Dawntrail character graphics update - opinions, requests and discussion megathread

[Moonfallen]

Went through all the expressions for emotes...they are absolutely horrendous now. They really look awful on certain faces/mouths now and I just can't. They definitely changed something in regards to the animations as well because they do not look the same as they did before 7.0. The mouth just looks incredibly off when emoting. I'm also getting terrible eye strain and issues to where I can no longer play the game as long. Waterfalls and other areas seem to flicker A LOT and no matter what I change for graphics settings nothing helps the eye strain/issues or the flickering. The graphics before caused issues in that I had a hard time seeing some things which caused me to turn the brightness and graphics down for the game and now it's even worse. I just can't get happy with the graphics or how my WoL looks now. A lot of the lighting is just off which makes my characters look even more different and ugly.

[Hatsuoki]

Went through all the expressions for emotes...they are absolutely horrendous now. They really look awful on certain faces/mouths now and I just can't. They definitely changed something in regards to the animations as well because they do not look the same as they did before 7.0. The mouth just looks incredibly off when emoting. I'm also getting terrible eye strain and issues to where I can no longer play the game as long. Waterfalls and other areas seem to flicker A LOT and no matter what I change for graphics settings nothing helps the eye strain/issues or the flickering. The graphics before caused issues in that I had a hard time seeing some things which caused me to turn the brightness and graphics down for the game and now it's even worse. I just can't get happy with the graphics or how my WoL looks now. A lot of the lighting is just off which makes my characters look even more different and ugly.

Agreed. I also just went through all of the emotes and a lot of the expressions feel stretched, too exaggerated, and hildibrand-esque. It's uncanny.

This is the closest I could get the same emote and expression to an old picture I had. I used to be able to take a lot of pictures effortlessly and spontaneously and it would look good. I would randomly stop and take a picture because something looked good and the lighting was just right. Now I have to fight every angle and frame to get something decent and I haven't felt that urge to just stop and take a picture again.

[Argantaelle]

I have a feeling the FFXIV team sacrificed players' enjoyment for the sake of unification and ease of development (that's why some "unusual" mouths turned into a convenient triangle, like male Elezen mouth type 2 and male Au Ra face 2 mouths). I understand that some sacrifices have to be made, but I'd rather look for a healthy compromise between players' expectations (who've grown attached to their characters during all years of playing FFXIV) and not putting strain on the FFXIV team. Unfortunately, it hasn't been done. We haven't even gotten an explanation for why the development team decided to deviate from their initial intention to preserve characters' features.

I see that some race and gender combinations got more attention than others (for example, my Roegadyn friend is very happy with the changes to her character's face), and some race-gender-face combinations turned out to be half-baked (unfortunately, my character's face belongs to the second category; I've made more than enough posts about it, and I would rather not make other people read through all those lengthy posts again ).

I would like to ask a development team about their future plans and if there is any chance to correct the appearance of some race and gender combinations. Also, I thought about posting this long rant on Japanese forums, but I'm afraid auto-translation might do a poor job. So I'm making the post in this thread, where the developers won't see it for sure, but at least I've got the burden off my chest and used the last day of my subscription, haha.

[RulerKelso]

Hair color is my biggest gripe in this new graphic rework.
Hair no longer has the same vibrant colors like in old graphic version.
Most hair colors I tested are washed out during gameplay, with black color ended on the worst end of spectrum. Only the colors on the light spectrum of the palette looks right (more or less - also depending on ambient lighting).

Game no longer render true black color properly (my favourite which im using on my main) and got "Fifty shades of grey" instead during gameplay, depending on location and light source
Except when in character window or in total darkness, hair always shows washed out, without the right color.

Has someone already created bug report about this after the rework went live?
I already created bug report once during Benchmark V1, but it was closed and marked as "works as intended". Maybe it is worth to create bug report again now when it was pushed into live version of game and problem is still there.

*ye, here it is https://forum.square-enix.com/ffxiv/...in-DT-graphics ... sorted to "Working as intended" - yea, sure. Nothing has changed since the first benchmark

https://forum.square-enix.com/ffxiv/...e-been-changed here is another bug report on this - also guess what... "Working as intended" so i guess devs are satisfied with our washed out characters and dont planning to fix it in the near future

[Feathetaria]

The graphical Update is only good in the world itself on environment. I actually like how the world itself looks a lot and it runs well performance wise, however....

I desperately plea that they revert all the changes and textures/models of players and all housing furnishings that are indoor. PLEASE! I beg of you. Furnishings are making it so that places where me and friends used to have 60 fps we now have 15 fps. Builds that had certain lighting and colors / themes for interior housing design now are ruined. We built our housing builds based on how the lighting effects looked at the time and now this effectively pulls the rug out from under anyone that has a build they purchased or commissioned from a housing designer.

I don't even want the slot increase if me and my friends can't enjoy our time in the house anymore because something is killing our FPS. Maybe it's because you changed Luminous Wooden Loft to produce weird yellow FPS KILLING light that makes a once beautiful combo become ugly as heck. Combo being Luminous wooden loft above Eulmoran Marble Flooring. This combo once looked great but now it kills your FPS while looking horrible. WHY? Please just revert the graphics update for Interior Housing and Character Models. Miqo'te Female Face 3 Mouth 4 got her lips mutilated by botched plastic surgery and i might quit the game because of it unless a modder makes a mod for old character models and i start modding. I might get depressed and be forced to move on to a different game after thinking this was my home where i could stay and be happy the way things were.
</3

I love this game and i almost feel like someone is trying to make us all quit by changing the faces of our characters when we didn't ask for it. I don't like my miqo'te anymore. She's a fake. I want my character back.

Suggesting i try the free fantasia adds insult to injury. I guess I have to let Feathetaria die and rest in peace because this isn't my character anymore.

PLEASE just add some settings in graphics similar to "Movement Physics" and "Shadows" Sections that have Options such as Display or Hide, and Self / Others. You NEED to allow us to opt in or out of this graphical update. I hate my characters lips, now, and Fantasia won't fix it. Considering quitting unless a modder makes a mod for old models

Please allow us to opt in for the graphics update in settings for the world, the lighting, the character models and interior housing. We need 4 separate options.

Like this:


And this:

[Rikizza]

I feel like there's not enough complaints or changes regarding female Seeker Miqo'te face 1 but I've been really sad about her update. She is not as cute, innocent, and youthful as she used to be, and some colors just look off. I couldn't even replicate a similar neutral lighting with the new light features when using Gpose without too much glare. I really tried to like her new appearance since the benchmark released, but it feels like what makes her herself is gone. The topology has definitely changed regardless of lighting.



Her eyes constantly look blank in most lighting environments. Her nose and lips are far too round and look bigger than they should. Everything looks purposely exaggerated and rounder compared to the original soft, painted look, especially in her lips. Her lips look like fillers, with a darker and matte color. The blues in her hair are washed out and even though her hair is a little off-white, it looks completely gray in many menus such as Character, Portraits, Dyes, Try On, etc. She just looks mature and serious now.

The adventurer plate in 7.0 completely changed how she originally looked. Her lips are far too exaggerated. The lighting looked so bad that I tried to salvage it, and I ended up changing her facial expression to something more subtle.



Her Lodestone picture no longer looks as cute and now has an emotionless blank stare. She looks very different here, and I often use these pictures for easy access to reference photos.




I will be making more detailed comparisons and draw them over in the JP forums later and hope there will be more Seeker Miqo'te face 1 feedback. I wish I took more pictures of her before the graphics update considering that I started playing this game for less than a year. I've also been enjoying this game less because of her new appearance...

I agree and understand why you're sad.
I feel like most of these issues would maybe be resolved through giving us a long lashes addon option (for all races and clans obviously), and reversing the changes they did to the lips. I dont like the new lip shapes.

[Feathetaria]

Rug pulled out from underneath me as a housing designer and my Miqo'te got plastic surgery to her lips that I didn't ask for. I might quit soon. The 2 main reasons I play this game are housing design and my cute Miqo'te named Feathetaria. I was perfectly happy the way things were. Why have you done this to my character and housing builds? It's setting in that you don't care about our attachments to our characters that we've built up over years.

I feel betrayed and I think I might just finish DT and then quit the game and move on, like you obviously want me to. You're trying to chase me away. Thanks. You're succeeding.

This game was my home and it made me so happy to just bask in what was. But now it seems like those times are over. </3 ):

[Daralii]

I saw these screenshots online a few days ago and thought it would be worth sharing here. I thought the Ancients' eyes were deliberately made to glow?


Has anyone checked early ShB Ryne's eyes?

I wonder how badly it hit the ending cutscene for Elpis. One of the most striking visuals at the end was Venat's eyes being so bright when she was otherwise coated in blood.

[Moonfallen]

Went through all the expressions for emotes...they are absolutely horrendous now. They really look awful on certain faces/mouths now and I just can't. They definitely changed something in regards to the animations as well because they do not look the same as they did before 7.0. The mouth just looks incredibly off when emoting. I'm also getting terrible eye strain and issues to where I can no longer play the game as long. Waterfalls and other areas seem to flicker A LOT and no matter what I change for graphics settings nothing helps the eye strain/issues or the flickering. The graphics before caused issues in that I had a hard time seeing some things which caused me to turn the brightness and graphics down for the game and now it's even worse. I just can't get happy with the graphics or how my WoL looks now. A lot of the lighting is just off which makes my characters look even more different and ugly.

Also to add, it really feels like they did not update the lighting to the same lighting they updated in character creation. I agree with everyone else in that the environments look great, but the characters in game do not look the same or as good in any of the environment lighting. All the lighting in portraits, adventurer plates, character window and environments makes my characters look different than in character creation and often uglier depending on the lighting. When my character is in complete darkness and shadow, she looks like she does in character creation, but the second the light hits her she's unrecognizable and very plastic looking and doll like. I wonder if they still have the same lighting everywhere else that they did in the first benchmark before people provided feedback and they made changes.

[Aurumis]

I'm just really dissapointed with what they did with the male miqo'te face 4 eyes 3... it's horrible how much expression of the eyes they erased to become dead inside. I want them to fix it so badly...