Is there a reason Character's Heads jerk around when talking?

This has been a thing since ARR. Whenever a character talks in a cutscene, there heads will bob around wierdly and janky and I don't understand why, but it's bothered me since forever. I've never seen this in any 3D video game before. And what's even more odd is that they are more than capable of controlling head movements, yet always when character's talk and only when they talk do their heads jerk around like this. It's just wierd and unnatural. People IRL ofc motion their heads occassionally when talking, but nothing like this.

There are plenty of scenes where characters don't do this and increasingly so but it still happens for the most part. Like I'm sure 99% of you know what I'm referring to here. What I suspect is that, probably related to the spaghetti code, character model's opening their mouths to speak is somehow tied to the entire head movement, and talking triggers the wierd jerking around of the head, and they have to manually animate a scene to prevent this.

I dunno it's just wierd, and I've wondered since forever why it happens. Anyone have any idea?

Myself and friends call this "chicken pecking" and find it most amusing.

https://c.tenor.com/voESVDdr7VsAAAAM...better-dog.gif

Not going to give a forum troll the honor of a measured response. Good day.

Kupo, don't judge lol because if we had to do all the things our toons do...I am sure we would have some CNS issues kupo <3 loool

lol I've noticed this, but it's never bothered me too much. I think it's funny now that it's being brought up in the OF cuz I think everyone's noticed it to some extent. Yeah it is awkward, idk why they're animated like that.

It's noticeable with male Hyurs. They're also prone to putting one hand on their hip and rocking back and forth while standing during a cutscene that has Machinations playing in the background for the thousandth time.

I just consider it a relic of the game being developed like 15 years ago. I imagine a lot of this jank will start to get smoothed over with the visual TLC patches that are coming in the future. We already saw the end of dungeon weapon sheathing animations get a bit of a once over with Endwalker.

Japanese cultural thing. Something something, it's considered showing interest and blahblah. Watch the girls head and enjoy a good clip. They're always nodding and so on, affirming what they say, etc.

https://youtu.be/eXpyr0aVkHM

ITT: OP has never seen an anime.

This man shares your pain: https://youtube.com/shorts/xIANCyXGN5I?feature=share

I can't unsee it! Ever since I noticed Minfilia and Alphinaud doing this in ARR I realized everyone was doing it. At least I can forget about it like cat that has no object permanence, or begin to accept this as a nose and it finally fades from my view. It will soon be just a memory until I notice it again.

My favorite is the nodding at each other though. I feel like the scene from the family guy starwars.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QBK069sN9DQ

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Originally Posted by Droxybrobotnik

Not going to give a forum troll the honor of a measured response. Good day.

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lol true. he has said some pretty dumb stuff in other threads.

MORE.

https://i.ibb.co/rsMb16f/vieranod.gif

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Originally Posted by SeverianLyonesse

ITT: OP has never seen an anime.

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I've watched countless animes and this literally never happens. Else I would have noticed it. I have never seen this before in any other video game let alone animated media. It is clearrly something with the rigging of the character models that causes this specifically when talking. It is extremely janking and unnatural looking.

I don't think some of you even know what I'm talking about, understandable if you just skip cutscenes, but what I am referring to is like the above poster's example. Characters, when talking, do this bizarre pecking with their heads like someone from the previous page said I don't know how else to describe it. Their heads jerk forward and bob around. It's odd.

What's especially odd is I've noticed numerous npcs who talk to eachother in cities/out in the world with uniquely rigged animations who don't do this and just animate like an actual person. Go up to any pair/group of npcs in a city like Kugane that talk to eachother and they don't do the wierd head jerking, they animate very fluidly and organically. I know these npcs have custom animations but clearly it shows they know how to do organic head movements when a character is speaking, so I dont understand wtf is going on with characters in cutscenes.

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Originally Posted by Droxybrobotnik

Not going to give a forum troll the honor of a measured response. Good day.

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*Comes to a completely innocuous thread to seethe about an argument from an entirely unrelated thread just to say you aren't going to respond, but in so doing are, in fact, responding*

Meds. Now.

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Originally Posted by Faafetai

I can't unsee it! Ever since I noticed Minfilia and Alphinaud doing this in ARR I realized everyone was doing it. At least I can forget about it like cat that has no object permanence, or begin to accept this as a nose and it finally fades from my view. It will soon be just a memory until I notice it again.

My favorite is the nodding at each other though. I feel like the scene from the family guy starwars.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QBK069sN9DQ

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Some people have claimed the nodding is some sort of cultural thing in Japan/an anime thing, which is complely false and I have no idea where these people get this from. It's an entirely unique thing to FFXIV. It's probably the devs do not know how to convey agreement without nodding, despite their being numerous ways for a character to express agreement/approval/etc. to another character without nodding, and now it's become such a meme that they do it as a half as a joke now.

XIV's facial/head animations can be definitely rather...robotic outside of the cutscenes that are using custom rigging and deliberately trying to avoid that.

I'm immediately reminded of that meme GIF of the Hyur doing a /laugh then immediately transitioning back to his default serious face that makes it look like he was being sarcastic.

Simply making the movements more gradual in both regards would make things look more natural.

Never noticed until you mentioned it lol. Pretty sure Japanese don't nod like the characters in game do.

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Originally Posted by KageTokage

XIV's facial/head animations can be definitely rather...robotic outside of the cutscenes that are using custom rigging and deliberately trying to avoid that.

I'm immediately reminded of that meme GIF of the Hyur doing a /laugh then immediately transitioning back to his default serious face that makes it look like he was being sarcastic.

Simply making the movements more gradual in both regards would make things look more natural.

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Lmao, I remember seeing that one.

It does look really funny in some cutscenes. I've found myself wondering if they were hurting their necks doing that more than once x.x

Quote:

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Originally Posted by KageTokage

XIV's facial/head animations can be definitely rather...robotic outside of the cutscenes that are using custom rigging and deliberately trying to avoid that.

I'm immediately reminded of that meme GIF of the Hyur doing a /laugh then immediately transitioning back to his default serious face that makes it look like he was being sarcastic.

Simply making the movements more gradual in both regards would make things look more natural.

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https://c.tenor.com/jE0FJoSS66MAAAAS...nder-laugh.gif

I don't think it necessarily has anything to do with coding, probably just a way to give more animation so it's clear they are talking, especially when the dialogue isn't voiced. Just makes it more "readable" as talking.

I've never noticed this. Probably because I'm usually looking at stuff on my other monitor while the cutscenes are running.

To be honest I've never even noticed this until it was pointed out.
I bet it was just some animator thinking "people standing around talking would look too boring".

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Originally Posted by Tetsujin

Japanese cultural thing. Something something, it's considered showing interest and blahblah. Watch the girls head and enjoy a good clip. They're always nodding and so on, affirming what they say, etc.

https://youtu.be/eXpyr0aVkHM

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Ok, that was adorable. Thanks for that.

Have never noticed this at all and I’ve played off and on since 2.0