Dawntrail Graphics Update - Eye Strain

Still no fix still no page 3

And back to page 1.


I can barely do any current content without either getting a migraine or feeling dizzy. Old content without all the visual vomit is no issue but all of the new stuff is just pain. I either will have result to IL-cheese to make sure i don't get any 100 raids/trials or just insta leave and take the 30 minutes penalty because the content simply makes me sick. Got M1 today and also a few days ago, got yoinked on the 2nd platforms in both runs because my head was hurting like crazy at this point and I simply couldn't focus anymore. Any other content doesn't give me any trouble (not even old savages are an issue so it's not an issue with mechanics themself). The level 100 stuff is just bloated with visual vomit and way too bright. It's not even fun to play current content anymore, it's just literal pain.
At this point it's also getting harder and harder to even remotely justify the monthly sub...not to mention that I am mainly only subbed anymore because a) cozy medium house and b) to even be able to even post here on this forum.

Back up this goes

Took a couple months off. Came back for the patch. Ran the new normal raids. Already considering another break. Holy crap, I could just about stand the excess flashiness in the first four, but these cranked it up to painful levels.

Lets get this back off page 3 again

On the topic of eye strain, am I the only one who finds the new metallic dyes- added with Cosmic Exploration- really difficult to look at?

Me and my gf is unable to continue playing due to eye strain and migraines :/

The glare, bloom and blur settings that got changed or straight up removed have made us unable to enjoy our favourite game... hope it get fixed. We will try again in a few months for now we cant play and have unsubbed

Has there been any updates on this at all?

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Originally Posted by Thalliah

Has there been any updates on this at all?

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Nope. They're content to continue to ignore everything but the most extreme outliers.

Quote:

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Originally Posted by Thalliah

Has there been any updates on this at all?

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Outside of the changes to Recollection, no. Those went up without fanfare. Despite several topics on the forums (besides this one) requesting adjustments for similar issues, there's been no dev response. There's a chance they might sneak some lighting tweaks into the upcoming patch (something similar happened in one of the 7.1 patches), but that's something to find out Tuesday. If the overall lighting situation is considered an issue, the devs aren't addressing it openly.

I see 7.25 didn't allow the disabling of the bloom effect.
I didn't expect it but it would have been a nice surprise.

Just a bump. Looking forward to once again be disappointed when we are ignored at the upcoming LL.

This has fallen far too low again

Giving it a bump even tho I don't log in anymore anyways.

One thing regarding visuals I'd like... in addition to a lot of the suggestions, is some kinda middle ground between "Don't show me anyone else's attack effects" and "wtf am I looking at it's all blinding Dragon Ball Z explosions".

Just saw that the Live Letter is going to include a section including about addressing feedback about Occult Crescent and Cosmic Exploration. Cool! A lot of people have strong opinions on those things. I personally haven't done much in either because going into new content tends to be full of bright effects that trigger a migraine. There's no in-game way to mitigate this.

We're almost at 100 pages of this thread and nearly a year out from the original post without a peep from the devs. I haven't logged in to see if the hotfixes that went in last night did anything about this but I'm fairly confident that's a no.

I resubbed because my friends in game were holding an event that they wanted me at, and in my time back I've been focusing on leveling an alt and getting them through EW. All that effort reminded me how much I really enjoy this game. I've been having a blast in old content up until the fights get a little too bright and I have to stop. Some days I don't want to FAFO where that threshold is. So unfortunately, I'm probably going to unsub again. I'll know by Friday.

It'd be nice if YoshiP could address this issue too.

Whoops, let this drop too low

Try turning down FSR to 99% and don't use DLSS. It sharpens textures and my help with the eye strain.

One year and one hundred pages of players having issues with the lighting in this game.

This is too low again

do ya'll even know what eye strain is

The term is pretty self-explanatory. Or do you intend to explain to us how our own eyes feel?

Upwards againwards

Live Letter tomorrow... Will they address is this time?

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Originally Posted by Vesplume

Live Letter tomorrow... Will they address is this time?

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

Sounds about right!

Back to the top, thanks.

Game looks great after introducing sharpening in Dawntrail. Now it doesn't look like a blurry or badly aliased mess stuck on PS3 rendering anymore.
I don't think some people understand that reality is meant to look as naturally sharp as your eyes are able to perceive (without visual noise), and games used to look sharp until forced TAA and FXAA ruined everything.

The problem is that with the graphics update, the devs have made an intentional focus on visual noise as part of new content design to show off the improvements of their new graphical capabilities. Visual noise is part of the encounter design, like in Vanguard (the entire environment with its flickering warning lights), Recollection (complicated visual tells that spawned multiple new threads about this problem when 7.2 dropped), and the new raids (especially Arcadion). It's also amplified problems with content that had similar issues before (like the Nier raids). The sharpness of the game usually isn't part of the problem unless its folks having issues with AA causing weird flicker effects, but that's been recorded here too.

This has made people who had few to no issues playing the game before DT experience severe eye strain leading to headaches, migraines, and seizures with side effects like dizziness, nausea and vomiting. Plenty of players who've reported to this thread have also mentioned this is an issue mostly exclusive to FFXIV and are able to play other games just fine.

I came back to the game after several years break and I am having a lot of trouble playing, I don't have any sight issue and I only have this problem with FFXIV. I tried fiddling with the options but I couldn't find anything, it's to the point where I have to stop playing.
Also, the amount of visual clutter, which was already over the top in this game, has reached all new levels of ridiculousness. Note that I always have all effects off except my own.

There is a video floating around from the final Nier raid where a RDM used limit break (good ol' Verflashbang) right at the same time that the red light / green light train mechanic was coming, and no one could see what the safe track was. Half the raid wiped.

Some QOL features I think could improve the visual effects:

* Being able to manually choose the colors for the visual effects from the boss. Right now, hostile ground AOEs are always orange, and friendly ground AOEs are always blue.
* Being able to change these settings via macros on the fly, allowing you to have a fight specific color profile that you can slap on. /aoe hostile red or /aoe friendly green
* Being able to set the transparency of the ground AOEs and other attacks. Some fights I need them really REALLY visible, other fights it gets in the way. Again, macro commands to set them - /trans 0-100 - the way I can type in /bgm 100 when a track comes on that I want to jam to in duty roulette
* Being able to control the total luminosity of visual effects. My friend with a high nits monitor jokingly calls out "ah my eyes" during any super bright attack. /lum 0-100
* Utilize fade down to black or a cooler color instead of fade up to white whenever possible. It made sense to fade to white in Shadowbringers, but that was two expansions ago. And as always, a choice! /fadeout set dark or /fadeout set light

I think the issue is they are over-designing these fights to be way more flashy and fast-paced than they need to be, with all sorts of spell effects shooting out everywhere, and there just isn't a need for it at all. I struggled focusing on anything going on for the new alliance raid last night because it was such visual vomit. Pretty much hoped no one would raise me and let me stay dead just to get through it. The airship fight about gave me a seizure.

Unsurprising that 7.3 still didn't add any setting adjustments

If you have to rely on visual noise to add difficulty to the fights, sorry not sorry, that's bad game design.

Glad it's not just me that's been struggling with stuff lately. I've found most of the later fights in the expansion to be much more visually overwhelming than previous expansions, and the latest treasure dungeon's moving background actually made me feel a bit queasy, and I rarely ever get motion sickness. Since the sales for XIV have fallen by a huge amount, I do hope the devs are looking more closely at the forums for feedback and see this one. It's kind of sad they seem to think flashier = better. I don't mind the fight mechanics themselves, I just don't want my eyes to sting after barely a couple hours of playing.

Finally adding my voice, because we all need to be heard, and the more voices the better. I was diagnosed with megaloblastic anaemia last year, that had damaged my eyesight because it got pretty bad before being diagnosed. Up until DT and the graphics update, I only got migraines from EXTENSIVE grind/binge sessions, like, hours at a time, which was probably more about staring at the screen for that long more than anything else. Since DT and the graphics update, I'm lucky if I can manage two hours in a row just doing overworld stuff like Shared FATEs, or doing a match of PVP. I've turned off as much of the ability spam flashes as I can; I've changed the settings to different settings in the hopes that it'll help; I've turned off the HDR on my monitor; I've changed colour settings, and more. Playing things like Arcadion means that I need to do it at the end of a gaming session, because if I do it at the start, that's pretty much me done. The painful "crowd" in the background of Arcadion is not only distracting, it's also just visual noise for the sake of visual noise. The amount of flashbangs and lights and explosions and just... STUFF... associated with a lot of the dungeons and bosses from DT and post-DT patches is just noise for noise's sake. You can telegraph the mechanics in a different way and the mechanics would still be as good. Please let us tune down the mechanic flashes/bangs/fireworks/explosions at least a little. Please let us tone down the neon flashing lights in so many of the new areas. PLEASE LET US OPT OUT OF SEEING LIGHTNING FLASHES IN HERITAGE FOUND.

I also know for a fact that it's FFXIV causing the problem, because I play Destiny 2, probably to excess, and despite the amount of visual noise in that game, it's nowhere NEAR the level of FFXIV's, and I don't get a migraine just from playing Destiny 2. But I do get one from FFXIV. And I'm clearly not the only one having this problem.

Adding my voice to this thread since as of 7.3, issues STILL have not been addressed or even acknowledged by SE.

I had to literally stop raiding multiple nights with my raid team on M8S due to severe migraines and nausea from the flashing raid-wide and blinding post-adds transition. This is not the only source of trouble for me either, but just using it as an example.

Due to these issues, I only log in once a week to raid with the team if I can, then I do not play because it causes me so much strain.

Another voice for the choir.
Since Dawntrail released I've had to adjust my monitor settings so that the game won't give me a baseline headache from doing everyday content. It's worked fine for me for the most part... except when I actually want to see my xaela man's face in cutscenes - at which point I enable a headache to see what they're doing with the models outside of two blinding limbal rings.
Now in San d'Oria: The Second Walk, I'm currently debating on if I learn when one of the second boss mechanics happens so I can kill myself and not have to deal with the intense nausea caused by the aoes (I do not rememember the name of the mechanic, but it's the red aoes that have adjusted end positions that are offset from players with the relevant debuff).
I have an easier time reading savage mechanics without my glasses than even looking at the screen during that second boss when those debuff aoes show up.

Unsubbed again. While the MSQ for 7.3 has me excited for the direction the story is going in, we're at yet another patch cycle where I'm locked out of major content because actually trying to do it would give me a migraine. All the reports I've heard from the new alliance raid are about how painful it is to look at. Flashbangs and visual noise everywhere. AFTER ALL THIS TIME.

How many pages of this thread are filled with people filing genuine concerns about how this game makes them physically ill to keep playing, only to be ignored? How many gave up and canceled their subscriptions because the devs cannot be bothered to address this? Half my posts in this forum are in this thread, trying to keep it active and spread awareness because I want to be able to play with my friends like I used to.

I've kept track as best I could of all the issues and lent my voice to other threads that have popped up. I want to keep fighting for this to get fixed but I'm not paying a sub for the privilege. I've set up a survey where people can document their experiences with this problem without being subbed and a site that makes it easy to find again. If the devs can't be bothered to dig through this thread or the others that have sprung up since, then at least it's documented somewhere.

If there are any content creators looking for a new take on "Dawntrail bad and here's why" you can also find a way to contact me there.

Stay safe y'all.

Sending this up again