Dawntrail character graphics update - opinions, requests and discussion megathread

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by Turnintino

For the record, this is with character lighting turned all the way down, and yet he's fully illuminated in a completely shadowed environment, as if cut and paste from another image.

---

That was a direct result of player feedback. It was previously much more subtle but changed after the first benchmark when people complained.

Quote:

---

Environmental Lighting Adjustments

When characters were backlit or in shadow, the softened shading made details appear rather flat. As such, we made overall adjustments to characters' environmental lighting to preserve a three-dimensional appearance even when a character wasn't being lit. We also made minor adjustments to the overall environment, such as fog.

---

Source: https://na.finalfantasyxiv.com/lodes...ecd574ad0d397a

Unfortunately that's the double edged sword of addressing feedback. Any change meant to appease one group of people is going to be disliked by another group of people. Fortunately in this instance while I do think it looks silly to glow in the dark it doesn't ruin my enjoyment of the game or anything.

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by CidHeiral

That was a direct result of player feedback. It was previously much more subtle but changed after the first benchmark when people complained.



Source: https://na.finalfantasyxiv.com/lodes...ecd574ad0d397a

Unfortunately that's the double edged sword of addressing feedback. Any change meant to appease one group of people is going to be disliked by another group of people. Fortunately in this instance while I do think it looks silly to glow in the dark it doesn't ruin my enjoyment of the game or anything.

---

I can appreciate their attempt, but I'd also argue the inciting issue wasn't ultimately addressed; the details of the character still look flat -- we're just also glowing now lol. But if the saturation were just turned down a bit to match the environment, it would make a world of difference, IMO.

I think their fix was strange to begin with, though, since all it seems to do is force character lighting, a setting we have in the game but not in the benchmark, where of course some players might've felt its absence. It also doesn't appear everywhere. By my observations, it only seems to act like this when the character is in shadow during daylight hours, so I'm not sure it's even entirely intentional.

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by Turnintino

I can appreciate their attempt, but I'd also argue the inciting issue wasn't ultimately addressed; the details of the character still look flat -- we're just also glowing now lol. But if the saturation were just turned down a bit to match the environment, it would make a world of difference, IMO.

I think their fix was strange to begin with, though, since all it seems to do is force character lighting, a setting we have in the game but not in the benchmark, where of course some players might've felt its absence. It also doesn't appear everywhere. By my observations, it only seems to act like this when the character is in shadow during daylight hours, so I'm not sure it's even entirely intentional.

---

Personally I liked the softer lighting of the first benchmark and I think they should have let people actually run around in the world for a bit before making drastic changes, but it is what it is. It's definitely intentional though because you can see the same thing going on in their examples in that lodestone post.

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by CidHeiral

That was a direct result of player feedback. It was previously much more subtle but changed after the first benchmark when people complained.



Source: https://na.finalfantasyxiv.com/lodes...ecd574ad0d397a

Unfortunately that's the double edged sword of addressing feedback. Any change meant to appease one group of people is going to be disliked by another group of people. Fortunately in this instance while I do think it looks silly to glow in the dark it doesn't ruin my enjoyment of the game or anything.

---

The base cause of the player feedback was the devs' introduction of the new "soft lighting" in the first place, which affected different skin colours in drastically different ways – my dark-skinned Miqo'te looked fine in the first benchmark but my pale-skinned Midlander was translucent.

Both of them looked fine in the old lighting and both of them look awful in the new lighting in different ways to the benchmark – pale seems prone to going featureless and puffy in bright light; dark has constant reflection from the fake cool-white spotlights that shine on everything now.

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by Turnintino

Bumping to whine about the lighting, because it really is such an eyesore sometimes lol.

https://i.imgur.com/UgMPm7W.png

For the record, this is with character lighting turned all the way down, and yet he's fully illuminated in a completely shadowed environment, as if cut and paste from another image.

---

This is one of the worst parts of the update in my opinion that affects everything and isn't race/face specific. Characters are just way too illuminated, and barely have environmental lighting colors applied to them. Looking at the difference between the night scenes in the EW benchmark vs. live really shows how off everything looks in comparison.

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by Turnintino

Bumping to whine about the lighting, because it really is such an eyesore sometimes lol.

https://i.imgur.com/UgMPm7W.png

For the record, this is with character lighting turned all the way down, and yet he's fully illuminated in a completely shadowed environment, as if cut and paste from another image.

---

I've been replaying Heavensward lately (to help someone) and it's been so egregious that I complain about it every single time I enter a cutscene. Azys Lla was the worst one.
I can't forget about "how it's supposed to look"... Not to mention of course seeing how off all of the NPCs look now.

Also, it reminds me of my earlier post:

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by lunartears

Found this video today: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zgBEkzT8xhU
Good reference for the way that MSQ has been affected by the graphics update.

https://i.imgur.com/ynNKmVy.png
https://i.imgur.com/k9PLwGh.png
https://i.imgur.com/jcNIT8s.png
https://i.imgur.com/ShHPCBe.png

---

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by Kaziek

This is one of the worst parts of the update in my opinion that affects everything and isn't race/face specific. Characters are just way too illuminated, and barely have environmental lighting colors applied to them. Looking at the difference between the night scenes in the EW benchmark vs. live really shows how off everything looks in comparison.

---

It's particularly egregious in many old cutscenes now, as have been posted previously in this thread. Oh, did a scene once have harsh, dramatic lighting in it for artistic effect? Not anymore!

I'd say the issue is that "harsh, dramatic lighting" often just looked really bad. In those quoted examples above, the new one looks better every time to me because the old shadows were terrible. They often also ended up highlighting all the issues with the old face models.

To my knowledge, they haven't fully updated all the old zones with the new lighting and such yet, so that's probably a big reason why your character sticks out sometimes. The character models are using the new shaders but the environment hasn't been updated to reflect that yet.

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by lunartears

I've been replaying Heavensward lately (to help someone) and it's been so egregious that I complain about it every single time I enter a cutscene. Azys Lla was the worst one.
I can't forget about "how it's supposed to look"... Not to mention of course seeing how off all of the NPCs look now.

Also, it reminds me of my earlier post:

---

Like... I can understand the desire to soften the harsher lighting that we previously saw in cutscenes for the sake of clarity or whatever, but these examples plainly aren't doing that -- or they aren't only doing that anyway. The shadows weren't just softened, the characters have been illuminated. It's jarring, I would argue even without the side-by-side comparisons in some cases. Turn the dimmer down even a little bit lol.

But where I can at least understand the intent behind the above tweaks (I still agree they way over-corrected, rest assured), I don't think there's any good reason to apply this "fix" outside of cutscenes, especially. It bears repeating, I would really love to see further adjustments, across the board.

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by Turnintino

Like... I can understand the desire to soften the harsher lighting that we previously saw in cutscenes for the sake of clarity or whatever, but these examples plainly aren't doing that -- or they aren't only doing that anyway. The shadows weren't just softened, the characters have been illuminated. It's jarring, I would argue even without the side-by-side comparisons in some cases. Turn the dimmer down even a little bit lol.

But where I can at least understand the intent behind the above tweaks (I still agree they way over-corrected, rest assured), I don't think there's any good reason to apply this "fix" outside of cutscenes, especially. It bears repeating, I would really love to see further adjustments, across the board.

---

I feel like a good middle ground would be to adjust the character lighting slider to allow for it to go even darker than it currently is at zero. That would let people who enjoy the way things look now continue to do so, while letting those who preferred the old style have it back again.

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by Arzalis

I'd say the issue is that "harsh, dramatic lighting" often just looked really bad. In those quoted examples above, the new one looks better every time to me because the old shadows were terrible. They often also ended up highlighting all the issues with the old face models.

---

Yeah, at least the last two in that example look better. I remember playing through that cutscene for the first time and thinking the lighting was atrocious. I don't know that they've gone through and adjusted that cutscene for the new lighting, but at least now the characters are visible, and the last shot of Alphinaud is nicely balanced artistically with the red in the background.

The first two...probably the before pics are better.

The first benchmark lighting did make my character look flat while in shadow, though I don't recall saying anything about it, since who knows what it would have been like live.

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by Astronis

Yeah, at least the last two in that example look better. I remember playing through that cutscene for the first time and thinking the lighting was atrocious. I don't know that they've gone through and adjusted that cutscene for the new lighting, but at least now the characters are visible, and the last shot of Alphinaud is nicely balanced artistically with the red in the background.

The first two...probably the before pics are better.

The first benchmark lighting did make my character look flat while in shadow, though I don't recall saying anything about it, since who knows what it would have been like live.

---

The before pictures just remind me of that one Game of Thrones episode. The first two are so dark you almost can't see Ilberd's face and certainly can't see much detail. There's definitely a better middle ground there somewhere, but the after is still the superior image to me.

I really miss my character.

Me too. I really miss her gentle look, and smile. Why they screwed with the lips the most is beyond me. Tons of faces ruined thanks to a botox kardashiened pair of lips.

Not to speak lightly of all the other issues, or dismiss them, but the lips are one of the biggest things that bother me.

Same. Primarily I miss gposing. Back in endwalker it's what I spent the majority of my time doing outside raid, and it's frustrating because I have so many ideas and projects I want to make, that I can't because my WoL functionally doesn't exist right now. At best it'll be another month and a half until I can do it again; at worst it'll be 5 to 6, and that's assuming they actually do good work across 7.1 and 7.2. A large part of me still worries they'll take a bunch of half-measures as to not mess with the "new" look too much. I wish we could do more than just wait around and see.

It's sad that the translation team deemed Mr. Yoshida's words about character appearance adjustments too insignificant to include them into the Producer LIVE Part LXXXIII event digest.

there's extra light reflection in the eyes that's q̶u̶i̶t̶e̶ s̶t̶a̶t̶i̶c̶ bound to camera no matter where real light sources are.

It is visible especially in night or without any light source nearby.

I wish there was way to have it optional /options checkbox/ rather than forced.


WoW has added similar feature last year and it also raised concerns.

https://i.imgur.com/OBFqNU3.png

https://www.reddit.com/r/wow/comment...lutely_broken/

while it doesn't impact player characters, I'm happy that the changes to ancient npc eyes were directly addressed at the PAX panel and explicitly said to be in the process of being fixed! its small, I'm not getting my hopes too up, but I am glad to see that at least that very specific feedback on a pretty drastic change to npc appearances was checked, confirmed, and will be changed.

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by Kaziek

I feel like a good middle ground would be to adjust the character lighting slider to allow for it to go even darker than it currently is at zero. That would let people who enjoy the way things look now continue to do so, while letting those who preferred the old style have it back again.

---

This sounds like an inelegant solution to me, since this would necessarily mean our characters would also appear more darkly lit even in broad daylight with 'character lighting' at a subzero setting, creating the same problem in reverse. Only the players who were indifferent to begin with would be pleased with that, I think, since they wouldn't be adjusting the setting either way.

Toning down what we currently have to better match ambient lighting -- as it should have, to begin with -- and relegating the rest to the player's discretion through 'character lighting' makes the most sense to me.

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by Turnintino

This sounds like an inelegant solution to me, since this would necessarily mean our characters would also appear more darkly lit even in broad daylight with 'character lighting' at a subzero setting, creating the same problem in reverse. Only the players who were indifferent to begin with would be pleased with that, I think, since they wouldn't be adjusting the setting either way.

Toning down what we currently have to better match ambient lighting -- as it should have, to begin with -- and relegating the rest to the player's discretion through 'character lighting' makes the most sense to me.

---

I may not have put it in a way that was clear. Your idea is what I meant, where the new zero setting is more accurately reflecting environment lighting and shadow on the character (which will end up being darker in most cases compared to how it is right now). I was just suggesting that the character lighting setting have a wider range to keep people who enjoy the current options happy if changes were made.

Ah, I see! Yeah, we're on the same page. ^_^b

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by Kaziek

I feel like a good middle ground would be to adjust the character lighting slider to allow for it to go even darker than it currently is at zero. That would let people who enjoy the way things look now continue to do so, while letting those who preferred the old style have it back again.

---

That's a great idea. I'd definitely make use of that.

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by CidHeiral

That's a great idea. I'd definitely make use of that.

---

Ditto. I don't think the problem ends at characters being too brightly lit while in the shade either; I've been saying for a bit now that characters glow like lightbulbs in direct sunlight, especially those with paler skin. IMO character lighting is way too high across the board and looks terrible.

Are they really going to do something to the eyes? If so, that's great news. I gave up the game just because I just can't look at my cat with new eyes.

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by Dazedu

Are they really going to do something to the eyes? If so, that's great news. I gave up the game just because I just can't look at my cat with new eyes.

---

Next Live Letter coming November 1st… really hope we get some more details about exactly what they will change and what they will not, as well as some updated examples so we know what to expect!

Curious what people think considering the upcoming changes to characters again next patch. Should the free fantasia quest reappear for everyone who completed it? It seems only fair to give folks a chance to make adjustments if need be the same as DT launch.

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by PaulusHamsteru

I miss my old character.

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

The new one has no personality and looks weird as hell. He always has this blank look on his face now.

https://i.imgur.com/yZdPk5Q.jpeg

---

Yoshi, pls.

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by Erin1491

Curious what people think considering the upcoming changes to characters again next patch. Should the free fantasia quest reappear for everyone who completed it? It seems only fair to give folks a chance to make adjustments if need be the same as DT launch.

---

Agreed, they really should so something like this

This is super late but I wanted to make a comparison of my character as well.

It's Au Ra(f) Face 4. I miss her a lot. :(

I'm most annoyed by her mouth area so I focused on that.

Face 4's change to the eyes (bigger pupils, less intense stare) bothers me as well but I didn't have time to make an in-depth comparison of them.

I think other people have pointed this problem out before though so I hope it gets taken into account.

I compared the DT model to the original EW model as well as to an edit of the DT model where I tried to paint the old mouth back in as well as I could.
(Unfortunately I don't have pictures of my EW and DT char in the exact same situation so I wanted to make this extra comparison.)

The edited one is not a perfect comparison (I didn't get the upper lip right 1:1, sorry :( ) but I hope it can still demonstrate the key differences.

-----

Baseline


https://64.media.tumblr.com/4f7ba35c...c33b3c3faa.pnj

-----

In the one below I made a "compromise" regarding her jaw to adjust the balance of the proportions to the new DT model.
(The lips are the same as in the other edit.)
It's less puffed up, like in EW, but the face has the same length as in DT (the EW one is slightly shortened).

https://64.media.tumblr.com/9ab1e053...de307c50e3.pnj

-----

Comparison

In DT her cheeks are more puffy. The shadows at the corners of her lips are more pronounced, adding to the puffed up look.

To me she looks like she has a constant subtle "Hmpf"-expression.
She looks more "mildly displeased" than "fierce/piercing".

The lips are also a lot more curvy in every aspect: the philtrum, the shapes of the upper and lower lip, as well as the line where the upper and the lower lip meet.
(See gifs below for detailed demonstrations.)


(This is the most flattering lighting btw. It reduces the puffiness as much as possible, and yet you can still see it. In other lighting situations it is much more pronounced.)


Original EW vs. DT

(Ignore the DT eyebrows. I changed them after launch so they can't be compared to the EW eyebrows but I only noticed this after I was done with my editing. orz)

https://64.media.tumblr.com/e61dee9f...c7aeed3b75.pnjhttps://64.media.tumblr.com/fedef70c...30ea138c3b.pnj


https://64.media.tumblr.com/7ccc06c8...13551c133.gifvhttps://64.media.tumblr.com/20c88560...830f8f5b5.gifv
https://64.media.tumblr.com/a1908258...dcdff0d59.gifvhttps://64.media.tumblr.com/dd34e3fd...7e6512ad4.gifv


https://64.media.tumblr.com/c2ac48a6...5c33c6798.gifvhttps://64.media.tumblr.com/e92c93c5...676866f3f.gifv
https://64.media.tumblr.com/f86a0a5e...f1bcf940a.gifvhttps://64.media.tumblr.com/49a8b7e9...d1f82afb6.gifv


DT vs. Edit

https://64.media.tumblr.com/517f4a4b...20891de41.gifv


https://64.media.tumblr.com/b5b69874...131a058e9.gifv

https://64.media.tumblr.com/1e32531e...eee28858c.gifv

https://64.media.tumblr.com/b224ddd8...5caec41f8.gifv

https://64.media.tumblr.com/6205b914...6f52e747f.gifv

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by Loggos

Au ra face 4 comparison

---

(Sorry for the double post but I can't add any more graphics to the first one.

Edit: Also, I'm sorry for taking up so much space on this page but I wanted to do these comparisons as thoroughly as possible and for several characters, hoping it's somewhat useful feedback if the devs really look at this thread.)

-----

Here is an example of the change "in action". The graphics update completely altered the way emotes look. Those are not the same facial expressions and I really miss the EW one.

The "puffiness" and somewhat puckered lips are also a lot more visible here. Same goes for the differences regarding the general face shape and jaw line.
This reflects the average ingame look a lot more than the CC images.

https://64.media.tumblr.com/1b0ff065...2b8bdb78c5.pnj

https://64.media.tumblr.com/aa11b2d0...6c6b2ae39.gifv https://64.media.tumblr.com/6a53c359...793d4f531.gifv https://64.media.tumblr.com/900b04a6...e1814e59f.gifv

Schematic drawings:

https://64.media.tumblr.com/a3025e2f...e84b13321d.pnj

-----


Edit: Viera and Elezen

Last one, I promise! :'D

But I was able to take some EW benchmark screenshots and made some thorough face comparisons for my viera and elezen, since they've been hit pretty hard, as well.

(I made a proper full-face comparison of my Au Ra too this time, so I'll include it as well.)


Viera (m), face 3

I'm not gonna say much and let the pictures speak for themselves because that's just a different face.
The mouth and the face shape are the biggest offenders but the nose and the eyes are different too.
(The latter lost that confident/piercing gaze. The colours of the lashes, the iris and the pupil have been muted so much the eyes now look "cloudy"/glassy/milky and lifeless. Please bring the original saturation back. The DT eyes are also slightly softer/smoothed down whereas the EW eyes' shapes are "sharper".)

The DT face doesn't look terrible at least (though I definitely prefer the EW version) but this is definitely not adapted "as closely to the original as possible".

https://64.media.tumblr.com/04dc7ae0...55251b9382.pnj

https://64.media.tumblr.com/26d9842d...85f22bf49.gifv https://64.media.tumblr.com/7303a8ee...a5dcb8fe8.gifv https://64.media.tumblr.com/675b6e8a...e05394aeb.gifv

Schematic drawings:

https://64.media.tumblr.com/97b47636...97c00aa0b6.pnj

Elezen (m), face 3

This has to be one of the most egregious examples I have seen because not only is the new face completely different, it also doesn't look all that appealing anymore.

The mouth is such a downgrade. In top of that it has lost all its sheen (even though the DT face is wearing light lip colour!). The nose and the eyes have been altered significantly, as well, and are straight-up different features.
Also, the ears! I liked the old ones better, esp. the pointy tips.
Lastly, the whole face just looks terribly flat now. (And no, it's not just the CC lighting. He looks like that ingame as well.)

https://64.media.tumblr.com/826451f8...7bea77bf3b.pnj

https://64.media.tumblr.com/91455ff9...006bbfdc7.gifv https://64.media.tumblr.com/70d7b1c5...7e8cb27da.gifv https://64.media.tumblr.com/a9915105...7d351565f.gifv

Schematic drawings:

https://64.media.tumblr.com/da51adac...656a810488.pnj

-----

Au ra (f), face 4

Everything's already been said but here is a proper full face comparison to make it complete.

https://64.media.tumblr.com/52f3e978...64b86168ef.pnj

https://64.media.tumblr.com/bd1d509b...c9aaf480c.gifv https://64.media.tumblr.com/da940b8f...bee44e30a.gifv https://64.media.tumblr.com/6aa60cb8...8c610d83a.gifv


Schematic drawings:

https://64.media.tumblr.com/55df8586...f8d94bd019.pnj

Something that I still don't understand about this graphical update is.... why now?
Once upon a time miqo'te and elezen had hats specially molded to their ears, and miqo'te had gear made to accommodate for their tails. Not only do viera and brothgar STILL have no hat support, but we're also seeing less and less gear that accommodates for these racial features. Additionally, hrothgar♀ have botched rigging. We haven't even gotten more customization options to make the graphical update (and the free fantasia) actually worthwhile.

And this is all without going into the technical details that in my honest opinion should have been addressed before giving this game a landlord's paint-over. The game is being held together by two toothpicks and the power of God, and yet what we needed and got was a botched facelift? It all seems counter-intuitive to me. Change for change's sake. Wrong priorities.


In regards to the feedback we've gotten in early September, you cannot convince me these faces look the way they do because of "an increased number of polygons and the improved accuracy of normal mapping":

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by Loggos

https://64.media.tumblr.com/826451f8...7bea77bf3b.pnj

---

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by Einnecy

https://i.imgur.com/U082c3A.png
Please disregard the difference in hair colour. Every other option is the same between the two pictures.

---

I'm still here. Still mulling things over. Whether this is the push I needed to get into modding and learn 3D, or accept what is and move on. I like to think some of my feedback was heard. I hope it was. I hope the next PLL and 7.1 bring good news and our characters back home. But a large part of me will always think this graphical update was entirely unnecessary. I wish they had left the game alone. As I said in the beginning, there were so many things which should have been addressed first.
I don't know how relevant this is to the thread anymore, but I thought it was worth putting out there.

I saw that they were changing it so Au Ra horns don't have light shining through them anymore, which is a huge shame.... it was beautiful! Light shines through fingernails, even ear cartilage, it wouldn't be inaccurate for it to shine through the edges of Au Ra horns too, no?

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by jiangzai

I saw that they were changing it so Au Ra horns don't have light shining through them anymore, which is a huge shame.... it was beautiful! Light shines through fingernails, even ear cartilage, it wouldn't be inaccurate for it to shine through the edges of Au Ra horns too, no?

---

Are they changing it so light doesn't shine through anymore? Or just adjusting it so it's not such a strong effect? I thought it looked nice on my au'ra's horns too but it was waaaaay overtuned. They have some serious problems with the lighting still in general.

https://i.imgur.com/p9KHUZG.png

Stood next to a window and my hair and horns went nuclear. Even the insides of my eyes and mouth catch light they shouldn't be.

https://i.imgur.com/gKbEp5m.png

Same on my cat. Glowing hair, and light coming through the head and lighting inner edges that shouldn't be lit.

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by jiangzai

I saw that they were changing it so Au Ra horns don't have light shining through them anymore, which is a huge shame.... it was beautiful! Light shines through fingernails, even ear cartilage, it wouldn't be inaccurate for it to shine through the edges of Au Ra horns too, no?

---

The explanation they gave is that Au Ra horns don't actually contain blood vessels unlike all those other features, so the subsurface scattering is inaccurate in that case.

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by Cheapshot

https://i.imgur.com/p9KHUZG.png

Stood next to a window and my hair and horns went nuclear. Even the insides of my eyes and mouth catch light they shouldn't be.

https://i.imgur.com/gKbEp5m.png

Same on my cat. Glowing hair, and light coming through the head and lighting inner edges that shouldn't be lit.

---

This is probably the most egregious problem with the lighting engine right now. Let's all pray our glowing lower eyelids aren't one of those mysterious "spec" items.

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by Einnecy

Something that I still don't understand about this graphical update is.... why now?

---

I've been wondering about something similar. Why release an update that is evidently not finished together with a new expansion, something highly anticipated, highly scrutinised, that is supposed to draw lots of attention (incl. professional and consumer reviews) to your product and attract new people?

The graphics update is so inconsistent, it feels like it was a chaotic last minute assembly. Faces have been "updated", bodies haven't.
Some hair and gear textures have been changed, some haven't.
Lighting has been changed but the quality in old regions or houses often went down etc. etc. Everything aboutit felt unfinished.

I'll forever be sad that we didn't get the kind of graphics update they were originally working on when they talked about it the very first time:

https://youtu.be/18-F5uAyRgw?t=424

https://64.media.tumblr.com/6e69bcd3...21b95f2eec.pnj

https://64.media.tumblr.com/72c5d01e...dcc909ed72.pnj

https://64.media.tumblr.com/0c1e623e...364a7e1127.pnj

https://64.media.tumblr.com/a51c7b1e...0788d7239e.pnj

https://64.media.tumblr.com/fb49ae77...753a347429.pnj

(Yes, I know this was "still in development and subject to change".)

Here they only updated the shaders and the face models on the "high res" side are the same as the original ones if I understand it correctly.
The characters look so good, all while retaining their unique features and personality.
That miqo'te is stunning imo.
(The skin textures in particular look so much better and more realistic than what we got. The eyes too. And before you say "that's not ingame lighting, that's their 3D program" or something: it doesn't change the fact that they chose those images to advertise what it would look like ingame according to their plans at that point in time.)


Even if updating shaders will not be a solution forever and at some point you'll have to work on the models, it might still have been an interim update that's consistent as opposed to what we got now?
If you """just""" improve shaders and have no modelling work to do then perhaps the quality of your graphics will increase more evenly across your entire game?

I'm not saying it would be easy, I'm sure updating shaders comes with its own technical challenges.
But I wonder if those are higher than the technical challenges the devs had to overcome wrt the actual update we got (including future challenges to build on the current update for further improvements).
Or if they just didn't want to stick with their original shader plan out of convenience (e.g., for lip syncing purposes, saving money bc why reinvest into FF14, etc.).

I think loggos' viera is another good example of how much more gray/cool toned dark skin tones have become with the update. I'm not sure if its partially because of how overtuned the shine is on dark skin now, but its really a shame. xiv has never had the best color palette or skin tone options, but now (other than male mooncats bizarrely being a little bit more warm toned for some reason), it feels like across the board a lot of the little warmth that was there has been pulled out of certain colors.
(There's probably more going on than just the shine though because I just remembered that some of my friends who play dark skinned au ra with fantasy skintones also had their undertones completely change)

Yeah it's a lot ashier compared to the EW version and more desaturated as well. Even though pre-DT ffxiv always had lighting issues when it came to dark skin characters at least the CC options looked more alive. You had a wider variety of true undertones and different levels of saturation. Now it seems like all colour choices are kind of washed out and their undertones are a lot closer to grey, minimising the differences between them.

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by jiangzai

I saw that they were changing it so Au Ra horns don't have light shining through them anymore, which is a huge shame.... it was beautiful! Light shines through fingernails, even ear cartilage, it wouldn't be inaccurate for it to shine through the edges of Au Ra horns too, no?

---

I believe what they plan to do is change the color of the subsurface scattering so it's not red. Light should still shine through to some degree, but without blood in the horns, the light won't be tinged red. I hope that's what they do, in any event.

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by Cheapshot

Are they changing it so light doesn't shine through anymore? Or just adjusting it so it's not such a strong effect? I thought it looked nice on my au'ra's horns too but it was waaaaay overtuned. They have some serious problems with the lighting still in general.

https://i.imgur.com/p9KHUZG.png

Stood next to a window and my hair and horns went nuclear. Even the insides of my eyes and mouth catch light they shouldn't be.

https://i.imgur.com/gKbEp5m.png

Same on my cat. Glowing hair, and light coming through the head and lighting inner edges that shouldn't be lit.

---

Changing this would require something like ray tracing, which is not something they will do. I think we should be happy they managed to reduce the effect of it as much as they have. It used to be so much worse.

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by Astronis

It used to be so much worse.

---

Can you elaborate on this? Light shining through heads was not an issue prior to dawntrail

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by noumen0nn

Can you elaborate on this? Light shining through heads was not an issue prior to dawntrail

---

It absolutely was. I have no screenshots, unfortunately, because -- well, why would I have wanted to commemorate that? But I would notice light shining through my character's head between their lips all the time, for example, even more glaringly than in Cheapshot's examples. In my experience, at least, it's much reduced now. But of course I'd love to see it completely eliminated, if that's feasible, because it's still jarring.