I realize Dark Knight is coming in Heavensward, but why are shadows so BLACK?

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=w2Q7MlpPSOQ

If you don't know what I'm talking about, watch this video. I recorded a Heavensward benchmark run, so you can see what I'm seeing. All places where dynamic shadows are being cast are like pitch black, the engine is completely crushing all shadow detail right now. It's easily noticeable for example on all flying mounts when the sun is behind them, the front of the mounts is all pitch black. Similarly, when Alexander raises his leg out of the water, the underside of his leg is completely black and all the flying mounts flying across the screen in the background are all black. Later on when the party confronts the dragon, you can barely see it because it's all black on black. I don't really think this is being correctly rendered, it looks fine right now in the existing client in-game. Hopefully this can be corrected in the released Heavensward client.

The benchmark was run at 4K resolution, DX11 Maximum. You can see my system in the lower left corner of the screen. Yes, framerate is that bad in 4K on a GTX 970. I need a GTX 980 Ti, sigh.

They actually did change the lighting engine, including removing a minor ambient effect centered on player characters.

I'm curious to see how it looks in action. I think it could add quite a lot of atmosphere. I'm actually reminded of the art direction of FF6, which was defined by a lot of low-saturation, high-contrast colors.

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Originally Posted by Mahri

They actually did change the lighting engine, including removing a minor ambient effect centered on player characters.

I'm curious to see how it looks in action. I think it could add quite a lot of atmosphere. I'm actually reminded of the art direction of FF6, which was defined by a lot of low-saturation, high-contrast colors.

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As Mahri said, it's darker and it's because they made it so :P, but I wanted to add that you can turn your character "light" back on and up.

Anyone notice the increased contrast and change in lighting for Steps of Faith battle? I presume that is how the new areas lighting will appear, personally I think it looks great. As for the black shadows if you adjust your settings (as well as on your monitor) you can level it out a bit and bring back some of the detail. It worked for a few people I know, depending on the contrast range for your monitor the new shadows may appear a bit too dark. But as they said you should be able to toggle the settings back to the original lighting.

(Obligatory Bane Quote)

Some of what they've said about darkness and lack of color had me concerned, but as long as we can still see what's going on, I'm fine with it.

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Originally Posted by Gunspec

(Obligatory Bane Quote)

Some of what they've said about darkness and lack of color had me concerned, but as long as we can still see what's going on, I'm fine with it.

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http://i.imgur.com/BptTvOY.jpg

Yoshida mentioned something about the lighting during his demo of Heavensward, that the char "light" was off, but players who wanted that light back would have a option to turn it on. TBH its more realistic, to have a bright light behind a tree such as a sun set and to see the tree in shadow it will appear to be darker than it really was from that pov(at least in photography it does).

Found the little self light slider:

http://www.twitch.tv/finalfantasyxiv/v/5280683?t=72m25s

Subtle mood setting difference, but keep in mind the area's light isn't particularly bright either (vs the sun shining down on you).

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Originally Posted by Shougun

Found the little self light slider:

http://www.twitch.tv/finalfantasyxiv/v/5280683?t=72m25s

Subtle mood setting difference, but keep in mind the area's light isn't particularly bright either (vs the sun shining down on you).

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Interesting. However what about mounts, other players, and mobs?

Based on interview with Yoshida.

Yoshida: The shading of the graphics is definitely darker this time around. Actually, there used to be lighting on the character even if there was no ambient lighting in an area, but with more of an emphasis on the image quality, we've turned it off. However, you can bring it back with a slider in the system settings to make it look more like A Realm Reborn.

Will the lighting disappear even in 2.0 areas?

Yoshida: It will. Actually, we've also changed shadows in the 2.0 areas as a whole to make them more picturesque. I think the new style is better, but if you play with the lighting and gamma, you can get it close to the original atmosphere. We got differing feedback on the brightness of the original game where some people liked it and some were troubled by it. We decided long ago that after the patch 2.55 scenario the overall atmosphere would be plunged into darkness.

Yoshida did say he wanted the expansion to be dark compared to the original game (2.0). This is probably to enhance the dark setting of Ishgard and Heavensward. The gothic architecture of the main city in Ishgard also goes in that sense.

I hope Yoshi realizes that players do like being able to see themselves, other players, monsters, etc. Black blobs fighting black blobs isn't very aesthetically pleasing nor is it very practical in terms of seeing what is going on.

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Originally Posted by Illya

Interesting. However what about mounts, other players, and mobs?

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That is a good question, you can see in the video that all players lighting changes with the slider and I imagine it would also apply to mounts (just because of how the mount is likely perceived by the game..). However, I don't believe there is anything particular to that question on mounts and monsters, sorry :(. If I find an answer specifically I'll update the thread.

Since the game overall will be darker, as suggested above, you could try fiddling with your monitor and GPU settings (and game gamma). Or... try some DirectX injector - which there are a number of quite powerful options. I don't think you'll get a yay or nay from an official source if these are ok to use, that's a bit scary lol (threads on like tools have been on the forums and not removed though, if that means anything).

i dont mind it personally, i think it helps set a certain kind of mood for ishgard

They just need to make an off hand item....

http://everquest.allakhazam.com/pgfx/item_507.png

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Originally Posted by Illya

I hope Yoshi realizes that players do like being able to see themselves, other players, monsters, etc. Black blobs fighting black blobs isn't very aesthetically pleasing nor is it very practical in terms of seeing what is going on.

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I have faith in the dev team and the QA team to look at the game before releasing it. Of course the graphics might not be optimal on cold war era computers, but I am sure that is not the case for anyone here.

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Originally Posted by Kaethra

They just need to make an off hand item....

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Maybe a tonberry lamp. Or better yet, a tonberry pet.

Ugh I'm so sick of racist persons on the thread

obvious sarcasm/joke is hopefully obvious

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Originally Posted by Illya

OPs Words

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So i ran the Benchmark on maximum DX11 on my R9290x, and aside from discovering the Benchmark doesn't do 5760x1084 properly, i didn't have the kind of shadow problems i can see in your video.
Shadows were noticeably darker on the underside of my character/mount when in bright light, but not so dark as to look pitch black as your video does.

This may simply be an issue with the 4K Resolution. Try running it again on maximum settings with a standard 1920x1080 resolution and see if the Shadows remain pitch black. If they do, you'll have to look to your Monitor's Contrast/Gamma settings for the problem.

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Originally Posted by Illya

I hope Yoshi realizes that players do like being able to see themselves, other players, monsters, etc. Black blobs fighting black blobs isn't very aesthetically pleasing nor is it very practical in terms of seeing what is going on.

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you think they didn't have it in mind?
and like others said, there's a slider so you can make it look like now.

they made HW darker, cause of the apocalyptic "vibe" of the story; with what happend in 2.55 story, and what's happening in Ishgard.
All they really did, was remove the light source that is always in front of the character; which you can turn on/off-slider.
There's always ambient light, so your character isn't gonna be a black blob, They will adjust ambient lights, so your char is always visable.
They kind of do this is every movie, when the setting turns bleak. First harry potter movies are very colorful, while the last movies are less color, more contrast, etc.

Oh, so it's adjustable? When I tried the benchmark, the depth of the shadows was one of the first things I noticed. As for the last scene in the benchmark, there are a couple of camera angles where the PCs kind of blend into the arena IMO, but I think that's more to do with the color scheme (eg dark clothes on the BLM and the purple/lint-colored flooring) than the lighting in that instance.

As long as we can cancel out his changes to lighting and make lighting levels like they are now, then I'm good.

I see what you're talking about but it looks more natural to me. Up until now the entire game world has felt like it has a very low level of ambient light absolutely everywhere and it ruins the mood in areas with more interesting lighting as you can't see the contrast properly. This is an atmospheric change and I really like it.

I'm personally fine with increased darkness. Because of my class, I have a personal lamp with me wherever I go anyhow......