Dawntrail Graphics Update - Feedback on changes to the world's aesthetic and feel

[SongOfTheWind]

Old areas looking terrible is especially appalling, as this graphical update was meant to attract new players (lets face it - who really cared among existing ones enough to quit over it?) - and now they are going to be stuck with ugly for 5 expansions. Where is the logic in it?
And based on how our characters turned out - I personally don’t have much faith that those areas will truly get their artistic vision restored even with more iterations.

[Daralii]

Old areas looking terrible is especially appalling, as this graphical update was meant to attract new players (lets face it - who really cared among existing ones enough to quit over it?) - and now they are going to be stuck with ugly for 5 expansions. Where is the logic in it?
And based on how our characters turned out - I personally don’t have much faith that those areas will truly get their artistic vision restored even with more iterations.

My extremely jaded guess is that it was something that wasn't originally planned and was sloppily put together because CBU3 or SE marketing realized that the expansion didn't have many selling points that weren't just more of the same formula. I don't know how else to explain something as basic as updated characters from the neck down getting pushed back to "It's coming later".

[Granyala]

I don't know how else to explain something as basic as updated characters from the neck down getting pushed back to "It's coming later".

Because it's an extreme amount of work. Clothing does not go over the body model, the body model is part of it and slightly different for each attire. If you want to make changes other than simple texture upscaling / shader conversions (these two can be automated in many cases) ... if you want to make model changes you have to redo them.

ALL OF THEM.

Given how much gear a 10yr old MMO has, that ain't really feasible within a short-ish timeframe.