Hyurgoth face 1, black hair and eyebrows
I simply don't recognise my character anymore...



The difference is really disturbing..


Don't get me wrong the character is pretty, the lights and textures are definitely better.
But the general look is completely different.

The dark hair and eyebrows colors seem to be washed out by the lighting compared to before. The black hair doesn't show as dark, more like dark grey or dark blue, which is a common issue in video games that I always struggle with as I always put black hair on my characters, but this was never an issue with FFXIV before... And it can really mess up the eyebrows as well, and thus the expression of the character.

Eyebrows are less full (even if you add the stronger eyebrows facial feature they still have holes like the regular eyebrows, the facial feature that you can toggle was specifically supposed to fix that by giving you strong eyebrows but now even with this feature activated the eyebrows are still not full...)



The eye shape was modified, Eye 3 is supposed to be the only "fox" type eyes for all races, that's the reason why they're my favorite eye shape and why I pick those eyes for all of my WoL, but now the shape isn't as "foxy" anymore as the tip of the eyes now falls downward like all other eye shapes of the game...

The 2nd facial feature that is a sort of liner/black eyeshadow is almost completely useless now, there's barely any difference when you toggle it. The fact that we lost some of the strength of the black/dark shades makes the eyelashes more discreet and thus makes the eyes feel smaller. Even if you activate this facial feature that is supposed to make the eyelashes and eyes pop up a bit more doesn't help at all as the difference is absurdly small. It could've been a solution to this "smaller eyes" feelings but no, it doesn't change anything...

BUT my biggest issue is still the mouth/lips.
They're completely different from before.
I don't mind the new texture at all but the way they changed the line/shape and completely removed the lip corners shades is a big issue to me. The lips suddenly feel fake and doll-like, definitely less realistic than before so for me this is the only real downgrade so far. They also give a more "pokerface" expression to the character while the expression was more neutral and natural before, now she feels a bit haughty...



The face looks more round and young generally speaking, the chin's shape was definitely smoothed for all races, that's not a big issue to me but if you add it to the rest it really makes my character feel like a complete different character...