elezen bean mouths, completely changing features like Sir Grinnaux's lips on page 6 are not a result of upscaling but an actual human going in and making an alteration. These are the things that need to be addressed ASAP. These are 100% not okay.

Too many of these feel SE doesn't care about the "original feel" of the character. Like someone at SE decided they thought certain facial features were ugly and then sanded them down to be more in line with their apparent goal of plasticine beauty.

Posted this comparison on other threads as well but figured it's better to have it in more places than one!
Here is a comparison from the EW benchmark and the DT benchmark. The skin tone may be salvageable? I don't know, I haven't played around with it - but right now the changes look abysmal, and of course there's nothing I can do with the reduced angularity of my son's face. They really did remove any kind of sharpness in favor of ?????? not everything has to be smooth CBU3. Please.

https://i.imgur.com/kA8tPsC.jpg
https://i.imgur.com/yTe8bqc.jpg

Going forward I'd like to see
a) restoration of the cheekbones/chin
b) restoration of the brow ridge
c) duskwight have always been quite cool-toned but the jaundiced look that he now has is quite concerning. maybe look into that too.
d) the lips look kinda bad. I'm not sure what went wrong with their texture but the old ones look so much more full, less painted on, and less stretched.

Quote:

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Originally Posted by SheOfManyAlts

In an effort to make the lips feel… distinct(?), I guess, they’ve added a small beam of light along the upper lip. To emphasis the curve of the skin connecting to the upper lip, I suppose? However, it does run the risk of becoming a bit of a milk moustache/down thing instead.

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Seconding this opinion! The beam of light is quite distracting. In some cases it looks like a milk mustache, and also gives off the impression of filled lips which isn't the look I want for my character.

This is Face 4; skin tone is first row, third from the left.
https://i.postimg.cc/sfNY3hV0/ffxiv-...uthexample.png

I've been doing some more playing around and it appears to be the eyelashes that are the main culprit here. They've been made much thicker and darker, and because they angle downward on most male characters they start covering the eyes a lot more than they used to. This also contributes to the "dead eye" look as it covers up some of the highlights that are in the eyes.

https://i.imgur.com/z0PZ10R.jpeg

In an extreme close up view it isn't too bad, because you can see more of the eyes in this angle, but go a little further away and it already starts to become different.

https://i.imgur.com/0fCFKXO.jpeg

And then in this screenshot from the trailer, at this angle you can barely even see the eyes for all the lashes, and it becomes a very different face.

https://i.imgur.com/dQwRKlw.png

Because of the lashes covering the eyes so much, it affects and changes the apparent shape of the eyes, which leads to a different facial expression and with that a different mood and feel for the character.

This doesn't happen in the same degree for most female characters though, mostly because their lashes tend to be angled upwards and so don't get in the way of the eyes as much.

https://i.imgur.com/OGPTWtc.png

In this final image I've edited one eye a little to remove the Wildwood dark circles and lessen the effect of the eyelashes. It makes the eye look much more open, and gives back a little more of the original feel.

https://i.imgur.com/GEK8Wjb.jpeg

Basically, I would recommend either thinning the lashes so you can see more of the eyes through them, or angling them up more so they don't cover up so much of the eyes. Additionally, I would consider lightening up the top part of the eyes themselves a bit, too, as they tend to run a bit dark, even with lighter eye colors.

Edited to add: I do like most of the changes. The new skin textures look good, other than the slight waxiness, and I especially like the new lighting - there have been many times when my boy has looked exceedingly strange due to awkward lighting angles. Hopefully that won't be as much of an issue now.

There is an inconsistency with Female Elezen mouth.

Before (6.5) :

https://cdn.discordapp.com/attachmen...eef4120dd3623&

After (7.0) :

https://cdn.discordapp.com/attachmen...be28c68dd3ae6&


As you can see, the inferiors lips seems to do a subtil shape like a W when Elezen use /cheers or even in the final image we have at the end of the benchmark when we cut the boss. This doesn't appear with the actual model of Elezen we have.

6.5 was way better in term of shape, please SE can you fix this ?

Quote:

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Originally Posted by Tsumdere

I think it is important for us to make a stink about changes that were very clearly the result of developer preference and not graphic updates.
Faces looking softer is a nasty result of us Elezen being five polygons and then getting more. I think these are the graphic updates that won't get addressed. Sometimes, I don't see the difference people are pointing out.

BUT! Eyebrow shapes changing, addition of extra textures (dark circles), harsh lip outlines, female Elezen bean mouths, completely changing features like Sir Grinnaux's lips on page 6 are not a result of upscaling but an actual human going in and making an alteration. These are the things that need to be addressed ASAP. These are 100% not okay.

Too many of these feel SE doesn't care about the "original feel" of the character. Like someone at SE decided they thought certain facial features were ugly and then sanded them down to be more in line with their apparent goal of plasticine beauty.

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A lot of the changes I've seen really do give that vibe to me too. Nose/Lips/Eyebrow changes come off kinda..not right if you're a person who specifically went for it to avoid the rounded out/cutesy look but are now forced to conform to it. The viera flattened lips are just laughably bad by themselves though. Also weirdly amplified make up on a lot of the female faces with extra caked in eyeliner or thicker eyelashes that give a fake vibe is a weird choice considering the original look for some of them, especially when it genuinely changes the eye shape. And the bizzare catchlight choice that translated their chase for realism into all of us just looking more dead inside lol.

Honestly ultimately I just do hope that they become aware of some of these issues that people have pointed out across all forums that has taken the wind out of their sails for this new expansion because what they get isn't their WoL anymore. Its definitely something to be investigated after reading so many forum posts , both here and on JP , of people pleading to have an option to keep their current face instead of being forced into the new one.

Looking at the beam of light that is cast on nearly every elezen's upper lip is especially frustrating because I can tell that it's where the lips were formerly drawn out to. Not only were the lip models changed, they were changed so poorly that the lighting is still catching on the vestiges of where they used to be. On one hand, this gives me hope that (maybe) through skin textures, the lips could be returned to their former glory, but on the other it aggravates me that they were ever thinned to begin with.

The lip two options for both Face 1 and Face 2 male elezen (the full lips) have been completely nerfed at an anatomical level. There's no lighting that can fix that. I really hope that these concerns are addressed, because it feels like whoever made these changes really did just decide that the original features on Elezen were ugly and needed to be tinkered with. The gaunt features, the smaller eyes, the full lips ; these were features, not a bug to be fixed ):

I slapped together a quick comparison video for my character using an image slider. The images are from my original post a few pages back, and the main reason I did this is to highlight the difference on the eyebrows and nose. To me, that's a really big change in both angle and thickness for the eyebrows, and the shadows on the nose make it look weirdly straight and almost blocky. To me, those are the most glaring issues that need to be addressed, as well as the mouth looking terrible in certain emotes as other people have pointed out.

In my original post I did mention it seemed like the eye shape had changed, but it seems like it's just slightly bigger while the shape is the same. What might've been throwing me off is the makeup around the eye, but maybe that will get tweaked, and I'm less critical now that I know the eye shape is still the same. The skin tone and hair colour also aren't bad in the benchmark itself, but that isn't too surprising since as mentioned, lighting in the character creator has always been dogshit. Here is a screenshot from the benchmark proper:

https://i.imgur.com/tkkTbB8.png

Clearly that looks a fuckload better, and even the nose doesn't seem that bad now that the lighting isn't directly dead centre of the face. Doesn't make it a non-issue though because if there ever is a scene like that then my character is gonna look weird as shit. Also, seriously, I want my old eyebrows back.

New post bc I didn't want to edit my old one AGAIN, so...

I have finally found something that bugs me but couldn't put a finger on before.
As it seems, the culprit is, like for so many, the lip shape (M!Elezen Face 2 Lips 3 btw)

https://cdn.discordapp.com/attachmen...76b302b819625&

The lower lip is just way too round, it looses a lot of detail in light and just looks.... strange in shadow. Because of that the whole mouth in general looks wider than before, which is what's throwing me off both in the character creator and the Benchmark.

So yeah, I agree with all the people who said that lips are different than before and that it alters the characters general look too much.