MrHappy interview with yoshida from tokyo

[Shura]

I guess that thing that really worries me with said beast race is from what I can gather from the statements given they were already in development before Viera were on the table.

where they not confident enough in their work to say "let's finish this race (male and female) and give them bunnys (male and female) next expansion?

It's because they don't want to make new races period. It's time consuming and taxing on the rest of the development, everything from adjusting past gear, facial movements, cut scenes, movement and so on. if they release one race now M/F and did another next expansion, not only will they have to make adjustments for every past expansion gear but for all the new gear between those two expansions. Considering how in FFXIV every race can play any class, just between expansions, tens of thousands of gear would need adjustment which is all time consuming. Which is why they said point blank they don't want to add new races after this. They wanted to make a beast type race that is vastly different from anything we currently have and at the same time give people Viera since it was a popular choice among fans. Just like bringing gunblade back since it's a popular weapon among fans. They didn't have time to do both M/F for each so they decided to gender lock. That way they can make a new race, something they wanted while also giving fans Viera something fans wanted. Creating new races and adjusting them to gear isn't easy, old players probably remember when we had ears sticking out of helmets and necks that would shrink because of gear.

And the statement about wanting a third ranged attacker still sounds incredibly stupid to me considering how many people do things using the duty finder.

I don't understand why it would be stupid, people like certain play styles, some like healing, some like casting, some like tanking and some like ranged melees. Been playing Archer/Bard since 1.0 and I like the play style of doing physical dmg from a distance. While I don't know if I would like dancer, always felt that we didn't get much in terms of gear/design and classes. So I'm rather happy they realize that ranged melees are a bit lacking.

[Burningskull]

It's because they don't want to make new races period. It's time consuming and taxing on the rest of the development, everything from adjusting past gear, facial movements, cut scenes, movement and so on. if they release one race now M/F and did another next expansion, not only will they have to make adjustments for every past expansion gear but for all the new gear between those two expansions. Considering how in FFXIV every race can play any class, just between expansions, tens of thousands of gear would need adjustment which is all time consuming. Which is why they said point blank they don't want to add new races after this. They wanted to make a beast type race that is vastly different from anything we currently have and at the same time give people Viera since it was a popular choice among fans. Just like bringing gunblade back since it's a popular weapon among fans. They didn't have time to do both M/F for each so they decided to gender lock. That way they can make a new race, something they wanted while also giving fans Viera something fans wanted. Creating new races and adjusting them to gear isn't easy, old players probably remember when we had ears sticking out of helmets and necks that would shrink because of gear.




I don't understand why it would be stupid, people like certain play styles, some like healing, some like casting, some like tanking and some like ranged melees. Been playing Archer/Bard since 1.0 and I like the play style of doing physical dmg from a distance. While I don't know if I would like dancer, always felt that we didn't get much in terms of gear/design and classes. So I'm rather happy they realize that ranged melees are a bit lacking.

Hopefully since they are genderlocked now, and they adjust the gear for those races now, it wouldn't be "too" difficult to add in the opposite gender since they would already have the gear adjusted for those races... in theory... I'm not a 3D Modeler.

[Kidria]

Hopefully since they are genderlocked now, and they adjust the gear for those races now, it wouldn't be "too" difficult to add in the opposite gender since they would already have the gear adjusted for those races... in theory... I'm not a 3D Modeler.

Sadly it's not so simple. While you can argue that the 3D models share similarities (Hyur female base body, so to speak, is also pretty much the base for the rest of the females) there are still rigs and morphs that have to be taken into consideration. Male vs female is even bigger because some armors change drastically in terms of shape depending on the gender (the tried and true coliseum gear, for example.) and also have to take into account, at least somewhat, any morphs the players applied to their characters (ex: female busts). Depending how they model the other genders, and if the armor piece in question changes based on gender; morphs, meshes, and rigs, it can all add up to be just as difficult. I only have a rudimentary knowledge of 3D modeling, so please don't quote me, but I'd imagine it's still just as difficult adding a gender as it is the new race. Especially if there is obvious sexual dimorphism between them.

[Burningskull]

Sadly it's not so simple. While you can argue that the 3D models share similarities (Hyur female base body, so to speak, is also pretty much the base for the rest of the females) there are still rigs and morphs that have to be taken into consideration. Male vs female is even bigger because some armors change drastically in terms of shape depending on the gender (the tried and true coliseum gear, for example.) and also have to take into account, at least somewhat, any morphs the players applied to their characters (ex: female busts). Depending how they model the other genders, and if the armor piece in question changes based on gender; morphs, meshes, and rigs, it can all add up to be just as difficult. I only have a rudimentary knowledge of 3D modeling, so please don't quote me, but I'd imagine it's still just as difficult adding a gender as it is the new race. Especially if there is obvious sexual dimorphism between them.

That makes since. I was only thinking about headgear and failed to think about other stuff like what you mentioned. I was thinking that say once they got the headgear down to deal with Viera ears it would be easy to apply that to male Viera ears. I had forgot how some gear generally does look different on different genders. Not to mention the boobs... ah boobs... *drool*

[Kazran]

That makes since. I was only thinking about headgear and failed to think about other stuff like what you mentioned. I was thinking that say once they got the headgear down to deal with Viera ears it would be easy to apply that to male Viera ears. I had forgot how some gear generally does look different on different genders. Not to mention the boobs... ah boobs... *drool*

If Male Vierra shares their meshes and textures With Midlander Like Au'Ra, Elezen, and Miqote do then that would make things easier! and all those races have in my option very different body types! Alot of the work would be in the Helmets/headgear and the new body morph for the gear.

[Iscah]

If Male Vierra shares their meshes and textures With Midlander Like Au'Ra, Elezen, and Miqote do then that would make things easier! and all those races have in my option very different body types! Alot of the work would be in the Helmets/headgear and the new body morph for the gear.

Indeed. Gear for a late-addition second gender is far more likely to be remodeled from other races of the same gender, than the opposite gender of the same race. (Depending on hypothetical female Hrothgar design, I suppose...)

Curiously, I'd read somewhere that male Elezen actually share models with Roegadyn rather than the human-proportioned characters - which is rather odd but does probably explain why things sometimes scale oddly on Elezen. The best "proof" I'm aware of is that the monk Lv50 relic gear actually has a few different shirt designs - from memory, Hyur, Au Ra and Miqo'te have a high-necked black undershirt, but Elezen and Roegadyn only have the collar as a necklace.

(Can see for yourself - go into character creator, go through to job selection, pick monk, set the character to wear job gear, then backtrack to character creation and compare.)

. I think it's possible that this gender-lock might have been our only route to two races though, maybe we'd otherwise only have one. It might be impossible to say for sure if that's true, but if we picture it like that perhaps people can find more peace with it? (it sounds like a possible reality to me at least).

I've wondered about that. Whether maybe someone higher up said "no more races, we're not giving you the budget for it" so they put in the two half-races exactly because they knew the fandom would rage and demand the other half...

They still could have handled the reveal better. Especially confirming we had something other than Viera coming, "please look forward to it", and getting a lot of that rage out of the way early. Then at least there would be some excitement for the second reveal in itself, rather than being overshadowed by the full extent of the negative reaction.

[Kazran]

Indeed. Gear for a late-addition second gender is far more likely to be remodeled from other races of the same gender, than the opposite gender of the same race. (Depending on hypothetical female Hrothgar design, I suppose...)

Curiously, I'd read somewhere that male Elezen actually share models with Roegadyn rather than the human-proportioned characters - which is rather odd but does probably explain why things sometimes scale oddly on Elezen. The best "proof" I'm aware of is that the monk Lv50 relic gear actually has a few different shirt designs - from memory, Hyur, Au Ra and Miqo'te have a high-necked black undershirt, but Elezen and Roegadyn only have the collar as a necklace.

(Can see for yourself - go into character creator, go through to job selection, pick monk, set the character to wear job gear, then backtrack to character creation and compare.)

I'm going to be careful with my words, but lets say I know from experience that Elezen shares with Midlander and that Roe has its own category. I have looked into it and it seems to be the case that Elezen is a Midlander based race and Roe is all by itself, though I wonder if male Hrothgar will share with it since they are very similar.

[Burningskull]

I'm going to be careful with my words, but lets say I know from experience that Elezen shares with Midlander and that Roe has its own category. I have looked into it and it seems to be the case that Elezen is a Midlander based race and Roe is all by itself, though I wonder if male Hrothgar will share with it since they are very similar.

I really don't want Hrothgar to share Roe's model even if it's easier to just retexture and rig it so it hunches over like it appears to be in the video... I don't want Hrothgar to have orangutan syndrome. Roe's legs look shorter than they should for their body. I want Hrothgar to be proportioned right. However in the reveal video they appear to have the same problem so perhaps I shouldn't hope.

[Kazran]

I really don't want Hrothgar to share Roe's model even if it's easier to just retexture and rig it so it hunches over like it appears to be in the video... I don't want Hrothgar to have orangutan syndrome. Roe's legs look shorter than they should for their body. I want Hrothgar to be proportioned right. However in the reveal video they appear to have the same problem so perhaps I shouldn't hope.

They wouldn't share a body model, each would have their own body 'morph' as it were, this morph tells the gear mesh how to shape itself to appear as if your Avatar is wearing it, how to conform to the shape of their body as clothes and the like would naturally do! And so they could share gear models instead!

If they were to try to use a less thicc race as the base the gear would looked stretched out and weird and so they could use the gear made for roes as their body types would be much more compatible!

[Burningskull]

They wouldn't share a body model, each would have their own body 'morph' as it were, this morph tells the gear mesh how to shape itself to appear as if your Avatar is wearing it, how conform to the shape of their body as clothes and the like would naturally do! And so they could share gear models instead!

If they were to try to use a less thicc race as the base the gear would looked stretched out and weird and so they could use the gear made for roes as their body types would be much more compatible!

LOL. I'm not going to pretend I know what you are saying lol. I just hope they make their legs a tad bit longer ><